{"id":11606,"date":"2012-07-11T15:20:19","date_gmt":"2012-07-11T19:20:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/?p=11606"},"modified":"2012-07-13T05:27:07","modified_gmt":"2012-07-13T09:27:07","slug":"why-is-the-episcopal-church-near-collapse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/07\/why-is-the-episcopal-church-near-collapse","title":{"rendered":"Why is the Episcopal Church near collapse?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The headlines coming out of the Episcopal Church\u2019s annual U.S. convention are stunning — endorsement of cross-dressing clergy, blessing same-sex marriage, the sale of their headquarters since they can’t afford to maintain it.<\/p>\n

The American branch of the Church of England, founded when the Vatican balked at permitting King Henry VIII to continue\u00a0annulling marriages to\u00a0any wife who failed to bear him sons, is in trouble.<\/p>\n

Somehow slipping out of the headlines is a harsh reality that the denomination\u00a0has been\u00a0deserted in droves by an angry or ambivalent membership. Six prominent bishops are ready to take their large dioceses out of the American church and align with conservative Anglican groups in Africa and South America.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Bonnie Anderson, President of the House of Deputies<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cAn interesting moment came at a press conference on Saturday,\u201d reports convention attendee David Virtue,<\/a> \u201cwhen I asked Bonnie Anderson, president of the House of Deputies, if she saw the irony in that the House of Deputies would like to see the Church Center at 815 2nd Avenue, New Yorik,\u00a0sold (it has a $37.5 million mortgage debt and needs $8.5 million to maintain yearly) while at the same time the national church spent $18 million litigating for properties, many of which will lie fallow at the end of the day.”<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
“Church Center,” the Episcopal headquarters, up for sale.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This is no longer George Washington\u2019s Episcopal Church \u2013 in 1776 the largest denomination\u00a0in the rebellious British colonies. Membership has dropped so dramatically that today there are 20 times more\u00a0Baptists than Episcopalians.<\/p>\n

U.S. Catholics out-number the Episcopal Church 33-to-1.\u00a0There are more Jews than Episcopalians.\u00a0Twice as many\u00a0Mormons. Even the little African Methodist Episcopal denomination has passed the Episcopalians.<\/p>\n

Among the old mainstream denominations reporting to the National Council of Churches, the Episcopal Church suffered the worst loss of membership from 1992-2002 — plunging from 3.4 million members to 2.3 million for a 32 percent loss. In the NCC\u2019s 2012 yearbook, the Episcopal Church admitted another 2.71 percent annual membership loss.<\/p>\n

Convention attendees were told that\u00a0they had\u00a0spent $18 million this year suing\u00a0their own local congregations — those\u00a0which have protested\u00a0the denomination’s\u00a0policies by trying to secede. The New York hierarchy has consistently won in court \u2013 asserting that the local members signed over their buildings decades ago. As a result, some of the largest Episcopal congregations in the United States have been forced to vacate their buildings and meet elsewhere.<\/p>\n

So now, convention delegates were told, the denomination is the proud owner of scores of empty buildings nationwide \u2013 and liable for their upkeep in a depressed real estate market where empty church buildings are less than prime property. It\u2019s the classic \u201cdog in a manger.\u201d The denomination has managed to keep the buildings \u2013 for which it has little use. However, they made their point \u2013 refusing to Continued on Page 2<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The headlines coming out of the Episcopal Church\u2019s annual U.S. convention are stunning — endorsement of cross-dressing clergy, blessing same-sex marriage, the sale of their headquarters since they can’t afford to maintain it. The American branch of the Church of England, founded when the Vatican balked at permitting King Henry VIII to continue\u00a0annulling marriages to\u00a0any…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":270,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[555],"class_list":["post-11606","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-episcopal-church"],"yoast_head":"\nWhy is the Episcopal Church near collapse?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2012\/07\/why-is-the-episcopal-church-near-collapse\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Why is the Episcopal Church near collapse?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The headlines coming out of the Episcopal Church\u2019s annual U.S. convention are stunning — endorsement of cross-dressing clergy, blessing same-sex marriage, the sale of their headquarters since they can’t afford to maintain it. 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