Ecclesiastical Compromise

For months, Episcopal churchmen of New York's rich, 100,000-communicant diocese have prayed and politicked over the successor to Bishop William T. Manning, who retired last December. No candidate seemed to have quite the shade of Episcopal grace to please both high and low churchmen.

At a special convention of the diocese last week, the 1,000-odd clerical and lay delegates reached an obvious compromise. As new Bishop of New York they elected tall, cigaret-smoking Rt. Rev. Charles Kendall Gilbert, suffragan* bishop under Bishop Manning for the past 16 years. Bishop Gilbert knows his big, heterogeneous flock inside out, has maintained an average of 2,200 confirmations a year since becoming suffragan bishop. His chief drawback as a candidate was, paradoxically, a major factor in getting him elected. Bishop Gilbert is 68--which gives him only 3 1/2 years in office before compulsory retirement at 72.

* Of the two kinds of assistant bishop, a coadjutor automatically succeeds his chief; a suffragan does not.

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