The Rev. Mark Giroux serves Communion during Sunday worship at St. Mark's Episcopal Church, on River Road in Chenango Bridge.

As his congregation looks on, the Rev. Mark Giroux holds the Gospel Procession during Sunday worship at St. Mark's Episcopal Church.

Now, months after the General Convention voted to make the Rev. Gene Robinson the church's first homosexual bishop, those rectors say it's time for healing within the worldwide Anglican community.

"The way the decision was made was the way all our decisions are made in the Episcopal Church, in a democratic way," said the Rev. Mark Giroux, rector of St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Chenango Bridge.

"I'm personally supportive of the decision," he added. "I feel as though the arguments being used by those who oppose this decision are similar to those used against women, or going back earlier still, against those of color."

The church's top governing body consecrated Robinson last November as New Hampshire bishop. He is a divorced father who lives with a same-sex partner.

The action ignited a firestorm of controversy within the worldwide Anglican church, which has 77 million members. About 22,500 members are on the rolls at 100 Episcopal churches in the Central New York Diocese, which covers an area from Alexandria Bay near Canada, south to the New York-Pennsylvania border, east to Utica and west to Waterloo.

But the consecration isn't a volatile issue for some local Episcopalians.

"Some think this issue is critical, others think it's less critical," said Don Carlin, who has been a member of St. Andrew's in Vestal for 30 years. "For me right now, it's not critical."

Others said the decision just shows the Episcopal Church's diversity.

"About 13 years ago I made a conscious choice to begin attending the Episcopal Church," said Karen Van Kleeck, who goes to St. Mark's in Chenango Bridge and sits on its vestry.

"Part of my reasoning is that the belief system is based on tradition, Scripture and reason," she said. "People who are black, white, evangelistic, gay, straight -- we are all welcome in that church."

Van Kleeck said she has no problem with Robinson being a bishop. But she believes the church did things backward. By Anglican tradition, she said, an unmarried person who has a sexual partner wouldn't be welcome to live in the rectory and lead a parish.

"So until they change tradition, we're speaking out of both sides of our mouth," she said.

But some local rectors remain upset by Robinson's consecration.

The Rev. Anthony Seel resigned as dean of the 10-parish Binghamton district. He remains pastor of St. Andrew's, while the Very Rev. Noreen Suriner of Trinity Memorial Church in Binghamton now serves as dean.

And the Rev. Anne Kennedy, assistant rector at the Church of the Good Shepherd, has asked Central New York Diocese Bishop Gladstone B. "Skip" Adams III to stop paying her salary. Kennedy works with her husband, the Rev. Matthew Kennedy, who is Good Shepherd's rector. But she said the diocese paid her for work in the Binghamton parish and for other Episcopal ministries.

"Fundamentally, I resigned because of the bishop's position on this issue," Anne Kennedy said. "Part of my trouble with the bishop is he voted directly for (the consecration)."

Seel and Anne Kennedy have sent letters to Adams indicating their position. Neither the bishop nor his assistant were available for comment last week.

Local parishes of many denominations often show their dissent with higher church decisions by withholding the money they are expected to give for regional or national ministries.

Episcopal parishes are required to give an assessment and a pledge that represent about 15 percent of the church's income, Matthew Kennedy said.

He doesn't intend to pay Good Shepherd's full assessment to the diocese. Kennedy has given church members the choice of using their money to pay the assessment or keeping their offerings within the parish. Many have chosen to keep their pledges in the parish, he said.

Seel said St. Andrew's vestry voted to send a portion of its assessment to the diocese. But some parishioners indicated they want their offerings to remain in the parish, he said.

Seel and the Kennedys intend to stay in the Episcopal Church. But the rectors don't attend the monthly meeting of the Episcopal clergy group in the area.

St. Andrew's joined the American Anglican Council, which has declared itself in "impaired communion" -- a broken relationship -- with the Episcopal Church in the United States.

"(After) the bishop's vote at general convention, I felt like I didn't want to be getting money directly from him and I felt he didn't really want to be giving it to me," Anne Kennedy said. "I feel he has walked away from historic orthodox Christianity, and I find that really grievous."

Added Matthew Kennedy: "We have not made the decision to leave the institutional framework of the Episcopal Church or this diocese. We're not ready to leave the institution yet, but we feel the institution has left us."

He won't predict the denomination's future.

"We don't really know what the Episcopal Church, what the diocese will look like five years down the road," he said. "But it seems increasingly clear to me the two positions are irreconcilable."

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