Bishop of Iowa announces plans to retire
Alfred the Great, 26 October 2019
Dear sisters and brothers in Christ,
Today, at the Diocesan Convention, I announced that "I believe that it is time to draw a finishing line across our time together as Bishop and People. And though this will be my penultimate Convention, 2019 is the last Convention when you won't be obsessed with the search for the next Bishop of Iowa".
Therefore, I have called for the election of the tenth Bishop of Iowa, sometime in Spring 2021, with a tentative date for the consecration of September 18th, 2021. It is my intention to retire officially on that date, as I look to hand over the Diocesan crozier to my successor.
Nothing concentrates the mind like a deadline, and we have reached it. At the November Board retreat, Bishop Todd Ousley, Bishop for Pastoral Development of The Episcopal Church, will be present and he will advise on the schedule for the search, election and transition periods. The Standing Committee, and members of the Diocesan staff will also be present at the gathering.
That an English King, Alfred the Great, is honored on this particular day is, on the surface, about as relevant to us as his statue standing in its prominent place in the middle of the road in downtown Winchester. And yet, there are two elements of the collect for Alfred that echo something of our common life over these past decades. "Awake in us a keen desire to increase our understanding while we are in this world, and an eager longing to reach that endless life where all will be made clear".
Together we have seen ourselves "In mission with Christ through each and all". Ministry resides across the whole body of Christ, regardless of status and background. We have sought to express ourselves as One Church with many locations, and like Alfred have been very conscious that God's call to us to express and live the Gospel has been "for a time like this". Alfred rose in a time of conflict, and we too have lived through the conflict of human sexual identity, and the struggle of the Church to stretch out its arms of love to embrace all God's creation. We have been called, fed and sent through Revival and the subsequent years of growing Iowa leaders, and engaging each other in discipleship. My prayer is to leave you walking your neighborhoods and building relationships of love with all around you, satisfied more to fulfill the actions of Christ, rather than settle with mere Christ-like thoughts and feelings.
Your gracious, patient and generous spirit has made me your Bishop, always humbled and proud to be "the Bishop of Iowa" and never merely "from Iowa". To stand before General Convention in 2018 and describe your Revivals was one of the greatest honors of my life. God only knows the sparks we have set alight through that witness. I am sure that some are saying," Well, if Iowa can do it, so can we".
I know also that the Spirit softly whispers the words she put into the writing of the apostle Paul: "Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to confound the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God. God is the source of your life in Jesus Christ, who became for us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, in order that, as it is written, "Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord".
In the love and peace of Christ,
+Alan
The Rt. Rev. Alan Scarfe, Bishop of Iowa