Episcopal Press and News

OKLAHOMA: New bishop to be consecrated September 15

Episcopal News Service. September 12, 2007 [091207-04]

Bishop-elect Edward J. Konieczny will be ordained and consecrated on September 15 as the fifth diocesan bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Oklahoma.

Konieczny, 52, rector of St. Matthew's Episcopal Church in Grand Junction, Colorado, was elected May 2 on the first ballot from a slate of six candidates. He was elected with 112 lay votes and 62 clergy votes. An election on that ballot required 100 votes of 198 cast in the lay order and 61 of 120 votes cast in the clergy order.

Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori will be the chief consecrator during the liturgy which will take place at the Freede Wellness and Activity Center on the campus of Oklahoma City University.

Co-consecrators will be bishops Edward S. Little II of Northern Indiana; Robert M. Moody, the retiring bishop of Oklahoma; and Robert J. O'Neill of Colorado, who will also preach.

Gerald McAllister, third diocesan Bishop of Oklahoma, will be present.

Before the traditional ordination/consecration liturgy, the ceremony begins with a pre-service that will draw on Oklahoma's Native American heritage, according to Oklahoma Canon to the Ordinary Charles Woltz. It will begin with drumbeats, a prayer to the four directions and the sweet smoke of cedar, sweetgrass, sage, and tobacco, followed by a Cheyenne Beaded Cross Procession of representatives of Oklahoma's many tribes.

Konieczny will succeed Robert Moody, 67, who was elected in 1987 and has been Oklahoma's bishop since 1989.

The Diocese of Oklahoma comprises about 17,700 Episcopalians worshipping in 69 congregations.