Wednesday, October 15
LONDON -- Leaders of the world's 77 million Anglicans face a theological brawl about the Bible and homosexuality here today. When the dust clears, any ''communion'' in their historic Anglican Communion could be in tatters.
Ultra-conservatives in the church are at war with progressives over whether homosexual priests can be bishops and whether same-sex unions may be blessed in the church.
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In an effort to mediate, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, head of the Anglican Communion, has called a special two-day session for all 38 primates, the leaders of all autonomous national and regional Anglican churches, including the Episcopal Church USA.
The issue exploded in August when an overwhelming majority of bishops and lay leaders in the U.S. church, headed by Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold, approved of openly gay Rev. V. Gene Robinson as a bishop of New Hampshire and agreed that dioceses may permit churches to bless gay unions.
A small band of dissenting churches and dioceses, under the flag of the American Anglican Council, immediately aligned with several fundamentalist African primates in outraged opposition.
At a rally in Dallas last week, council leaders denounced Griswold to a cheering crowd of 2,700. They said progressives were ''hellbent'' on destroying the church.
In a ''Call to Action,'' they demanded that the Anglican Communion punish the U.S. church severely for its ''unbiblical and schismatic'' stance. They asked to be recognized as the true Anglican Church in the USA and pledged to support only like-minded ministries at home and abroad. Sympathetic African bishops will present the council's case to Williams and their colleagues today and Thursday.
No one is optimistic that this clash will be resolved in two days. On a recent visit to Rome, Williams told Vatican Radio he was ''hopeful rather than optimistic'' that he could avert a schism.
Tuesday, the Rev. Martyn Minns of Truro Episcopal Church in Fairfax, Va., a leader in the American Anglican Council, said he, too, doubted any quick resolution.
But, he said, the culture clash is so urgent that the primates ''will have to find a way to declare what they stand for -- what's the glue'' that holds the church together.
''Anything could happen,'' says Paul Handley, editor of the Church Times, an independent newspaper of the Anglican Communion. ''Some very uncompromising things have been said these last few days.''
Part of the problem is the structure of the Anglican Communion. It's a gentlemen's club that gathers based on goodwill. Every 10 years, members meet to share ideas and issue proclamations.
Otherwise, they don't vote, pass binding resolutions or have any say -- in religious or secular law -- in how each province operates.
They are members of the group only as long as the Archbishop of Canterbury invites them to the table.
All they can do, if mediation fails, is spurn each other -- and divide a communion bound by centuries of history and common prayer.
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