Clergy Relay How Their Congregations Are Processing Life Under Coronavirus

From NPR-

When word came on Monday of the latest White House guidance - no gatherings of more than 10 people - that ruled out, among other things, church, synagogue, Friday prayers at mosques. This week marks the first that many services of all faiths are being canceled or shifting online. And this at the very moment when so many of us say we are in need of comfort and ritual and spiritual guidance. 

Well, to speak to that, we've invited three guests to join us. In Detroit, Imam Dawud Walid, welcome.
DAWUD WALID: Thank you very much.

KELLY: In Denver, we're joined by Episcopal Bishop Dan Edwards. Welcome, Bishop Edwards.
And from Los Angeles, Rabbi Susan Goldberg. Hi there. Welcome.

SUSAN GOLDBERG: Thank you.

More here-

https://www.npr.org/transcripts/819186556

Priest makes Steamboat a stop on his 6 Million Steps for Kids journey

From Colorado-

Near the summit of Rabbit Ears Pass, the Rev. Peter Munson looked energized as he made his way along the seeming endless expanse of pavement marking a path he has been called to follow.

“It wasn’t audible words certainly,” Munson said Tuesday from Steamboat Springs where he was slated to speak to the public at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church that night. “What I heard was to walk across the country and to speak and to write as I go.”

That calling, which came more than 10 years ago, is the reason the 62-year-old Episcopalian priest has worked hard to overcome many hurdles, it’s the reason he is making the 3,600-mile journey from Charleston, South Carolina, to San Francisco, and it’s the reason he is asking people to donate to his nonprofit, 6 Million Steps for Kids.

More here-

https://www.steamboatpilot.com/news/priest-makes-steamboat-a-stop-on-his-6-million-steps-for-kids-journey/

Faith-based alliance seeks temporary shelters for homeless

From Colorado-

A Durango faith-based alliance is working to set up temporary day and night shelters to offer homeless residents a refuge next winter.

The Neighbors in Need Alliance plans to set up the shelters by November, said Caroline Kinser, an organizer with the group. The alliance was established this spring by volunteers from St. Mark’s Episcopal Church who are working with about 20 other churches on the effort. 

The need for the shelters “had been simmering for a long time,” Kinser said.

The group came together after a harsh winter left some homeless residents camping in several feet of snow. The shelters would be open November through March and accept homeless residents with substance addictions, she said.

More here-

https://the-journal.com/articles/144724-faithbased-alliance-seeks-temporary-shelters-for-homeless

'God has been calling me here:' First female, black Episcopal bishop in Colorado talks her past and the church's future

From Colorado-

For the first time in history, the Episcopal Church in Colorado will be led by an African American woman.

On Saturday, the church hosted the ordination and consecration of Kym Lucas as its 11th bishop. She is both the church's first woman bishop and first black bishop.  

Before being elected to the position last October, Lucas served as rector of St. Margaret's Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C. 

9NEWS sat down with Lucas to learn more about her history with the Episcopal Church, the challenges ahead, and the congregation she now leads.

(Editor's note: Responses have been edited for context and clarity.) 

9NEWS: Where did your journey with the Episcopal Church begin?

Lucas: I am actually what they call a near-cradle Episcopalian. My godmother had me baptized in the church when I was two years old. So, I started my spiritual journey in the Episcopal church. She was a member of what our church calls the Altar Guild. That is the group that sets the table and prepares the space for worship every Sunday. I remember my early childhood, spending early Sunday mornings in church while back then the Altar Guild ladies did their work. I just got to hang out in church which was a pretty cool thing.

More here-

https://www.9news.com/article/news/local/next/god-has-been-calling-me-here-first-female-black-episcopal-bishop-in-colorado-talks-her-past-and-the-churchs-future/73-54229b30-b417-49e2-a790-695d4c6da4b4

Faith-based groups organize to tackle homelessness in Durango

From Colorado-

A fledgling effort to shelter homeless residents in Durango has attracted strong interest from area churches.

A group of volunteers from St. Mark’s Episcopal Church is organizing the effort to determine how faith-based communities could shelter the homeless while they search for long-term housing, said Caroline Kinser with St. Mark’s Neighbors in Need Taskforce. 

A shelter or dispersed shelters could keep homeless residents out of the coldest weather and inside when fire danger is peaking, church representatives said last week at the group’s first meeting.

The group is not looking to duplicate the Durango Community Shelter operated by the Volunteers of America or housing offered by any other nonprofit.

More here-

https://durangoherald.com/articles/271590-faithbased-groups-organize-to-tackle-homelessness-in-durango

Episcopal Church in Colorado elects first African American woman bishop in its history

From Colorado-

Growing up between two military bases in North Carolina, the Rev. Kimberly Lucas  learned early the values and challenges of diversity. She learned how to garden from a Japanese neighbor and discovered treasures at the local Mexican-Thai bodega.

When she married her husband, Mark, the two had to navigate what it meant to be a multi-racial family in the United States.

For Lucas, diversity has always been an integral part of her past. Now, she plans to brings that perspective to parishioners across Colorado.

On Saturday, Lucas was chosen as the 11th bishop of the Episcopal Church in Colorado, becoming the church’s first woman and first African-American bishop in state history.

More here-

https://www.denverpost.com/2018/10/30/episcopal-church-colorado-new-bishop/

Kym Lucas elected bishop of Episcopal Church in Colorado

From Colorado-

The Rev. Kimberly (Kym) Lucas was chosen as the 11th Bishop of the Episcopal Church in Colorado during its 131st Annual Convention held at Saint John’s Cathedral in Denver on Oct. 27.

One of two candidates, Lucas was elected on the fourth ballot, receiving 124 of 173 clergy votes and 237 of 306 lay votes. In order to be elected, a candidate needed to receive two-thirds votes from both the clergy and the lay delegates, voting separately as orders in the same balloting round. The second ballot was invalid due to a reporting error after the announcement of the first ballot. The other candidate was The Rev. Ruth Woodliff-Stanley, canon to the ordinary of the Episcopal Church in Colorado.

More here-

https://www.episcopalnewsservice.org/2018/10/29/kym-lucas-elected-bishop-of-episcopal-church-in-colorado/

Bp. Prior on Canon Pipkin’s Case

From The Living Church-

The Rt. Rev. Brian N. Prior, Bishop of the Episcopal Church in Minnesota, writes to his diocese about accusations brought against the Rev. Canon Michael Pipkin:

I write this day asking for your prayers.

Every person in discernment for a possible call to the episcopate encounters a deep vulnerability — not only for the potential candidate, but for their family as well.

The Episcopal Church in Colorado has removed your Missioner for Missional Management, Michael Pipkin, from consideration in their bishop search.

As such, I ask for your prayers for the entire Pipkin family, as well as the Episcopal Church in Colorado, as they continue to discern whom God is calling to be their next bishop.

Once I became aware that concerns were raised about Michael, which led to his removal, I gathered together the President of the Standing Committee, Tom Cook, the Chair of the Personnel Committee, Judy Shoulak and the Chancellor for ECMN, Doug Franzen. This group counseled that we seek to gather all relevant material regarding these concerns in order to conduct our own independent inquiry.

More here-

https://livingchurch.org/2018/09/07/bp-prior-on-canon-pipkins-case/

Diocese of Colorado drops candidate from bishop search process

From Colorado-

The Standing Committee of the Diocese of Colorado on Sept. 6 released the following letter regarding the search process for the diocese’s next bishop diocesan.

Dear People of God in The Episcopal Church in Colorado:

In the last several days, we have received reports of serious personal, professional, and vocational issues involving The Reverend Canon Michael Pipkin. Because we recognize that these complaints are serious, and because they cannot be resolved prior to our October 27 election, the Standing Committee voted unanimously on August 29 to remove him from consideration in the upcoming election for the 11th Bishop of Colorado.

As these changes in our discernment and election process have unfolded, we have been in close communication with Canon Pipkin’s bishop as well as with Bishop Todd Ousley, who works for the Presiding Bishop and provides oversight and guidance for all episcopal elections. These allegations have been referred to them for further action under the provision of The Episcopal Church’s canons.

More here-

https://www.episcopalchurch.org/library/article/diocese-colorado-drops-candidate-bishop-search-process

Denver’s century-old St. John’s Cathedral installs new tech to help congregants with hearing loss

From Denver-

The clergy at St. John’s Cathedral in downtown Denver don’t want anyone to miss out on a sermon.

For that reason, the church is taking steps to make it easier for congregants with hearing loss to listen by purchasing a new system to help reduce background noise in the 107-year-old cathedral, including echos and organ notes that waft through the church.

St. John’s, located at 1350 Washington St., had the new hearing loop installed this week by Denver-based Assist2Hear. The system works by transmitting an audio signal to hearing aids or headset receivers.

“The hearing loop is to serve a portion of our congregation that has trouble hearing the sermons,” said Seth Reese, communications director for St. John’s.

More here-

https://www.denverpost.com/2018/08/30/st-johns-cathedral-hearing-loop/

Denver Calls New Dean

From The Living Church-

St. John’s Cathedral in Denver has called the Rev. Richard Lawson as its 10th dean. Lawson will begin his work July 10.

A native of Guntersville, Alabama, Lawson is a graduate of Auburn University, General Theological Seminary, and the University of the South’s School of Theology. He has served as rector of Grace-St. Luke’s Church and School, Memphis, since May 2010.

He has been published in Sewanee Theological Review, and his article “Mysticism and Pragmatism in Modern Religious Architecture” will be published in the Spring 2017 issue of The Anglican Theological Review. His essay “Three Sketches of Symbols and Sacraments” will appear in Reasonable Radical? Reading the Writings of Martyn Percy (edited by Ian Markham and Joshua Daniel).

More here-

http://livingchurch.org/new-dean-denver?platform=hootsuite

Judge Neil Gorsuch's Anglicanism is still a mystery that journalists need to solve

From Get Religion-

It’s been about three weeks since Neil Gorsuch has been nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court and we’re no closer to figuring out what makes him tick, spiritually. However, there have been a few jabs at trying to gauge the spiritual temperature of his family's parish in downtown Boulder, Colo..

The most aggressive reporting has been by a British outlet, the Daily Mail, whose reporters have shown up at Gorsuch’s parish, St. John’s Episcopal. The Mail has also been sniffing about Oxford University (pictured above), which is where Gorsuch apparently became an Anglican during his studies there. It was also where he met his future wife Marie Louise. Her family is Anglican and the Mail explains that all here and here.

Very clever of them to nail down his wife’s British background and that of her family and to have interviewed Gorsuch’s stepmother in Denver.

They too see a dissonance in Gorsuch’s purported conservative views and the church he attends:.

More here-

https://www.getreligion.org/getreligion/2017/2/22/judge-neil-gorsuchs-anglicanism-is-still-a-mystery-that-journalists-need-to-solve

Is Gorsuch a secret liberal? Trump, GOP have reason to wonder.

From The Hill-

Gorsuch lives in the ultra-liberal college town of Boulder, Colorado.  He also teaches at the University of Colorado’s law school, also a progressive bastion, and is supported in his quest for the Supreme Court by most of the faculty and students there.

Gorsuch is also a member of the St. John’s Episcopal Church in Boulder.  The Episcopal Church has embraced very liberal positions on a variety of issues, including performing same-sex commitment ceremonies since the 1980s and eventually same-sex marriages. At church, he often hears a very liberal point of view. 

Mike Orr, a spokesman for the Episcopal Church in Colorado, described Gorsuch’s church, as a congregation that “does a lot of social justice and advocacy.” He said, “It’s a healthy and vibrant congregation. It’s very diverse in its congregants as well as its ministry.”

More here-

https://origin-nyi.thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/the-judiciary/318565-could-court-pick-gorsuch-be-a-crypto-liberal-conservatives

Meet Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch's ultra-liberal church

From The Daily Mail (UK)

He has been described as 'the heir to Scalia' and is a religious conservative whose appointment to the Supreme Court was greeted with jubilation on the pro-gun, anti-abortion Right.

But DailyMail.com can reveal that Neil Gorsuch's own church, in Boulder, Colorado, is a hotbed of liberal thinking – and is led by a pastor who proudly attended the anti-Trump Women's March in Denver the day after the President's inauguration.

Another member of the clergy at St. John's Episcopal Church is outspoken about the need for gun control, and helped organize opposition to a gun shop giveaway of high-capacity magazines in the run-up to a 2013 law that banned them from the state of Colorado.

More here-

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4196096/Trump-s-Supreme-Court-pick-belongs-liberal-church.html

Neil Gorsuch belongs to a notably liberal church — and would be the first Protestant on the Court in years

From The Washington Post-

The day after Donald Trump was elected president, the Rev. Susan Springer wrote to her congregation that they should strive to behave as Godly people who spread hope even though “the world is clasping its head in its hands and crying out in fear.”

That Sunday, one of the ushers at Springer’s church was Neil Gorsuch — soon to become President Trump’s nominee for the open spot on the Supreme Court.

Gorsuch has staked his own conservative positions on numerous issues, including topics of religious concern: In cases involving the art supply chain Hobby Lobby and the Catholic order Little Sisters of the Poor, both of which eventually reached the Supreme Court, Gorsuch ruled in favor of religious conservatives who said the Affordable Care Act infringed on their religious freedom to not pay for contraception.

More here-

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2017/02/01/neil-gorsuch-belongs-to-a-notably-liberal-church-and-would-be-the-first-protestant-on-the-court-in-years/?utm_term=.f8918f198005

Episcopal Church services resurrected in Telluride

From Colorado-

The Episcopal Church has a long-standing presence in Telluride, dating back to before the turn of the century when Coffee Montgomery “Parson” Hoge traveled by horseback through the San Juans from St. Mark’s parish in Durango, via Mancos and Rico, to visit St. Michael’s parish in Telluride.  

Episcopal services will begin again this Sunday at St. Patrick’s Church at 6:30 p.m. Services will sometimes consist of evening prayer; occasionally communion will be offered.

Dave Lamb, who has lived in this region for 25 years and owns Telluride Music on Colorado Avenue, has conducted extensive historical research on regional churches and is currently involved with a major archival project at St. Mark’s in Durango. St. Mark’s, St. John’s in Ouray and St. Michael’s in Telluride were all established in the 1870s and 1880s. St. Michael’s parish, Lamb believes, was located on North Pine Street. 

When Lamb and his wife, Karen, moved to Telluride in 1992, they tried to re-establish St. Michael’s Episcopal Church.  

More here-

http://www.telluridenews.com/news/article_0d654fa6-e4a7-11e6-ac6a-fb50ef480a05.html

Episcopal church in Breckenridge does weekly prayer against gun violence

From Colorado-

Every Wednesday until Nov. 2, St. John the Baptist Episcopal Church in Breckenridge will fill the air with the crisp peal of 49 rings from its church bells.

St. John is joining several congregations from the Diocese of Colorado in the project, which is meant to draw people’s attention to gun violence happening throughout the United States and across the world. Each of the 49 rings are meant to symbolize one person who died in the June 12 attack at a nightclub in Orlando.

Rev. Robert Franken from St. John said that traditionally the bells have drawn attention to important things happening within the community. The bells ring at 1 p.m. The church chose that time in the hopes that people would hear it on the way back from lunch hour.

More here-

http://www.summitdaily.com/news/local/episcopal-church-in-breckenridge-does-weekly-prayer-against-gun-violence/

Police arrest man suspected of making threats against Denver's St John's Episcopal Cathedral Read more: Police arrest man suspected of making threats against Denver's St John's Episcopal Cathedral

From Denver-

Worship services and other events St. John's Episcopal Cathedral in Capitol Hill have resumed after the Thursday arrest of a man who police said threatened to kill priests and bishops there.

Dominique Richard, 60, also threatened to kill a woman and desecrate the altar at St. Andrew's Episcopal Church at East 20th Avenue and Glenarm Place, according to his arrest affidavit. Richard was jailed on $1,000 bond and faces menacing charges.

Richard on Tuesday called a woman who had been dispersing his Social Security payments and left her voicemail messages. When she called him back, he told her, "It doesn't matter, I'm going to get a gun and come kill you, and I'm killing any priest and bishop from the Episcopal Church, and I am going to desecrate the altar at St. Andrews," according to the affidavit.
More here-

http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_24522721/man-arrested-threats-at-denvers-st-johns-episcopal

Colorado Floods: Churches are drying out, finding ways to help

From ENS-

Devastating floods up and down Colorado’s Front Range have impacted several communities and Episcopal churches. As those churches – none of which suffered catastrophic damage – dry out, they are making contact with parishioners, and will be working to help in their communities in days to come.

The staff in the [Diocese of Colorado] Office of the Bishop has been contacting clergy in affected areas, and has determined they are all safe and accounted for, although some of them have experienced some personal property damage and loss. Clergy and other leaders continue to get in touch with their parishioners to determine their safety and immediate needs. In some places this has been much more difficult than in others. Based on initial assessments, while many church buildings have had some flooding damage, none has catastrophic damage.

Several churches have already begun to reach out to those least likely have personal resources to deal with the disaster. St. Aidan’s in Boulder has already been working through their existing partnership with Boulder Outreach for Homeless Overflow to provide overnight shelter for the homeless in these adverse conditions. The St. Aidan’s community is also reaching out through their Canterbury ministry to University of Colorado students who suffered losses.

More here-

http://episcopaldigitalnetwork.com/ens/2013/09/18/colorado-floods-churches-are-drying-out-finding-ways-to-help/

Rector of burned Denver church wrestles with issues of urban homeless

From Denver-

Each of the seven stained-glass windows on the south side of the Church of the Ascension represents one of the holy sacraments — baptism, communion, confession, matrimony, confirmation, ordination and anointing of the sick.
The only window that shattered when the landmark Denver church caught fire early Monday morning was the one that symbolized the ordination of the priesthood.

"It was a blow to my morale," said the Rev. Lucas Grubbs, as he stood in the still smoky-smelling sanctuary Thursday afternoon. "It pretty much summed up my week."

Grubbs has been in action since he was awakened by the sound of sirens at 3 a.m. and ran outside to find his church in flames. He's been talking with fire investigators,insurance agents and stained-glass restoration companies.

He said he also is wrestling with his "own demons," pondering an incident the afternoon before the fire, when he asked a homeless man to move out of the bushes next to the church.

Like the leaders of many urban parishes, Grubbs struggles to balance Christian moral teachings about serving the poor with the need to keep people safe, especially the 50 children, ages 3 to 5, who attend Ascension's preschool at the corner of East Sixth Avenue and Gilpin Street.

Grubbs was hired as rector of the 107-year-old Church of the Ascension less than a year ago. The small, close-knit parish cherishes its people and its history. The church started as a Sunday school in the Capitol Hill home of Thomas Ward, a lawyer who was friends with Theodore Roosevelt. Many prominent citizens integral to the development of Denver have been members. The funeral of Doud Eisenhower, the 3-year-old son of Dwight and Mamie Eisenhower, was held there, even though Mamie's family attended Corona Presbyterian Church a few blocks away.

More here-


http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_23275931/rector-burned-denver-church-wrestles-issues-urban-homeless