Edmond L. Browning Elected Bishop of Hawaii
Episcopal News Service. May 19, 1976 [76171]
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- The Rt. Rev. Edmond Lee Browning, Executive for National and World Mission on the staff of the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church, was elected Bishop of Hawaii at a special convention of the diocese May 1. He was elected on the third ballot of the convention, held at St. Andrew's Cathedral, Honolulu.
Bishop Browning, 47, will succeed the Rt. Rev. E. Lani Hanchett, who died in office last year at the age of 56. His election must be approved by a majority of the Episcopal Church's House of Bishops and by a majority of the Standing Committees of the dioceses of the Church.
Bishop Browning was appointed to his present post on the Executive Council staff by Presiding Bishop John M. Allin in June, 1974. As Executive for National and World Mission he works directly with both overseas and U.S. dioceses of the Episcopal Church, coordinating and administering a wide variety of programs and relationships which link the national church with its 113 dioceses.
Bishop Browning was consecrated Bishop of Okinawa, Japan, in 1968 and was instrumental in effecting the merger of the Diocese of Okinawa with the Nippon-Seikokai (The Holy Catholic Church of Japan), with which the Episcopal Church is in communion.
In October, 1971, Bishop Browning was appointed Bishop-in-Charge of the Convocation of American Churches in Europe by Presiding Bishop John E. Hines, a post he held until joining the Executive Council staff.
A native of Corpus Christi, Tex., Bishop Browning was graduated from the University of the South, Sewanee, Tenn., in 1952, and from St. Luke's Seminary, Sewanee, in 1954. He was ordained deacon and priest in 1955. He served parishes in Texas before volunteering for overseas work in Japan in 1959. He served several parishes and missions in Okinawa and was an archdeacon of the diocese before becoming its bishop.
Bishop Browning is married to Patricia Sparks of Taft, Tex., and they have five children.