Bishop Stokes has informed the Diocese of New Jersey of his intent to retire on June 24, 2023. By giving the diocese almost 2 years notice, we will have time to have a new Bishop ordained by the date of his retirement.

As I always tell my confirmation classes, the Constitution of the Episcopal Church was drafted in Independence Hall in Philadelphia, just a few years after the Constitution of the United States was drafted in that same building—and many of the people who worked on our nation’s constitution returned for our church’s constitution. So, many of the precepts that went into the founding of America were enshrined in the founding of our church. Chief among them is that we are a representative democracy. 

The election of a bishop is a glowing example of this representation. Each congregation  in the Diocese of New Jersey will send its clergy and its own elected delegation of lay members to the Electing Convention. For a bishop to be elected, they must gain a majority of both the clergy and lay votes.

But, who gets to be on the slate (ballot) to be considered for bishop? Well, there’s a group of clergy and lay from the diocese which will serve as a Bishop Search Committee, who will conduct the search and the initial interviews, before handing off to the diocese a slate of well qualified candidates. 

Bishop Stokes has called on every congregation in the diocese to have a parish meeting on September 26th for the sole purpose of electing six (6) people to attend a meeting on October 24th of the congregations in our region—where we will then elect two (2) people to represent our region on the Search Committee.

Fr Rick