Frank T. Griswold III, former presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, local rector, teacher, and author, has died at 85

Frank T. Griswold III, 85, of Philadelphia, former presiding bishop of the national Episcopal Church, past bishop of the Diocese of Chicago, onetime rector at St. Andrew’s Church in Yardley and St. Martin-in-the-Fields in Chestnut Hill, teacher, lecturer, and author, died Sunday, March 5, of respiratory failure at Chestnut Hill Hospital.

As a progressive leader, counselor, and spiritual director for other clergy, Bishop Griswold served as chief pastor, president, chief executive officer, and chair of the executive council of the 2.5 million-member national Episcopal Church from 1996 to 2005. He supported the ordination of women and gay people as priests, and navigated the church through contentious disagreements over war, gay rights, the role of women, racial discrimination, and other controversial issues.

He used humor and empathy to defuse conflict and bridge division, and officials at the Washington National Cathedral called him “a kind and gentle priest who held the church together despite enormous pressures from around the world.”

He told The Inquirer in 2000: “I realize my role is very much a minister of communion, encouraging deep and open conversation within the community so that the divergent points of view can be heard and become part of a common search for a greater truth.”

A conservative friend told The Inquirer in 1997: “Frank was always willing to listen to me. We didn’t always agree on things, but he always had good answers.’’

His wife, Phoebe, said: “He was a broad thinker. He saw the shades of gray.” His daughter Eliza said: “He loved the edges of Christianity.”

Bishop Griswold oversaw 140 congregations in Chicago from 1985 to 1996. He also cochaired the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission from 1998 to 2003 and contributed to the church’s 1979 Book of Common Prayer.

He was ordained as an Episcopal priest in 1963, served four years as assistant rector at the Church of the Redeemer in Bryn Mawr, eight years as rector at St. Andrew’s, and a decade at St. Martin. He told The Inquirer when he left St. Martin to become bishop in Chicago that he and the congregation were “going through a real time of grief. We’ve lived a very intimate and intense life with each other, and so the cost of that is a real sense of abandonment.”

Creative and vocal in his views, he wrote countless sermons, letters, and papers, and published four books: Going Home: An Invitation to Jubilee in 2000, Praying Our Days: A Guide and Companion in 2009, Tracking Down the Holy Ghost: Reflections on Love and Longing in 2017, and Seeds of Faith with a coauthor, the Rev. Mark McIntosh, in 2022.

He met Pope John Paul II as an Anglican representative and served as a longtime delegate to the Episcopal triennial conventions. He lectured and led retreats around the world, and taught as a visiting professor at seminaries and universities in the United States, South Korea, Cuba, and Japan.

He was a “remarkable and faithful servant of God,” current Presiding Bishop Michael Curry said in a tribute.

Born Sept. 18, 1937, Frank Tracy Griswold III was baptized and confirmed at the Church of the Redeemer in Bryn Mawr. He became serious about the priesthood as a teenager at St. Paul’s School in New Hampshire and earned a bachelor’s degree in English at Harvard University and a master’s degree in theology at Oxford University in England.

He met Phoebe Wetzel at a baptism at the Church of the Redeemer, and they married in 1965. They had daughters Hannah and Eliza, and lived in Bryn Mawr, Yardley, Chestnut Hill, Chicago, and New York. They returned to Chestnut Hill in 2006, but he never really retired.

Bishop Griswold went to the gym often, practiced yoga, and liked to vacation in New Hampshire, hiking the trails and soaking up the quiet. He enjoyed poetry, put on funny puppet shows, and shared endearing bedtime stories with his children and grandchildren.

He encouraged sharing what he called “gifts of the spirit,” and a fellow bishop said in a tribute: “You always felt at ease with his smile and laughter.”

His family praised his “warmth and wit” and said “he championed Eastern traditions of the openhearted and healing power of God’s love.” His daughter Hannah said: “His talent was his spirituality.”

In addition to his wife and daughters, Bishop Griswold is survived by three grandchildren and one brother.

Services are to be held at 11 a.m. Saturday, March 18, at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, 5421 Germantown Ave., Philadelphia, Pa. 19144.