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FLORIDA PRIEST FLEES ECUSA FOR AMIA: “Choose this day whom you will serve…”
by Frank D. Gough II
Beloved in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Most of you know how I have struggled over the past year with the actions of the General Convention of the Episcopal Church, and subsequent consecration of a non-celibate homosexual as bishop of New Hampshire.
My struggle arose not from the individual acts, but from the deeper moral and theological degradation in the Episcopal Church, of which they are but symbols. These actions ultimately represent nothing less than the abandonment of the authority of Holy Scripture, and the Apostolic faith and tradition, and the institution of a new doctrine, embodied by the leadership of this church at its highest level; a new doctrine inconsistent with the Word of God and the catholic faith.
To put it in the words of the first vow I took at ordination, they constitute the forsaking of “the doctrine, discipline, and worship of Christ, as this Church has received them”. I believe that for a priest to continue in the Episcopal Church is to accede to that new doctrine.
It has become very apparent that no reasoning, no pleading, no arguing, no praying and no action by the overwhelming majority of the Christian world will sway this church’s leadership from their chosen apostasy. It is an apostasy and a doctrine in which I believe no Christian should take part, if they would be faithful to God’s Word.
To stay in the midst of this or to go to a place of orthodoxy is a decision you must all still make. We must decide whether we shall spend our energies worshipping God and sharing the Gospel with others, or spend them apologizing for the truth, enmeshed in political conflict.
At my ordination, my first promise was “to be loyal to the doctrine, discipline and worship of Christ as this church has received them”. Later I declared that “I do solemnly engage to conform to the doctrine,
discipline, and worship of the Episcopal Church.” Sadly, those two are no longer the same.
After hearing Archbishop Kolini speak one day, the words of Joshua 24 came to mind, “Choose this day whom you will serve…”
For that reason I cannot much longer continue to serve as a Priest in the Episcopal Church, USA. I have therefore resigned as Vicar of Shepherd of the Hills Episcopal Church, in Lecanto, Florida.
Beginning October 10, 2004, I will be establishing public worship in the new Anglican Church of Our Redeemer in Citrus County, Florida, along with a large portion of the faithful from Shepherd of the Hills, including approximately half the Vestry. We will ask to be received into the Anglican Mission in America of the Anglican Province of Rwanda, to continue to serve God in His church, in the ministry to which we are called, as members of the Body of Christ.
“And we urge you, beloved, to admonish the idlers, encourage the faint hearted, help the weak, be patient with all of them. See that none of you repays evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to all. Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise the words of prophets, but test everything; hold fast to what is good; abstain from every form of evil. May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
In the Peace of Christ,
Rev. Frank D. Gough II is Vicar of Shepherd of the Hills Episcopal Church, in Lecanto, Florida.
