Episcopal Diocese picks moderate bishop

A Cleveland priest had been in the running.

WHEELING, Ill. (AP) — A moderate church leader, the Rev. Jeffrey Lee, was elected the 12th Bishop of Chicago at the diocese convention Saturday, defeating seven other candidates, including an openly lesbian priest.

If the Rev. Tracey Lind, dean of Trinity Cathedral in Cleveland, had won, she would have become the second bishop living with a same-sex partner in the Episcopal Church.

In written remarks distributed to delegates before the vote, Lee said he wanted to keep a conversation going with conservatives on the issue of gay clergy. But he also said he has stood for “the full inclusion of gay and lesbian people in the church.”

“He would be perceived as someone who is qualified for the job, but not polarizing as other candidates might have been,” said the Rev. Canon Mike Stephenson of the Diocese of Chicago. “I think the vote says it’s a healthy diocese ... that it wants to be unified.”

Speaking to more than 500 delegates by telephone from Washington state, Lee said he was “honored and humbled” by his election.

Lee, the rector of St. Thomas Church in Medina, Wash., was elected on the second ballot, after winning the most votes on an earlier ballot without achieving a needed majority.

Lee’s church in Washington supports the inclusion of lesbians and gays, but also does not exclude members who disagree with that stance, Lee said in his written remarks.

“I make it clear that I don’t expect everyone to agree with me, but as a leader I have a duty to articulate my own understanding of what God may be calling the church to do,” Lee wrote of his position on welcoming gays to the church.

A consecration ceremony is planned for Feb. 2 in Chicago. Chicago Bishop William Persell plans to resign after his successor is consecrated.

New Hampshire Bishop V. Gene Robinson, who has a male partner, was consecrated in 2003, pushing the world Anglican Communion to the brink of schism.

A majority of the 77 million-member Anglican Communion, a loose-knit worldwide coalition of churches that align themselves with the Church of England, hold traditional views that homosexuality is condemned by Scripture, while a majority in the Episcopal Church do not.