Espiscopal Diocese searching for eighth bishop

From Fond du Lac -

The Episcopal Diocese of Fond du Lac is beginning the process of selecting a new bishop.

The Standing Committee of the Diocese of Fond du Lac will accept nominations to succeed retiring Bishop Russell Jacobus until May 15.

Any bishop, priest or deacon of the church is eligible for nomination.

Election of the bishop will be held on Oct. 19 within the context of the celebration of the Holy Eucharist at Fond du Lac’s Cathedral of St. Paul during the annual Convention of the Diocese. Ordination and consecration is scheduled April 26, 2014.

Jacobus has served as Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese, which covers northeast Wisconsin, since 1994. He will retire on Oct. 31 as bishop and from active ordained ministry at that time.


More here-


http://www.fdlreporter.com/article/20130425/FON0101/304250095/Espiscopal-Diocese-searching-eighth-bishop

Episcopal Bishop announces retirement

From Wisconsin-

The Right Rev. Russell Jacobus, Seventh Bishop of Fond du Lac, announced today his intention to resign effective Oct. 31, 2013.

He made the announcement at the conclusion of the 138th Annual Convention of the Diocese of Fond du Lac meeting in Manitowoc.

He has served as Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese which covers northeast Wisconsin since his election and consecration in 1994. He will also retire from active ordained ministry at that time.

In his comments to the Convention, Jacobus said "what a joy it is being the Bishop of the Diocese of Fond du Lac. As I tell many people – this is a wonderful Diocese."

In addition, Jacobus called for the election of a successor at the next annual Convention of the Diocese in October 2013, noting the business will be held during the day on Friday and election of the new Bishop on Saturday.

Plans are being made to hold this Convention in Fond du Lac so that the election can take place in St. Paul’s Cathedral within the context of the celebration of the Holy Eucharist.

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http://www.fdlreporter.com/article/20121029/FON01/310290109/Episcopal-Bishop-announces-retirement

Episcopal bishop withholds approval to form new diocese

From Wisconsin-

After consultation with diocesan leadership, the Rt. Rev. Russell E. Jacobus, bishop of Fond du Lac, has announced he will withhold his approval to form a new diocese.

Separate conventions of the Dioceses of Fond du Lac and Eau Claire, meeting in October, had mutually agreed to form a new diocese pending consent of the General Convention of the Episcopal Church.

Church law also requires approval by the bishop of each diocese.

The vote to junction in the Diocese of Fond du Lac is now in question.

At the request of members of the Standing Committee, the ballots were recounted and an irregularity discovered.

The clerical order of 32 "yes" votes and 28 "no" votes was confirmed.

However, the lay order of 53 "yes" votes and 51 "no" votes may have been in error.

The recount by two members of the Standing Committee — who voted on opposite sides — found a result of 51 "yes" and 53 "no" votes.

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http://www.fdlreporter.com/article/20111104/FON0101/111040417/Episcopal-bishop-withholds-approval-form-new-diocese

essay: Charles Chapman Grafton, Second Bishop of Fond du Lac

From The Living Church-

Charles Chapman Grafton was born on April 12, 1830, in Boston, Mass. He was an 1843 graduate of the Boston Latin School and earned a bachelor of laws degree from Harvard in 1853. During his adolescent and undergraduate years, Grafton was associated closely with the Tractarian beginnings of the Church of the Advent in its several earliest Boston locations. Persistent tradition says that the future bishop walked the nearly eight-mile roundtrip circuit to the Advent from his Harvard lodgings with great regularity.

After finishing his legal studies (and turning his back on a promising legal career) Grafton sought ordination under William Rollinson Whittingham (1805–79), an overlooked and gentle scholar who served as Bishop of Maryland for nearly four decades from 1840 to 1879. Whittingham ordained Grafton deacon in 1855 and priest in 1858; the young priest served in this Tractarian-friendly diocese at St. Paul’s Church, Baltimore, throughout the Civil War.

After his Maryland curacy, Grafton traveled to England to observe firsthand the changes taking place there in the wake of the Oxford Movement. His extended stay from 1865 to 1870 brought him into contact with a large number of Oxford Movement and Ritualist leaders, including E.B. Pusey, Alexander Penrose Forbes (“the Scottish Pusey”), T.T. Carter, H.P. Liddon, Richard Meux Benson, and John Mason Neale. He was also part of the beginnings of the Society of St. John the Evangelist — known more familiarly as the Cowley Fathers or SSJE — whose community life began in 1865 at Oxford.

More here-

http://www.livingchurch.org/news/news-updates/2010/8/6/essay-charles-chapman-grafton-second-bishop-of-fond-du-lac

New Episcopal Diocese plan includes FdL

Fond du Lac's Episcopal Diocese may become part of a bigger religious picture.

Discussions will continue this week at the general convention in Anaheim, Calif., about the possibility of joining together the dioceses of Eau Claire and Fond du Lac.

Fond du Lac Bishop Russell Jacobus said although the local membership may have concerns about the future of St. Paul's Cathedral if a new diocese is formed, the cathedral would remain a center of local religious activity.

"Both St. Paul's and Christ Church in Eau Claire are seats for the bishop's throne. I would not want to give up either," Jacobus said.

Eau Claire's diocese has been without a bishop since April 2008. Jacobus has performed some Episcopal functions in the diocese, including an ordination and confirmations.

"They could elect another bishop, which they can't afford, or junction with another diocese. They are in the process of discerning what to do," he said.

Jacobus, who is turning 65, said he is willing to see the process through before considering retirement. Episcopal Church bishops are required to retire at age 72.

A decision from Eau Claire's diocese is expected in November, when it meets for its convention.

In the fall of 2008, each diocesan convention passed resolutions seeking consent to begin the juncture process from its general convention, the necessary first step in the process. Jacobus said the union is called a juncture, not a merging of two dioceses, because both would cease to exist and a new diocese would be formed.

When both dioceses are ready to pursue substantive discussion about juncture, they will move in that direction. If those discussions yield a decision by both dioceses to become one new diocese, then consent of the general convention will be sought.

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http://www.fdlreporter.com/article/20090707/FON0101/907070332/1289/FON01/New-Episcopal-Diocese-plan-includes-FdL

EAU CLAIRE, FOND DU LAC: Dioceses call merger resolution 'premature'

From Episcopal Life Online-

The Episcopal dioceses of Eau Claire and Fond du Lac, located in the state of Wisconsin, will not ask the upcoming meeting of General Convention for permission to merge.
A June 26 news release from the two dioceses said that presenting the July 8-17 General Convention in Anaheim, California, with a resolution to merge, or junction, the two "would be premature."

Fond du Lac Bishop Russell Jacobus said June 29 in an interview with Episcopal News Service that Eau Claire "is not at the point of being able to do any serious discussions or planning."

Eau Claire has been without a bishop since Keith B. Whitmore left in April 2008 to become assisting bishop in the Diocese of Atlanta.

Representatives of the two dioceses, which encompass the northern two-thirds of the state, met in January 2008 "to discuss common mission opportunities because of similar ministry challenges, comparable demographics and shared heritage of the dioceses," according to the joint news release. The idea of junction came up during this meeting.

In the fall of 2008, both diocesan conventions passed resolutions seeking consent to begin the juncture process from General Convention. Those resolutions were passed "with an understanding that consent of General Convention was the necessary first step in the process of discernment," rather than the immediate creation of a new diocese, according to the release.

Research by the chairs of each diocese's constitution and canons committees showed that the dioceses' understanding of the junction process "contradicted the understanding of our conventions when they passed their enabling resolutions," the joint statement said.


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http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81803_111513_ENG_HTM.htm