Boston Globe: Ohio priest elected new Episcopal bishop

Episcopalians of eastern Massachusetts on Saturday elected the Rev. Alan M. Gates, rector of a large church in Ohio, to succeed Bishop M. Thomas Shaw, who will retire in September after a 20-year tenure. Gates, 56, will lead a diverse and active diocese with 183 congregations and 63,000 baptized members, but one that, like most mainline Christian churches, continues to struggle with attracting young people and with meeting the spiritual needs of a society that has drifted away from institutions and organized religion.  He tells the Globe, “My eagerness is to shepherd the congregations, and to support the faithful and the clergy who serve the parishes,” he said. “What direction we go will be very much determined together.”