Though the Diocese of South Carolina remains affiliated with The Episcopal Church, the two are waging a battle over Scripture and polity. The diocese on Friday approved a resolution declaring itself as “a gospel diocese, called to proclaim an evangelical faith.”

South Carolina Bishop Mark Lawrence was not hesitant this week to express his continuing frustrations with the national church body’s “false gospel” and ongoing pursuit of litigations.

“The distractions that come from the decisions others have made within The Episcopal Church have created restlessness in my spirit,” he said at the diocese’s 219th annual
convention which concluded last Friday.

“Like those in the Church at Corinth with whom St. Paul was confronted, many within the leadership of The Episcopal Church have grown willful,” he lamented. “They will have their way though it is contrary to the received teaching of God’s Holy Word, the trustworthy traditions of the Christian Faith, and the expressed will of the Anglican Communion.”

Lawrence specifically mentioned the recent approval by a majority of Episcopal Church leaders for the ordination of a partnered lesbian. The Rev. Canon Mary Douglas Glasspool will be consecrated in May as bishop suffragan in the Diocese of Los Angeles.

“Clearly these are disruptive challenges to the teaching we have received from the last two thousand years in the church of Jesus Christ,” Lawrence said.

“This is our battle to engage,” he emphasized. “We are not entirely alone, but our list of allies at home grows thin. This is our time to stand and be humbly counted among the faithful, just as others have in prior generations.”

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