CONCORD, N.H. (AP) – The Episcopal Church’s first openly gay bishop, V. Gene Robinson, says he is being treated for alcoholism.

“I am writing to you from an alcohol treatment center where on Feb. 1, with the encouragement and support of my partner, daughters and colleagues, I checked myself in to deal with my increasing dependence on alcohol,” Robinson wrote in an e-mail dated Feb. 13.

Robinson’s assistant at the Diocese of New Hampshire, the Rev. Tim Rich, said that a growing awareness of his problem, rather than a crisis, led to Robinson’s decision.

In his letter, Robinson, 58, says he has been dealing with alcoholism for years and had considered it “as a failure of will or discipline on my part, rather than a disease over which my particular body simply has no control, except to stop drinking altogether.”

Rich said the news surprised him and many others.

“We did not see it in any way impact his ministry in the diocese,” Rich said.

The Rev. David Jones, rector of Robinson’s home church, St. Paul’s in Concord, said he also was surprised and had not seen any signs, even in retrospect, that Robinson had a problem with alcohol.

Robinson was elected bishop of New Hampshire in 2003 and confirmed by the national church, causing an upheaval not only in the Episcopal Church, but the worldwide Anglican Communion of which it is part.

Robinson will spend four weeks in rehabilitation. Spokesperson Mike Barwell said the diocese would not disclose the location.

Rich said he has spoken with Robinson since he went into treatment and it appears to be going well. “This is hard, hard work but he’s in good spirits,” he said.

Robinson indicates in his letter he plans to return to work soon.

“I eagerly look forward to continuing my recovery in your midst,” he wrote. “Once again, God is proving his desire and ability to bring an Easter out of Good Friday.”

In the Episcopal Church system, such matters are handled within the diocese. Between sessions of the diocesan convention, the “standing committee,” an elected panel of priests and lay parishioners, normally decides supervision of the diocese during a bishop’s absence and other questions regarding his administration. The national church gets involved only in rare cases of formal charges involving misconduct.

The diocese’s standing committee said its members support Robinson “and we commend him for his courageous example to us all, as we pray daily for him and for his ministry among us.”

In addition to touching off protests and struggles for control and property in the Episcopal and other Anglican churches, Robinson has found himself a celebrity.

At New York’s Pride parade last spring, marchers and spectators crowded around him for more than three hours, reaching out to touch his hand, crying and thanking him.

“It sounds soap-operaish to say, but I’m the son of a tobacco sharecropper who didn’t live in a house with running water until I was 10 years old. I can’t believe I’m here, you know. So I find it very difficult to be anything but grateful,” he told The Associated Press in an interview later last year.