From Southern Virginia-
Retired Episcopal Bishop C. Charles Vache, who championed women's ordination in the Diocese of Southern Virginia after first opposing it, died Sunday at Westminster Canterbury retirement community. He was 83.
Vache led the diocese, which includes Hampton Roads, from 1978 to 1991. His funeral will be at 11 a.m. Friday at Trinity Episcopal Church in Portsmouth.
Vache was a priest at Trinity from 1957 to 1976. After retiring as bishop, he served in Jerusalem and also as interim priest at Church of the Good Shepherd in Norfolk. He lived in Portsmouth.
Clergy friends said that Vache, who was unmarried, was a scholarly, firm leader who was unafraid to make public his beliefs, even if unpopular.
When Vache was elected bishop, "he was adamantly opposed to the ordination of women, and a lot of people were upset," said the Rev. Richard Bridgford of Epiphany Episcopal Church in Norfolk. "He was seen as 'high church," that is, highly traditional.
But Vache soon surprised those critics. At a clergy conference, Bridgford recalled Vache saying, " On the ordination of women, I have been wrong, and all I can do is stand before you and acknowledge that. "
More here-
http://hamptonroads.com/2009/11/retired-episcopal-bishop-vache-dies-83
1 comment:
I'm sorry to say I knew this man, he was the rector of the church where I used to go. Charles Vache was a homosexual who didn't do a very good job of hiding it. He used to roll around on the floor with Navy boys at 340 Court Street. And he was supposed to be an Episcopal priest. This was a disgrace and it was hushed up at Trinity Church
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