September 30, 2005

IRAQ – The entire lay leadership of St. George's Anglican Church in Baghdad, Iraq, is missing and feared dead after being attacked on a dangerous road west of Baghdad while returning from a trip to Jordan.

The five Iraqis were last heard from on September 13. "The most difficult thing is not knowing for sure what has happened," Canon Andrew White, rector of St. George's, told Episcopal News Service.

"We have no news of them and fear the worst," the Most Rev. Clive Handford, president bishop of the Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East, reportedly told BBC News.

St. George's Church has flourished in recent months with regular Sunday worship attendance at 800.

Episcopal News Service