The Lead

Bishop Bennison says in spite of a resolution from the House of Bishops calling for his resignation, he won't resign:

[My peers in the House of Bishops] have no cause to be worried. I am, and have always been, innocent of the charges against me. And now the Court of Review of the Episcopal Church has reversed the erroneous decision of the Trial Court, and I have been restored to my position as Bishop of Pennsylvania. ... I hope that the suffering I have endured during the past three years has strengthened me and will enable me to work for reconciliation within the Diocese.

He omits the Court of Review's finding upholding one count, but vacating it because the statute of limitations had expired. Read his statement here, and the ENS report here.

As the House of Bishops resolution had noted,

[T]he Court of Review reversed one count, upheld one count, but vacated the sentence because the statute of limitations had expired. We respect the decision of the Court of Review and we share their disappointment and find the ultimate resolution of this matter unsatisfactory and morally repugnant. The wholly inadequate response of our brother bishop to the sexual assault upon a minor is an inexcusable violation of his ordination vows.

The HOB resolution went on to quote the Court of Review:

The tragedy of this conduct unbecoming a member of the clergy is exacerbated by the fact that, during the trial of the case, Appellant testified that, upon reflection on his failure to act, he concludes that his actions were “just about right.” They were not just about right. They were totally wrong. Appellant’s testimony on this subject revealed impaired judgment with regard to the conduct that is the subject of the First Offence and that is clearly and unequivocally conduct unbecoming a member of the clergy.

More from Bishop Dan Edwards:

The most agonizing issue was a Resolution calling for the resignation of the Bishop of Pennsylvania who was convicted of conduct unbecoming a bishop by the Ecclesiastical Trial court but his deposition was set aside by the Appeals Court because the case was barred by the Statute of Limitations. The facts surrounding the brining of the case based on events that happened so long back made it a complicated thing. The political situation in Pennsylvania is a tangle. But the strong majority of bishops felt this action was required for the good of the church and to make clear that we have zero tolerance for some kinds of misconduct. It had to do with the bishop’s failure to respond adequately to a report of sexual abuse by a youth minister when the bishop was a parish priest. The youth minister was his brother. Our resolution has no legal force. It just says what we think. We had no authority to do anything more.

Comments (9)

Again with the suffering!

Posted by Susan Hedges | September 23, 2010 10:36 AM

How sad and incredibly selfish. All for some retirement money huh? May God have mercy on him.

Posted by Richard Jackson | September 23, 2010 10:36 AM

So how do we go about making sure that this can't happen in the future? Is doing away with the ridiculous statute of limitations for those who are accomplices to sexual misconduct after the fact enough, or do we need some way to remove sitting bishops for being incompetent and scandalous?

Bill Dilworth

Posted by billydinpvd | September 23, 2010 12:22 PM

The all-about-me obliviousness of the Bennison note above is beyond astonishing -- and more than a little scary.
Katie Sherrod
Fort Worth

Posted by www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawnfT_RtGoIo1 | September 23, 2010 12:27 PM

Bill - the way to make sure is to change the canons and make them consistent for bishops with the ones for clergy and to remove the statute of limitations for child abuse cases.

Posted by Ann Fontaine | September 23, 2010 1:05 PM

Ann, will this take more than one GC to accomplish, theoretically?

Posted by billydinpvd | September 23, 2010 1:12 PM

Canons take one vote at GC, Constitution takes 2 GCs

Posted by Ann Fontaine | September 23, 2010 7:47 PM

Diocesan Convention controls the budget. Cut Bennison's salary to zero at the next convention. Or is there some canon that precludes that?

Posted by John B. Chilton | September 23, 2010 8:18 PM

I think a couple of people here have (IIRC) called themselves "beloved brothers in Christ" of Bennison.

That's fine . . . but could you PLEASE do an intervention w/ him? Before he calls down any MORE disgrace upon himself? (And only secondarily, TEC?)

JC Fisher

Posted by tgflux | September 23, 2010 9:09 PM

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