Episcopal parish in Springs invited to join breakaway group

Jean Torkelson, Rocky Mountain News

Thursday, April 19, 2007

An Anglican bishop on Wednesday night made the case to members of an embattled Colorado Springs parish on why they should secede from the Episcopal Church.

"Frankly, the decision you're facing is the biggest decision your church will ever make. You should make it together," Bishop Martyn Minns told about 150 parishioners at Grace and St. Stephen's Church.

The parish's rector, the Rev. Don Armstrong, is being threatened by the Episcopal Diocese of Colorado with civil and criminal lawsuits involving allegations that he misused hundreds of thousands of dollars of church money. Armstrong says the diocese is persecuting him for his conservative views.

Last month, as his legal woes mounted, Armstrong and a majority of the church vestry, or board of directors, seceded from the Episcopal Church in the U.S. to join Minns and 35 other congregations in the Convocation of Anglicans in North America.

Minns, who is based in Virginia, represents a conservative branch of the worldwide Anglican Communion, which believes the Episcopal Church has abandoned scriptural authority and traditional doctrines on sexuality.

Armstrong hopes to persuade a majority of his parish's 1,500 to 2,000 members to join CANA in a vote May 20.

Minns and CANA are under the authority of the Anglican province of Nigeria, which agreed to sponsor conservative churches fleeing the Episcopal Church.

Minns told parishioners he believes CANA represents "a good way forward" at a time when the Anglican Communion itself appears to be fracturing. Most of the 38 Anglican provinces worldwide object to the U.S. church's stand in favor of gay clergy and same-sex blessings.

But the U.S. Episcopal Church refuses to back down.

"We're a mess," Minns said in an earlier interview, referring to a likely schism. "Many things are incoherent."

Minns and 11 Virginia churches are embroiled in multiple lawsuits with their own Episcopal diocese and the Episcopal Church USA over church property. But he said he believes the Armstrong case is the only one in which the Episcopal hierarchy is accusing a seceding pastor of personal wrongdoing.

Besides talking to parishioners, Minns said he is in Colorado to support Armstrong and his wife, Jessie, who have been his friends for 30 years. "I'm here because I care," he said.

torkelsonj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5055