It's an unexpected mingling of Christian traditions, said the Rev. Jeff Black, whose flock voted to leave the denomination because members believed Episcopal leadership had abandoned scriptural authority. At issue were the ordination of a noncelibate gay bishop and blessing rites for same-sex unions.

Officials with the Episcopal Diocese of Texas declined to comment on St. Barnabas' new affiliation.

Black and St. William's pastor, the Rev. Joel McNeil, found that they shared the same biblical view of homosexuality.

McNeil said when he heard about St. Barnabas last year, he was "impressed with the integrity of the pastor and the congregation" for determining they could not in good conscience remain in the Episcopal Church.

"There's a lot of pressure, it seems, to make the church like the world rather than evangelizing the world," McNeil said. "I admire that they have resisted those pressures and have decided to maintain the traditional Christian belief."

Word of McNeil's support traveled to Black via a St. William's parishioner visiting St. Barnabas as a photo copier salesman.

The two priests started talking and discovered they could help each other.

Founded in 1997, St. Barnabas congregants had been worshipping in rented North Austin office space and wanted a permanent home. St. William's was building a church near its present location on McNeil Road and needed to sell a 6 1/2-acre parcel and parish center.

And it just so happened that Black's mother was the librarian at McNeil's junior high school in Rome, N.Y., in the early 1970s.

Meanwhile, the roughly 250 St. Barnabas members had decided they wanted to officially join the Chicago-based Evangelical Covenant Church, an ecumenical fellowship of churches founded by Swedish immigrants in 1885, after several months of an informal association.

The covenant offered to buy the St. William's property and closed on the $1.7 million sale with the Catholic Diocese on Friday. Black said his congregation expects to invest $400,000 in improvements to the property, including an additional building for offices and classrooms.

The two congregations will share the parish center over the next year until St. William's facility is complete.

The arrangement is a "wonderful illustration of the body of Christ doing good work from a business perspective while really having great charity and respect from a kingdom perspective," said the Rev. Garth Bolinder, superintendent of the covenant's Midsouth Conference.

Bolinder was in Austin this week to finalize the sale with the diocese. The covenant will lease the property to St. Barnabas until the church officially becomes a member of the fellowship later this year.

Black said his church could have joined other American Anglican groups that opposed Episcopal Church decisions, but he couldn't find one that accepted female clergy. The covenant, which includes about 700congregations, promotes women in leadership and encouraged St. Barnabas to maintain its Anglican heritage.

Black said he and his church members agree with the key faith principles upheld by the covenant, including the authority of scripture, the unity of the body of Christ and a conscious dependence on the holy spirit.

St. Barnabas and the covenant were a theological fit. Now, Black said, "the big thing for us is we have a future."

END