''We couldn't let those people in trouble stay,'' said Frade, adding that the experience informed his commitment to human rights.

Elected bishop of Honduras in 1984, he helped political refugees from Nicaragua gain haven. Over the next 16 years, he grew the Episcopal community there from 14 churches to 83 and from 1,000 members to 20,000.

''We were in the right place at the right time,'' he said of Honduras, where he built churches in unserved rural areas and brought aboard Honduran clergy, including the current bishop.

EXPANSION GOALS

When he arrived in South Florida, Frade had a similarly ambitious goal: to build the diocese by 65,000 members and 20 churches by 2010. But the church is not ''growing as much as we'd like,'' he admits. With six months to go, the number of churches is unchanged and membership has grown by 3,000 to 38,000. His new target date: 2020.

Diversifying membership is another challenge. A choir of Hispanic, African-American, West Indian and Haitian South Floridians sang at his installation, a hopeful sign for a bishop who is fluent in Spanish, French and Portuguese. Today, the diocese has 15 Spanish-language congregations, up from nine in 2000, and three with Creole worship, an increase of one.

Frade has taken the church on the road, forming alliances with Episcopal dioceses as near as Cuba and the Dominican Republic and as far away as Madagascar. Each summer, he and his wife of 23 years, Diana, lead volunteers on a mission trip to Our Little Roses Ministries, a residential program they founded for at-risk girls in Honduras.

Frade has been an outspoken proponent of gay rights. In 2003, he was the only one of Florida's five Episcopal bishops to support the Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, who is openly gay, as bishop of New Hampshire. ''You have to understand that I am the bishop of Key West, the bishop of South Beach, of Fort Lauderdale,'' he told The Herald at the time.

Hundreds of South Florida Episcopalians broke away in protest, aligning themselves with the more conservative Anglican Mission in America.

''That was a difficult period of time for the church. There was internal soul-searching,'' said Nelson Famadas, a real estate developer and friend of the Frades who is an advisor to the Diocese of Puerto Rico. ``There has been a process of healing. The bishop has a capacity to make people come together.''

Last fall, Frade urged parishioners to vote against Amendment 2, the state constitutional amendment that banned same-sex marriage, calling it his ``Christian duty.''

''I tend to be much more conservative, but he supports me,'' said the Rev. Eric Kahl of St. Philip's in Coral Gables. ``I don't preach that from the pulpit, but if the bishop does, God bless.''

Miami Herald staff writer Andrea Asuaje contributed to this report.

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