By Emily McDonald
South East Area Correspondent

The Anglican Fellowship of Chattanooga held its first service of Holy Eucharist on May 2.

The fellowship was organized several months ago to provide a place for worship and fellowship for those who feel alienated by the General Convention consent to the election of Bishop Gene Robinson of New Hampshire and its consideration of response to same-sex committed relationships, fellowship organizers say.

“We want to come together and worship,” said Rob Healy, a communicant of St. Francis of Assisi and a member of the fellowship steering committee. Fellowship organizers are not sure if their actions represent the beginning of a new church or if the group is simply a community getting together, he said. “Where God leads us, we will end up.”

The service was held in the Make-A-Wish Foundation House and attended by approximately 75 people, including several Episcopal clergy.

Steering committee member and St. Peter communicant Dick Gruetzemacher welcomed the congregation “to the historic first service of Holy Eucharist being celebrated by the Anglican Fellowship of Chattanooga. I feel like the Holy Spirit is among us and being celebrated in this service.”

Bishop Charles vonRosenberg was the celebrant. At the time of the offertory, the bishop said, “We offer this Eucharist to the glory of God and with the special intention of giving thanks for our unity in Jesus Christ.”

The Rev. Ray Kasch, rector of All Saints, Smyrna, Tenn., was the preacher. Kasch, whose church is in the Diocese of Tennessee, is serving as a consultant to the fellowship.

In his sermon Kasch talked about “the schism in our church caused by the General Convention” and said “nothing will ever be the same again, in this church or in the Anglican Communion.”

Jesus’ role as shepherd was the Gospel focus for May 2, as written in John 10:22-30. “How can you exist in a church that has rebelled against the shepherd?” Kasch asked.

“For some of us, doing nothing is not an option,” he said. “We have to learn to hear his voice. We have to do things we have never done before in response to the shepherd’s voice, and that may require sacrifice.”

The Rev. David Bateman, rector of St. Thaddaeus, Chattanooga, was among those attending the service. “I am here to listen and to learn and to express my collegiality for the ministry of the bishop,” he said.

Lynn Schmissrauter, a communicant of St. Timothy, Signal Mountain, and a deputy to the 74th General Convention, said she came to support the bishop and the diocese. She said she was also concerned for the mission of the diocese and interested in any new mission initiative.

The Rev. Hugh Jones, rector of St. Alban, Hixson, said he was there “to acknowledge and bless the diversity of the church that comes from the point of view of someone who has signaled his open-mindedness about the actions of the General Convention.”

Jones said he was also there “to wish them well” and “to get a sense of what they were doing and where they were going so I might recommend that worshiping community to the handful of people who have left St. Alban’s since the General Convention.”

After the convention consented to the election of Bishop Robinson and decided to examine practice around the church regarding the blessing of same-sex unions, fellowship organizers said, some Episcopalians in Chattanooga stopped going to church — or they went to churches of other denominations and were unhappy. The fellowship was formed to provide an Anglican worship experience for those people.

The focus is to “be part of the worldwide Anglican Communion,” said Mike Patten of St. Paul, Chattanooga, a steering committee member. Asked if the fellowship wanted to remain part of the Episcopal Church in the United States, Patten said, “it depends on where things go.”

“It is not at all about sexuality,” said Kim Worley of Grace, Chattanooga, a steering committee member. “It is about the authority of scripture.”

Bishop vonRosenberg first met with the fellowship in late April. After learning of plans for the initial Eucharist, he said he told them as diocesan bishop it was his “prerogative to celebrate as a means of connection and to express my own care and concern for them.”

The bishop said he hopes to maintain contact with the fellowship and be supportive if they want to remain Episcopalians. He said more things unite Episcopalians than divide them. “We are able to agree on the basic tenets of the faith, which have not changed.”

As far as he knows, Bishop vonRosenberg said, the fellowship is the first group in the diocese attempting to start a new worshiping community because of unhappiness with the actions of the General Convention.

For the short term, Gruetzemacher said, the fellowship plans to hold one Holy Eucharist service and one Morning Prayer service each month. (The fellowship’s first Morning Prayer service was held in April.) A larger venue will be sought for future services as the Make-A-Wish House was filled to capacity for the first Eucharist.

Currently, people from 10 parishes in the Chattanooga area participate in the fellowship, said Dick Schier of Grace Church, also a steering committee member. Most of them continue to attend services in their own parishes, he said.

To read Bishop vonRosenberg’s letter to the Anglican Fellowship of Chattanooga following its first Eucharist, please visit www.etdiocese.net/sermons/2004/letterangfell.htm. Later correspondence is posted at www.etdiocese.net/sermons/2004/letterangfell5-28.htm

Anglican Fellowship of Chattanooga, 423-855-9337 or P.O. Box 147, Chattanooga, Tenn., 39401.