S.C. Distances Itself from Episcopal Bodies

http://www.livingchurch.org/news/news-updates/2009/10/24/sc-distances-itself-from-episcopal-bodies

[The Living Church[ 26 Oct 2009--The voting margins were huge on Saturday as a special convention of the Diocese of South Carolina approved four resolutions [PDF] supported by the diocesan bishop, the Rt. Rev. Mark Joseph Lawrence.

A fifth resolution addressed diocesan convictions on sexuality, without explicit implications for the diocese’s relations with the Episcopal Church.

As Bishop Lawrence urged approval of the resolutions, he acknowledged criticisms that they have attracted: “The resolutions that are before us, while seeming tepid to some, have to others the feel of haste, even imprudence.”

Those disagreements are clear even within the diocese. Only about six miles from the convention’s meeting site, Christ Church in Mt. Pleasant, is St. Andrew’s Church, which already has begun a 40 Days of Discernment program to decide whether it will separate from the Episcopal Church and, by extension, from the diocese.

In mid-September, the Episcopal Forum of South Carolina said the diocese “teeters on the edge of schism” from the Episcopal Church.