Episcopal Missionary Church
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The Episcopal Missionary Church (EMC)is a Continuing Anglican church body in the United States. Its founding in the early 1990s can be traced to the protests of members of The Episcopal Church in the United States of America (ECUSA) who were concerned that their church had become massively influenced by secular humanism. At first, these clergy and laypersons sought to change the direction of their church by working from within it, to which end they formed a voluntary association, the "Episcopal Synod of America."
When they later concluded that this approach would not succeed, a new missionary diocese was formed by them, still attempting to remain within ECUSA. In 1992, however, the missionary diocese withdrew from ECUSA and formed a separate church, the Episcopal Missionary Church. The Rt. Rev. A. Donald Davies, retired ECUSA Bishop of Dallas and Fort Worth, was named the first Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Missionary Church.
The Episcopal Missionary Church affirms the Holy Scriptures as containing all things necessary to salvation and as the ultimate rule and standard of faith. The Church acknowledges the Nicene and Apostles' Creeds and the necessity of the Sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion. It uses the 1928 American edition of the Book of Common Prayer or the Anglican Missal based upon it, and emphasizes the preservation of Apostolic Succession.
The name Episcopal "Missionary" Church was selected as part of the Church's desire to provide a home for all Episcopalians and other Christians who feel that they have been forced from their churches by the growth of liberalism within them. At present, the Episcopal Missionary Church has over thirty parishes in the USA. The presiding bishop is the Rt. Rev. William Millsaps, a former chaplain of ECUSA's seminary in Sewanee, Tennessee.
