Episcopal Press and News

NORTHWEST TEXAS: Bishop announces retirement plans

Episcopal News Service. April 30, 2007 [043007-05]

Mary Frances Schjonberg

Episcopal Diocese of Northwest Texas Bishop C. Wallis Ohl Jr. has written to the diocese announcing his intention to retire about the time he turns 65 on October 24, 2008.

Ohl said in his April 25 letter that he had asked the diocesan Standing Committee to begin preparations to elect and consecrate the diocese's fifth bishop. He noted in his letter that he anticipates a roughly 18-month process, with the election occurring in April 2008 and the hope that a consecration would happen in the context of that year's diocesan convention.

In his letter, Ohl wrote that he is "filled with a mixture of emotions: joy at having been able to serve among you for the past ten years; grief at seeing the close of our time together; love for all of you, both those who have been supportive and those who have opposed me personally or in the direction of ministry development; wonder at what may lie ahead in the years to come; hope for the future of the diocese; amazement that I am as old physically as I am (I guess I never thought I would be in my mid-sixties); excitement about being able to dig into some projects that have lain fallow for many years; and finally optimism because Jesus Christ is Lord of all."

Ohl had told the October 2006 diocesan convention that he was not yet ready to retire. At that same convention, Ohl, speaking about tensions in the Anglican Communion, said that while the interpretation of Scripture is not a minor concern, "to require that all everywhere adhere to a single understanding is simply not Anglican."

"I am convinced that we need to argue passionately with one another, and to stay in communion," he said. "Our heritage is to debate and disagree as heatedly as we can until we come to the Lord's Table. Remember, it is not your table, nor is it mine; it is the Lord's table."

Ohl, a native of Texas, was the rector of St. Michael the Archangel, Colorado Springs, Colorado, in 1997 when he was elected bishop coadjutor of Northwest Texas. He was consecrated June 28 of that year, the fourth bishop in the diocese's 97-year history.

He was ordained a deacon in December 1973 after graduating from Nashotah House seminary. He was ordained a priest in June 1974.

The Diocese of Northwest Texas comprises about 8,600 Episcopalians worshipping in 38 congregations.