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A conservative Episcopal priest, who is a top administrator in the Tennessee diocese, is leaving the church to become a Roman Catholic.

Andrew Petiprin recently announced his plans to change his religious tradition and resign his post as the Episcopal diocese’s canon to the ordinary. He wraps up his job on New Year’s Eve, and Petiprin and his family will start 2019 in the Catholic Church.

“I’m not really running away from the Episcopal Church, but running toward the Catholic Church,” Petiprin said in an interview.

Since June 2017, Petiprin has worked alongside Bishop John Bauerschmidt, helping him with the administration of the Episcopal Diocese of Tennessee, which covers much of Middle Tennessee.

Petriprin said he started the job excited about the chance to influence the future of the Episcopal Church, but it became clear several months ago that God was calling him to Catholicism.

“There are many reasons, but no one of them is definitive,” Petiprin said. “One of the great things that has happened to me over the last few months is, although I remain conservative on many of the questions that the Episcopal Church is facing, I have far less anger or bitterness about any of that than I used to have.”

Petiprin, who has been an Episcopal priest for eight years, is a conservative in a denomination that has made progressive shifts in recent decades. Like Bauerschmidt, he does not support the Episcopal Church’s decision to allow same-sex couples to marry in the church. That change came in 2015 and was broadened this summer.