South Carolina to begin search for 15th bishop

Posted Jan 28, 2020

[Diocese of South Carolina] In a letter to the members of the diocese, the Rev.  Caleb J. Lee, as president of the diocese’s standing committee, recently announced that the standing committee has unanimously voted to move forward with the process that will lead to the election and consecration of the 15th bishop of the Diocese of South Carolina, the first diocesan bishop of the historic diocese since the 14th bishop renounced his ordained ministry and left The Episcopal Church in 2012.  Read the letter at this link.

As noted by Lee, “This is a very exciting time for our diocese,” as he laid out the timeline whereby the standing committee hopes the diocese will be able to elect a new bishop at the 230th Annual Convention in November 2020. After that, following the canons of The Episcopal Church, 120 days are given to allow for a majority of the standing committees representing dioceses of The Episcopal Church throughout the country to consent to the election. “We expect the consecration of our new bishop to occur in the late spring or early summer of 2021,” said Lee.

According to the letter, the standing committee has begun a conversation with a search consultant, the Rev. Richard Callaway, the former canon to the ordinary of the Diocese of Atlanta, who has extensive experience in the church and as a consultant to various dioceses that have been through similar search processes.

A search committee composed of diocesan clergy and lay members has been named by the standing committee and is scheduled to meet with Callaway on Jan. 30 to formally begin the search. The Rev. Philip Linder, priest-in-charge at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Charleston, has been named chair of the search committee.

Since 2012, the Diocese of South Carolina, also known as The Episcopal Church in South Carolina, has been led by two provisional bishops – the Rt. Rev. Charles G. vonRosenberg from 2013-2016 and the Rt. Rev. Gladstone B. “Skip” Adams III from 2016-2019. Upon Adams’ retirement in December 2019, it was announced that the Rt. Rev. Henry N. Parsley Jr. would join the diocese as visiting bishop. See the announcement at this link.

A native son of the Lowcountry of South Carolina, Parsley, bishop coadjutor and diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Alabama from 1996-2012, spent many of his early years of ordained ministry serving in the Diocese of South Carolina at St. Philip’s, Charleston, All Saints, Florence, and St. Paul’s, Summerville.


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