The controversial head of the National Cathedral in Washington D.C. has decided to take an early retirement after reportedly depleting the church's finances due to questionable projects and failing to stem the decline in churchgoers' attendance during Sunday services.
Dean Gary Hall tried to attract more worshippers as the Episcopal church allowed gay weddings at the cathedral, which also welcomed its the first transgender preacher there. The liberalising moves kept the National Cathedral in the news but failed to draw more people as they "limited the church's appeal," Anglican Program Director Jeff Walton of the Institute of Religion and Democracy admitted.
Hall will retire on Dec. 31 this year, two years earlier than his five-year contract.
The church tried to raise $11 million of the estimated $34 million needed for earthquake repairs, according to a report from Breaking Christian News.
The report said an expensive underground parking facility and high costs of maintaining the Cathedral campus depleted the church's finances.
In an attempt to raise additional money, Hall instructed cathedral officials to charge admission fee for visitors and make the church available for rent for corporate events. Apparently, this also didn't work as planned.
The average Sunday attendance at the cathedral decreased from more than 1,800 in 2005 to less than 1,400 in 2013. The church's annual budget dropped to $12.9 million today from $27 million in 2009, the report said.
In his retirement announcement, Hall said, "Over the past three years, the bishop, the staff, the chapter, and I have done the hard work of placing the cathedral on solid financial footing: Our budget is balanced and we are closing the books on our most successful year in recent memory."
"Our programs, public ministry, and relations with the schools on the close are vibrant, and we have finished the first phase of the earthquake repairs. Together, we have made great strides, not only in carrying out the cathedral's mission, but also in stewarding this institution into its second century," he said.
However, Walton said Hall "seems to have been unaware of the scope of fundraising and budgetary challenges that he would necessarily confront. Instead, the cathedral dean delighted in inserting the church into any national news story he could find, from gun control to the Confederate flag."
Walton accused Hall of being "unaware of thriving new evangelical and immigrant congregations populating Washington, DC's religious landscape."
