The Economist: Wars of religion
Dec 19th 2006
WASHINGTON, DC
From The Economist print edition

Schism in Virginia

TIME was when liberal Episcopalians were all for listening to the voices of the developing world while their conservative brethren were not so sure. No longer. The voices of the third world have spoken loudly on the vexed issues of ordaining women and gays and blessing same-sex unions—they are against the lot—and the roles have been reversed.

On December 17th eight Episcopal parishes in Virginia announced that their members had voted, mostly overwhelmingly, to break with America's Episcopal Church over the ordination of gays and women. The church hierarchy is strongly in favour of both these: in 2003 it allowed the ordination of Gene Robinson, who lives with his male partner, as bishop of New Hampshire. The conservatives loathed that, and they dislike the leadership of the presiding American bishop, Katharine Jefferts Schori.

The schismatic parishes included two of the oldest and richest in the country—Truro Church in Fairfax and The Falls Church in the town of that name—which occupy property worth a combined $25m. The Falls Church once numbered George Washington among its vestrymen. It is now the church-of-choice to Washington's conservative power elite, including Michael Gerson, George Bush's former speechwriter, Porter Goss, a former head of the CIA, and Fred Barnes, the executive editor of the Weekly Standard. the rest