Blog Template Theology of the Body: Bishop Pope Popes: ECUSA Catholic Movement at an End

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Bishop Pope Popes: ECUSA Catholic Movement at an End

"The Catholic movement in The Episcopal Church has degenerated from a theological imperative into haberdashery, the retired Bishop of Fort Worth, the Rt. Rev. Clarence C. Pope, Jr., told a reporter for The Living Church, explaining his departure to the Roman Catholic Church.

On Aug. 6, Bishop Pope wrote to Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, resigning from the House of Bishops, and telephoned his successor, the Rt. Rev. Jack L. Iker, to announce his decision.

Bishop Pope said the Catholic movement, which has been part of “Anglicanism from the time of the Elizabethan Settlement, has gradually dissipated until we are left with lots of ‘catholic’ vestments worn in areas of The Episcopal Church where ‘low church’ used to be the order of the day.”

The movement has reached its end within the current institutional structures of The Episcopal Church, Bishop Pope asserted, and as a matter of conscience, it was time for him to go."

More from T19 here, if you have not been following this rather old news already.