Out in the Mountains A ministry to the gay community: The Ecumenical Catholic Church in the Champlain Valley Rev. Miki Thomas PLATTSBURGH, NY -- The Very Rev- erend Michael Frost was raised Roman Catholic and despite a conversion ex— perience in college that led to an in- volvement with an evangelical campus group, he felt that the liturgy was still irn— portant to him. He then decided to enter Roman Seminary, but in 1984 he started the coming out process. He dropped out but returned to seminary in 1991, thinking he can "lie low" about his sexuality. After a year, he realized it was not going to work. Besides, he had just met the man he would eventually marry. One day, while reading The Advocate, he came across an ad asking "Are you interested in the priesthood?". In- trigued, he began an ongoing dialogue with the bishop of the church that placed the ad, the Ecumenical Catholic Church (ECC). In July of 1993, he was ordained into the ECC and St. Mary's Ecumenical Catholic Church of Plattsburgh, NY was born. ECC was started in 1987 by Bishop Mark Shirilau and his partner Jeffrey Shirilau be- cause according to Bishop Shirilau in an in— terview in Second Stone, "we saw the need for Catholic—oriented ministry to the gay community." The ECC is a liturgical (‘km"".. .>llTlllaI' in structure to the Roman Catholic and Episcopal churches. Its doc- trine and theology are based on the creeds developed at the Councils of Nicaea, Con- stantinople, Ephesus and Chalcedon during the Early Church period. It also observes the seven sacraments including baptism, the eucharist, and marriage, the latter open to both gay and nongay couples. The en- charist is open to all baptized Christians re- gardless of what church one may belong to. It currently has twelve churches in ten states. St. Mary's ECC began in the summer of 1993 at the home of Rev. Frost and his spouse Ken where they initially held mass- es. Since this past spring, the church has been meeting every Sunday at 6pm at RE- BOS ("sober" spelled backward) in Platts- burgh. The church is still relatively small and thus its ministry is limited to weekly masses. Despite this, Rev. Frost has in the past made hospital visits to prisoners with AIDS and is-currently planning a food drive for the local food shelf. Another current concern of Rev. Frost is the Holy Apostles Seminary, formed in 1991 as the Theological Institute for Cath- olic Studies to train those interested in the ministry of ECC. It became Holy Apostles Seminary in 1994 under the auspices of Rev. Frost. Prior to the formation of a semi- nary, most of the clergy coming into ECC were already priests and as such, a training program was not viewed as necessary. Lat- er, as more and more non-priests were showing an interest in the ministry, a train- ing program was developed. Presently, the seminary is a correspondence course, but plans are underway for a permanent build- ing for it, possibly in Burlington, because of its active gay and lesbian community. Rev. Frost is excited about the fast growth of the Ecumenical Catholic Church, which started with only seven clergy and is now blessed with many, including its first woman priest, ordained this past Sep- tember in Connecticut. There have been several inquiries into ECC, with some as far away as Kenya and the Netherlands. Rev. Frost himself has always felt a call to the ministry; the Ecumenical Catholic Church has given him the chance to heed that call. For more information about St. Mary's ECC, write to St. Mary's Ecumenical Catholic Church; P.0. Box 159; Chazy, NY 12921 or call (518)493-3272. For more information about ECC itself write to Ecumenical Catholic Church; P. 0. Box 32; Villa Grande, CA 95486 or call (707)865-0119. 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