Canadian parish defends right to flee without rector

http://geoconger.wordpress.com/2008/11/03/rebel-parish-defends-vote-to-leave-in-absence-of-its-rector-cen-103108-p-6/

[Conger] 4 Nov 2008--Charges leveled by the Diocese of Brandon that the secession of St. Bede’s parish in Manitoba was unlawful due to the absence of the rector from the parish meeting, are unfounded the Anglican Network in Canada (ANiC) tells The Church of England Newspaper.

On Oct 15 the congregation of St. Bede’s Church in Kinosota, Manitoba held a parish meeting under the presidency of its nsm curate, the Rev. Jona Weitzel, and voted 29 to 1 to quit the Diocese of Brandon for ANiC—the ecclesial “life boat” created by the Province of the Southern Cone for Canadian traditionalists pending the creation of a second province for the US and Canada.

Parish incumbent the Rev. Robert Bettson claimed the vote was unlawful telling the Anglican Journal, “I am the rector of the parish, and was not consulted about the meeting, which the canons of the diocese require.”

However, the congregation charged Mr. Bettson with having neglected the parish, thereby forfeiting his right to preside at parish meetings, claiming that in the year he had been rector, he had only been to the parish two times.