EPISCOPAL GAY & LESBIAN BISHOPS FAIL TO GROW DIOCESES

COMMENTARY

By David W. Virtue, DD | www.virtueonline.org | June 3, 2026

Despite all the hoopla about an inclusive, diverse church open to absolutely everybody, dioceses led by gay and lesbian bishops have failed to grow. The numbers say so plainly.

The latest available statistics are from 2023 — TEC has yet to release full 2024 figures — and they show continuing decline across nearly all dioceses, with losses running especially deep where gay and lesbian bishops hold the reins.

Eastern Carolina. Incoming Bishop Sarah Fisher, an avowed lesbian elected November 15, 2025, will inherit a diocese already hemorrhaging members. In 2014 the ASA stood at 6,360. By 2023 it had fallen to 4,432 across 67 parishes with 14,233 members — a 30 percent drop. She has yet to prove she can reverse it.

Maine. Bishop Thomas Brown, who is in a gay marriage, took the helm in 2019 with 59 parishes, 11,238 members, and an ASA of 3,537. By 2023 parishes had shrunk to 57, membership had fallen to 8,400 — a loss of 2,838 — and ASA had dropped to 2,695, a decline of 842. Total loss: 32 percent.

Michigan. Bishop Bonnie Perry, who is in a lesbian marriage, began her episcopate in 2020 with 75 parishes, 14,901 members, and an ASA of 5,081. By 2023 parishes had dropped to 70, membership to 13,311 — a loss of 1,591 — and ASA to 4,003, a loss of 1,075. Total loss: 30 percent.

Missouri. Bishop Deon Johnson, a Black gay bishop in a gay marriage, took office in 2020 with 42 parishes, 9,455 members, and an ASA of 2,994. By 2023 parishes had fallen to 39, membership to 8,745 — down 710 — and ASA to 2,443, a loss of 551. Total loss: 31 percent.

Connecticut. Bishop Jeffrey Mello, who is gay, began his episcopate in 2022 with 153 parishes, 37,322 members, and an ASA of 8,211. By 2023 one parish was gone — St. Paul's Darien, the diocese's leading charismatic congregation — membership had slipped to 36,763, and ASA had fallen to 7,383, a drop of 828. Total loss: 22 percent.

Los Angeles / New York. Retired lesbian suffragan Bishop Mary Glasspool began her Los Angeles tenure in 2010 with 144 parishes and 59,527 members. By 2016, when she transferred to serve as Assistant Bishop of New York, parishes had fallen to 128 and membership to 50,323 — a loss of 9,204 — with ASA dropping from 19,027 to 15,250, a 30 percent decline. The largest single-diocese loss in this survey. In New York she witnessed further carnage: 195 parishes became 191, membership fell from 51,309 to 41,888 — a loss of 9,421 — and ASA dropped from 9,866 to 6,947, a loss of 2,919. Total loss: 24 percent.

New Hampshire. V. Gene Robinson — the retired bishop whose 2004 consecration as an openly gay, divorced man lit the fuse for the entire sexual revolution inside TEC — began with 49 parishes, 15,531 members, and an ASA of 4,746. By 2013, his final year, parishes had fallen to 46, membership to 12,740 — a loss of 2,790 — and ASA to 3,810, a drop of 936. Total loss: 28 percent. Robinson did not start the fire; he simply struck the match that burned the house down.

Massachusetts. The late Bishop Thomas Shaw, SSJE — a celibate monk — presided over the largest absolute numbers. Diocesan records show 198 parishes and 91,465 members in 1995, with an ASA of 22,940. When he died in 2014, parishes had fallen to 183 and membership to 60,130 — a loss of 31,465. ASA had dropped from 22,940 to 16,024, a decline of 6,916 or 27 percent.

The verdict is in. Diocese after diocese, bishop after bishop, the experiment has failed on its own terms. The promise was a bigger tent. What they built was an emptier one. Inclusion, it turns out, is not a growth strategy — it is an epitaph.

David W. Virtue, DD is the president and Managing Editor of Virtueonline, the Anglican Communion’s most widely read orthodox Online News Service. www.vuirtueonline.org You can subscribe at no charge and receive updates as the stories are written. David’s Substack on the Middle East can be accessed here: davidvirtue2.substack.com