Church worships together for last time :: My Texas

Members of St. Nicholas' Episcopal Church and supporters from churches around
the city, state and nation began to fill the pews nearly an hour before Sunday's
service.

By 7 p.m., chairs spilled out into the sanctuary's foyer until
there was standing room only. It was the final Sunday many of St. Nicholas'
parishioners would gather together in the building they built only four years
ago.

Nearly 90 percent of the congregation is leaving St. Nicholas' to
begin Christ Church Midland (Anglican Communion) after Bishop Wallis Ohl of the
Episcopal Diocese of Northwest Texas told those who were dissatisfied with the
direction of the national Episcopal Church to leave the St. Nicholas church
building by June 1.

The headline is true; those members of the church gathered together were worshipping together as a church for the last time. The third sentence quoted above isn't literally true, although you know what the intended meaning is. Ten percent will continue to worship together at St. Nicholas'; most of the rest will worship together at Christ Church.

I admire the spirit reflected in the quotations of the persons interviewed for the article. When you believe something is taken from you and that you are in the right, it is hard not to let bitterness consume you.