Episcopal Diocese of Taiwan
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The Episcopal Diocese of Taiwan ( zh, t=臺灣聖公會, s=台湾圣公会, first=t, l=Episcopal Church of Taiwan) is the Anglican
diocese In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associa ...
in
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
and a member diocese of the
Episcopal Church of the United States The Episcopal Church, based in the United States with additional dioceses elsewhere, is a member church of the worldwide Anglican Communion. It is a mainline Protestant denomination and is divided into nine provinces. The presiding bishop of ...
. It was established in 1954, five years after Chinese Episcopalians fled from
mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...
to Taiwan following the
Chinese Communist Revolution The Chinese Communist Revolution, officially known as the Chinese People's War of Liberation in the People's Republic of China (PRC) and also known as the National Protection War against the Communist Rebellion in the Republic of China (ROC ...
in 1949. Early leadership included American military chaplains connected to The Church of the Good Shepherd or St. John's, but in 1965 the Diocese elected its first Chinese bishop. In late 2019 Lennon Yuan-Jung Chang was elected the sixth Bishop of Taiwan, and was consecrated on February 22, 2020. It is a diocese of Province 8 of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America.


History

From the earliest origins of Anglicanism on Taiwan (in or before 1895) until 1945, the island was part of the
Nippon Sei Ko Kai The ''Nippon Sei Ko Kai'' ( ja, 日本聖公会, translit=Nippon Seikōkai, lit=Japanese Holy Catholic Church), abbreviated as NSKK, sometimes referred to in English as the Anglican Episcopal Church in Japan, is the national Christian church rep ...
Diocese of Osaka. As the presence of American Episcopalians on the island grew, the island came under the jurisdiction of the Episcopal Diocese of Honolulu until 1954, when it achieved some independence — the 60th anniversary of this date was celebrated in 2014. In 1961, Taiwan was organised into a missionary diocese of the Episcopal Church (USA); and in 1988 it was accepted as a full diocese of the church.


Parishes

Parishes of the diocese:


Bishops

From 1954 until 1960, Harry S. Kennedy, Bishop of Hololulu, had direct care of Taiwan; from 1961 until 1964, Charles P. Gilson, Suffragan Bishop of Honolulu, was delegated care of the missionary diocese and was resident on the island. Further bishops of the missionary diocese were: * James C. L. Wong (1965–1970; ; formerly Bishop of Jesselton) * James Pong (1971–1979; ) * Pui-Yeung Cheung (1980–1987; ) Since full diocesan status was granted, the bishops diocesan have been: * John C. T. Chien (1988–2001; ) * David Jung-Hsin Lai (2001–2020; ) * Lennon Yuan-Rung Chang (2020–present; )


Charles P. Gilson

Charles Packard Gilson (; September 3, 1899,
Portland, Maine Portland is the largest city in the U.S. state of Maine and the seat of Cumberland County. Portland's population was 68,408 in April 2020. The Greater Portland metropolitan area is home to over half a million people, the 104th-largest metropo ...
August 11, 1980,
New London, New Hampshire New London is a town in Merrimack County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 4,400 at the 2020 census. The town is the home of Colby–Sawyer College. The town center, where 1,266 people resided at the 2020 census, is defined as th ...
), was consecrated a bishop at St Paul's Cathedral, Detroit during the Episcopal Church's 1961 General Convention. He had been missionary-in-charge at Taipei since 1958 when Convention elected him Suffragan Bishop of Honolulu in order to be the bishop resident on Taiwan. In 1964, his geographical jurisdiction (but not his post as Suffragan) was shifted to
Okinawa is a prefecture of Japan. Okinawa Prefecture is the southernmost and westernmost prefecture of Japan, has a population of 1,457,162 (as of 2 February 2020) and a geographic area of 2,281 km2 (880 sq mi). Naha is the capital and largest city ...
.


Lennon Yuan-Rung Chang

Lennon Yuan-Rung Chang (given name Yuan-Rung/Yuanrong, English name Lennon; ) was consecrated a bishop on February 22, 2020 at St John's Cathedral, Taipei. Deaconed in 1995 and priested in 1999, he served as Chaplain of
St. John's University (Taiwan) St. John's University (SJU; ) is a higher education institution in Tamsui District, New Taipei, Taiwan. It is the successor institution of the former St. John's University, Shanghai and St. Mary's Hall, Shanghai. Two well-known educational in ...
(1997–2016) and then as Vicar/Rector of Advent Church (on the same campus); he was also an associate professor of Mathematics at the university (1983–2016). Chang was elected bishop diocesan on August 3, 2019 and was duly consecrated and installed in 2020 by Michael Curry, Presiding Bishop (assisted by co-consecrators: Lai Jung-Hsin, then-Bishop of Taiwan; Bob Fitzpatrick, Bishop of Hawaii; Nathaniel Makoto Uematsu, Primate of
Nippon Sei Ko Kai The ''Nippon Sei Ko Kai'' ( ja, 日本聖公会, translit=Nippon Seikōkai, lit=Japanese Holy Catholic Church), abbreviated as NSKK, sometimes referred to in English as the Anglican Episcopal Church in Japan, is the national Christian church rep ...
; Haruhisa Iso, Bishop of Osaka; and Greg Rickel, Bishop of Olympia). He served briefly as coadjutor bishop and succeeded as bishop diocesan automatically upon Lai's retirement in March 2020.


See also

*
Anglican Communion The Anglican Communion is the third largest Christian communion after the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches. Founded in 1867 in London, the communion has more than 85 million members within the Church of England and other ...


References


External links

*
Morning Prayer and Holy Communion in Chinese (1928)
liturgical material digitized by Charles Wohlers and Richard Mammana {{DEFAULTSORT:Taiwan
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
Protestantism in Taiwan Christian organizations established in 1954 Dioceses in Taiwan Province 8 of the Episcopal Church (United States)