Bishop MacPherson and Bishop Duncan will attend Primates' Meeting
January 26, 2007

The Rt. Rev'd D. Bruce MacPherson, bishop of Western Louisiana, has been asked by the Most Rev'd Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, to attend a meeting in conjunction with the meeting of the Primates of the Anglican Communion February 14-21 in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

Bishop MacPherson, who is identified as a "Windsor Bishop," and Bishop Robert Duncan, bishop of Pittsburg, and convener of the Anglican Communion Network are the two bishops of the Episcopal Church who have been invited to participate in this gathering.

"This is an important meeting, a time during which the Windsor Report and the direction forward with the development of an Anglican Covenant will play a significant part in their time together," said Bishop MacPherson. "Importantly, the response of the Episcopal Church General Convention 2006 to the Windsor Report will be addressed as a part of this work," he continued. "The outcome of this gathering of the Primates could have a significant impact on not only the Episcopal Church, but the Anglican Communion as a whole."

The Windsor Report is a document produced by an international commission appointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury to "examine the legal and theological implications flowing from the decisions of the Episcopal Church to appoint a priest in a committed same-sex relationship as one of its bishops, and the Diocese of New Westminster (Canada) to authorize services for use in connection with same-sex unions, and specifically on the canonical understandings of communion, impaired and broken communion, and the ways in which provinces of the Anglican Communion may related to one another in situations where the ecclesiastical authorities of one province feel unable to maintain the fullness of communion with another part of the Anglican Communion." The Windsor Report was issued in September 2004.

Bishop MacPherson has been strongly identified as a "Windsor Bishop" since the term first surfaced at the House of Bishops meeting held in the spring of 2005, the first formal meeting of that body after the report's issuance. Those bishops of the Episcopal Church who embraced the report, committed to fulfilling the actions it requested of the Episcopal Church, and pledged themselves to the process of reconciliation proscribed by the report, were and still are designated as Windsor Bishops.

In October 2006, the Diocese of Western Louisiana adopted a posture of "Windsor Compliance" in support of Windsor Report recommendations and the position of its bishop.

"Looking toward this meeting, I am humbled at the prospect of participating. I ask for prayer for those preparing for this meeting, and for me," Bishop MacPherson said.

This article comes from the Diocese of Western Louisiana
http://www.diocesewla.org/

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http://www.diocesewla.org/toattendprimates.htm