the Rev. Larry R. Benfield, 51, rector of Christ Church, Little Rock, and the Rev. Thomas E. Breidenthal, dean of Religious Life and of the Chapel at Princeton University in New Jersey were elected bishops of Arkansas and Southern Ohio, respectively on November 11.
The Rev. Larry Benfield elected in Arkansas
A policy allowing individual parishes to offer same-sex blessings, recently enunciated by Arkansas Episcopal Bishop Larry Maze, looks set to be overturned by the cleric elected to succeed him today, according to a source in the diocese.
Chosen as the 13th Bishop of Arkansas from a field of five candidates was the Rev. Larry R. Benfield, 51, rector of Christ Church, Little Rock. Reportedly, he plans to ask clergy in the diocese to refrain from performing same-sex blessings at this time. Benfield says he wants to talk about marriage and not sex.
The bishop-elect himself is unmarried and has confirmed that he is celibate, according to the diocesan source.
Interestingly, clergy gave Benfield a majority of their votes before the laity did. Benfield was elected on the seventh ballot, with 57 lay votes and 57 clergy votes, with 44 of 87 and 55 of 108, respectively, needed to win. The election took place at Trinity Cathedral in Little Rock.
Maze, 63, will retire at the end of the year. Assuming sufficient consents from the wider Episcopal Church are forthcoming, Benfield is scheduled to be consecrated January 6. Auburn Traycik, The Christian Challenge (Washington, DC)
The Rev. Thomas E. Breidenthal was elected November 11 as the 9th bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Ohio. Breidenthal, 55, dean of Religious Life and of the Chapel at Princeton University in New Jersey, was elected out of a field of seven nominees on the third ballot. Breidenthal was elected with 151 lay votes and 86 clergy votes. An election on that ballot required 137 votes out of a total of 272 cast in the lay order and 77 of 152 in the clergy order.
Breidenthal will succeed Bishop Herbert Thompson Jr., 72, who retired at the end of 2005, and died unexpectedly August 16 while traveling in Italy. Bishop Suffragan Kenneth Price Jr., 63, also a nominee, has been serving as bishop in Southern Ohio. The last diocesan bishop election in Southern Ohio was in 1988.
Ordained to the priesthood in 1982, Breidenthal will bring a strong intellectual and academic background to the diocese. Prior to his position as dean at Princeton, he served for nearly a decade as the John Henry Hobart Professor of Christian Ethics and Moral Theology at General Theological Seminary in New York City. He was a senior chaplain at Harvard School in California and an Episcopal Church Foundation Fellow in Oxford, England. He also has served in two parishes, both in Oregon.
A noted author, Breidenthal has written about the issues of same-gender unions, what constitutes a Christian household and how to raise ethical children. His books include Sacred Unions: A New Guide to Life-Long Commitment, published in 2006, and Christian Households: The Sanctification of Nearness, published in 1997.
A member of ARCUSA (Anglican-Roman Catholic Consultation in the USA), Breidenthal has served on the General Board of Examining Chaplains of the Episcopal Church from 1997-2001 and as director for the Center for Jewish-Christian Studies and Relations at General Theological Seminary from 1994-1997. He also was a member of the planning and facilitation team for the 1996 Conference on Third World Debt Relief sponsored by the Office of the U.N. Anglican Observer.
He is married to Margaret Ann Garner Breidenthal, and they have two daughters, Magdalene, 20, and Lucy, 17.
The Diocese of Southern Ohio represents more than 25,000 people in 40 counties. The Diocese of Southern Ohio hosted the Episcopal Church's 75th General Convention, which met June 13-21 in Columbus. The Rev. Mary Frances Schjonberg, Episcopal News Service
