Episcopal Press and News
Wood, Emery Plan Retirements
Episcopal News Service. May 12, 1983 [83090]
NEW YORK (DPS, May 12) -- Executive staff changes at the Episcopal Church Center during the first half of 1983 are bringing new leadership into many areas of responsibility.
The Rev. Samuel VanCulin has already been replaced by Bishop Edward Haynsworth as executive for World Mission.
Bishop Elliot L. Sorge, executive for Education for Mission and Ministry, has accepted his election as Bishop of Easton and will leave the Church Center in New York before the end of the year.
Alice P. Emery has announced that her retirement as executive for National Mission in Church and Society will take place at the end of 1983.
Bishop Milton L. Wood, who has served as executive for Administration since 1974, will also retire at the end of the year.
The personnel office at the Church Center has already begun the process that will lead to new executives for administration, education and national mission. The job description for each is available and is being circulated throughout the church, with a suitable period having been set for the receipt of applications.
The continuing executives are the Rev. Thomas Carson, Jr., Stewardship; Matthew Costigan, Treasurer; and the Rev. Richard J. Anderson, Communication.
Presiding Bishop John M. Allin views the executive staff changes as coincidental, noting that two were caused by opportunities to serve in other places and two motivated by retirement.
"I am pleased when members of the Church Center staff are sought for other positions of responsibility by the Church," said Allin. "That says something positive about the people we have serving at the Center." He said he thought the changes will enable the church to move ahead with new leadership, building on the work that has been done by the departing executives and by those still serving.
Wood, a native of Alabama and a former suffragan bishop in the Diocese of Atlanta, joined the Church Center as the chief administrative officer when Allin began his term. He is chairman of the administrative group and serves as Allin's representative in a number of capacities.
After undergraduate work and theological training at the University of the South, Wood served parishes in Alabama before being called as rector of All Saints Church in Atlanta in 1952. He later served as director of the Appleton Church Home and an archdeacon and as canon to the bishop of Atlanta before being elected to the episcopate in 1967.
Emery joined the Church Center staff in 1970 as coordinator of the United Thank Offering and was named to her current post in 1977. She serves on the governing board of the National Council of Churches and the executive committee of the Joint Strategy and Action Council.
A graduate of the University of Minnesota, she taught in the early years of her marriage to the Rev. Richard R. Emery who later served as bishop of North Dakota from 1951 until 1964. After his death, she served as executive secretary of the University Episcopal Center of Minnesota for five years before coming to New York.