Archdeacon of Southeast Florida Elected Bishop of El Camino Real

The Living Church
Timothy Roberts
06/16/2007

The coastal California Diocese of El Camino Real elected as its next Bishop the Ven. Mary Gray-Reeves, Archdeacon for the Diocese of Southeast Florida, June 16 on the second ballot.

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Among the other candidates, Fr. Palarine may have hurt his chances when he stopped short of saying that he believed in the full inclusion of gay and lesbian parishioners in the rites and rituals of the church. The other candidates, including the bishop-elect said that they did.

Archdeacon Gray-Reeves told parishioners at one walkabout June 8 that she was one of only two priests and one bishop in Florida to have voted as delegates to affirm the election of the Rev. Canon Gene Robinson as Bishop Coadjutor of New Hampshire. She said she doubted that she could be called to serve in another church in Florida as a result of that vote.

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She told parishioners that growing up in the Coconut Grove neighborhood of Miami she was surrounded by gays, lesbians and people of many different cultures.

"I never questioned the presence of gay and lesbian people," she said.

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