The Rt. Rev. John-David Schofield, Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of San Joaquin, said it was “with a mixture of sadness and joy” that he learned that members of the clergy who left The Episcopal Church were deposed by his successor as the Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of San Joaquin.
 
“We are… grieved that the leadership of The Episcopal Church feels compelled to create this unprecedented division between the ministries of The Episcopal Church and their brothers and sisters throughout the rest of the Anglican Communion,” Bishop Schofield said in a statement released to the media on May 28. “For our part, we continue to recognize the orders of those who are properly ordained according to the Book of Common Prayer and who have chosen to continue to serve Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior within TEC.”
 
The two San Joaquin dioceses disagree on the number of priests deposed. The Episcopal diocese claims to have removed 61 priests while the Anglican diocese, which is now affiliated with the Church of the Southern Cone, sets the number at 52.
 
“I find the actions I was forced to take last Friday and Tuesday to be heartbreaking,” Bishop Jerry Lamb said in a May 26 statement.  “I have known a few of these clergy personally and others by the stories I have heard about their ministry. But the fact is they chose to abandon their relationship with the Episcopal Church. They declined to ask for a release from their ordination vows, and I had no option but to bring the charges of Abandonment of the Communion to the Standing Committee last year and take these final steps today. It is a sad day.”
 
The 36 priests and 16 deacons deposed by Bishop Lamb on May 22 and May 26 were not inhibited until October and November 2008, meaning that as of the special reorganizing convention at which Bishop Lamb was elected in March 2008, there was an insufficient number of clergy present to hold a convention. According to report published shortly after the reorganizing convention by Episcopal News Service, there were 21 clergy present. According to canon 3.01 of the Episcopal diocese, “A quorum shall consist of one-third of all the clergy entitled to seats and votes...If a quorum be not present at any convention, no business shall be transacted except that of adjournment from time to time until a quorum shall be present.”
 
Additionally, the Rev. Canon Bill Gandenberger, canon to the ordinary for the Anglican Diocese of San Joaquin, told The Living Church that several of the clergy certified to vote at the special reorganizing convention did not meet the canonical requirement of having been resident in the diocese for at least 90 days prior to the start of that convention.
 
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