New Hampshire diocese names three nominees for bishop

The Diocese of New Hampshire’s Bishop Search and Nomination Committee March 15 announced a three-nominee slate for a bishop coadjutor to succeed Bishop V.  Gene Robinson.

The nominees include:

• the Rev. Penelope Maud Bridges, 53, rector, St. Francis Episcopal Church, Great Falls, Virginia (Diocese of Virginia);
• the Rev. A.  Robert Hirschfeld, 51, rector, Grace Episcopal Church, Amherst, Massachusetts (Diocese of Western Massachusetts);
• the Rev. William Warwick Rich, 59, senior associate rector for Christian formation, Trinity Church, Boston, Massachusetts (Diocese of Massachusetts).

More information about the nominees is here.

Announcement of the slate opened a petition nomination process that closes March 25. Any additional candidates’ names are due to be announced on April 30, according to a timeline here.

The bishop coadjutor will be elected May 19 at St. Paul’s Church in Concord.

Because the election will occur close in time to the 77th meeting of the General Convention of the Episcopal Church in July, Episcopal Church canons provide (in Canon III.11.3) for the required consents to be sought from the bishops and deputies at convention.

Assuming that consent is received, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori is scheduled to consecrate the bishop coadjutor on Aug. 4 at the Capitol Center for the Arts in Concord.

On Jan. 5, 2013, the coadjutor will be installed as the 10^th diocesan bishop at St. Paul’s Church.

Robinson announced in November 2010 that he would retire in January 2013.

“Death threats, and the now-worldwide controversy surrounding your election of me as bishop, have been a constant strain, not just on me, but on my beloved husband, Mark, who has faithfully stood with me every minute of the last seven years, and in some ways, you,” said Robinson, speaking at the conclusion of the diocese’s 208th annual convention in 2010. “While I believe that these attitudes, mostly outside the diocese, have not distracted me from my service to you, I would be less than honest if I didn’t say that they have certainly added a burden and certain anxiety to my episcopate.”