Episcopal Leaders Expect Anglican Schism
American Church's Support For Gays Draws International Ultimatum

By RINKER BUCK
Courant Staff Writer

February 21 2007

Is the American Episcopal Church headed for a schism with its worldwide Anglican parent?

Connecticut Episcopal leaders said Tuesday that a final break with the international Anglican body could well be the outcome of a communiqué issued from Africa over the weekend demanding that the American church renounce its support for gay clergy and blessing civil unions.

The demand was made on Monday, at the end of a five-day meeting in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, of the 38 primates - or archbishops - of the international Anglican Communion. The primates gave the U.S. Episcopal Church until Sept. 30 to formally renounce its policies on homosexuals.

Bishop Andrew Smith, the head of the Episcopal Diocese in Connecticut, doubts the U.S. bishops will reverse their stand.

"If the Council of Primates is asking us to undo what we have already done, that is a step many of the [American] bishops would be unwilling to take," Smith said.

In 2003, Smith voted to confirm the election of an openly gay priest, Gene Robinson, as bishop of New Hampshire. Last October, Smith also announced that priests - with the permission of their congregations - could dispense a blessing on gay couples already joined by civil unions.

Both positions have placed Smith at the center of a long-festering controversy with six Connecticut congregations that object to the American church's position on inclusion of gays. (There are 174 congregations in the Connecticut diocese.)

While Smith said that he "greatly valued" his relationships with members of the Anglican Communion who disagree with his position, he made it clear that he and most bishops will find it morally impossible to accept the demands of the Dar Es Salaam communiqué.

"I'm not willing to do that," Smith said. "It has always seemed to me that if we accept gay and lesbian people as full partners in our church, we have to be consistent on matters of marriage and clergy. We can't advocate two classes of church citizenship: one for heterosexuals, one for homosexuals. Church unity is important, but you can't compromise on basic principles of conscience."

The Very Rev. Mark B. Pendleton, dean of Christ Church Cathedral in Hartford, said he also doubted that Episcopal leaders would change their position. Episcopalians, he said, have always prided themselves on their independence from their international body because that is what the church's break from Roman Catholicism was all about: freedom for churches in the provinces.

"I can't see how the [American] bishops could accept an explicit ban on same-sex unions," Pendleton said. "We're not going to reverse ourselves as a national church, especially under pressure by foreign bishops."

The Rev. Christopher Leighton, rector of St. Paul's Church in Darien, one of the six Episcopal congregations that have rebelled against Smith over gay issues, seemed to agree that the Dar Es Salaam demands could lead to a final break with the Anglicans.

"The Episcopal Church, in taking this position on homosexuals, has departed from the mainstream of teaching within the entire Christian church," Leighton said. "Now, if they don't renounce, there will be a replacement province recognized by the Anglican Communion which will rebuild the church in North America. The Episcopalians will become a boutique church pursuing its own agenda outside the purview of an international body."

In 1998 and 2003, just as a broad array of church groups in Europe and the United States were advocating an easing of the religious bans on gays, the Anglican Communion reiterated its positions on same-sex marriage and gay clergy. Marriage, the international body said, was reserved for unions between a man and a woman. Gay clergy members and bishops were expected to be celibate.

At its general convention in 2003, however, the U.S. Episcopal Church put itself on a collision course with the international Anglican Communion by approving Bishop Robinson's election in New Hampshire and by allowing priests, in concert with their parishes, to bless gay unions. The presiding bishop of the U.S. Episcopalians, the Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, supported these positions and has generally steered the American church toward a more inclusive policy toward lesbians and gays.

Following the Dar Es Salaam meeting, however, Jefferts Schori seemed to be struggling for reconciliation and asked church members for patience.

"Each party in this conflict is asked to consider the good faith of the other," Jefferts Schori said. "Both parties hold positions that can be defended by appeal to our Anglican sources of authority - Scripture, tradition and reason."

A small but vocal minority of churches and dioceses have sought to withdraw from the American Episcopal Church over the issue, and to realign with the Anglican Communion. The dioceses are: San Joaquim, Calif.; Pittsburgh; South Carolina; Dallas and Fort Worth in Texas; Quincy, Ill.; and Central Florida.

Smith and Pendleton said there was some encouraging language in the communiqué. It mentioned creating a special vicar for conservative dioceses that oppose the Episcopal Church's position on homosexuality, an idea that was proposed last fall by Jefferts Schori.

And the Council of Primates has demanded, in very technical language, that American bishops not authorize any "Rite of Blessing" for same-sex unions.

Technically, Smith said, the American bishops have not issued a formal rite for blessing gay unions, and thus have nothing to renounce.

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