Episcopal Church approves consecration of first lesbian bishop

By Martin Beckford, Religious Affairs Correspondent 301PM GMT eighteen March 2010

The Episcopal Church of the USA, the majority magnanimous range inside of the Anglican Communion, had been underneath vigour not to concede the Rev Mary Glasspool to turn Assistant Bishop of Los Angeles.

Its leaders had been warned privately by Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, not to take any decisions that would lower the predicament over sexuality inside of the worldwide church.

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But bishops and dioceses opposite the inhabitant church have right away authorized the eucharist of Miss Glasspool, after she was inaugurated last year, and a rite has been scheduled for May 15th. She and the Rev Diane Bruce will turn the initial women bishops in Los Angeles.

Miss Glasspool, a Canon in the Diocese of Maryland who has been with her womanlike partner given 1988, pronounced "I am additionally wakeful that not everybody rejoices in this choosing and consent, and will work, pray, and go on to magnify my own hands and heart to overpass those gaps, and make firm the holds of love between all people, in the Name of Jesus Christ."

The Rt Rev Jon Bruno, the Bishop of Los Angeles, pronounced the move showed there were no barriers inside of the Episcopal Church shaped on "gender and passionate orientation".

The Episcopal Church was the initial in the 80 million-strong Anglican Communion to challenge convention and prior agreements by comparison bishops and elect an plainly homosexual bishop, the Rt Rev Gene Robinson, in 2003.

Since afterwards most traditionalists in the Episcopal Church, who hold that homosexual acts go opposite Scripture, have turn aligned to regressive provinces in Africa and shaped a breakaway movement, triggering sour justice battles over the make use of of church buildings.

There have been calls for the Episcopal Church to be diminished from the Communion or criminialized from conferences over the actions, but it seems some-more expected that some-more approved Anglicans will simply dried it.

The Most Rev Peter Jensen, the Archbishop of Sydney, pronounced "With the choosing of the Reverend Mary Glasspool, a partnered lesbian, as a Bishop in Los Angeles in The Episcopal Church, the Anglican Communion reaches an additional wilful moment.

"It is right away positively transparent to all that the inhabitant Church itself has rigourously committed itself to a settlement of hold up that is discordant to Scripture. The choosing of Bishop Robinson in 2003 was not an misconception to be prepared in due course. It was a loyal denote of the heart of the Church and the citation of the affairs."

He claimed that traditionalists who have "patiently" remained inside of the Episcopal Church in new years are expected to "distance themselves from those who have selected to travel in the trail of disobedience".