Episcopal discord deepens
Key conservatives may call for schism
DALLAS -- More than 2,000 Episcopalians, furious that their church has elected an openly gay bishop in New Hampshire, signaled a deepening rift by refusing to allow a delegation sent by the denomination's leader to join them as they debated a possible schism.
Using words like "apostasy" and "heresy" and "immorality" to describe actions of their denomination, leading conservative Episcopalians told a gathering of about 2,600 they should demand that the archbishop of Canterbury "rebuke, reject, or correct" the Episcopal Church USA for allowing a noncelibate, gay bishop to serve in New Hampshire and for failing to bar the blessing of same-sex unions.
Gathered at a cavernous Texas hotel, the Episcopal dissidents -- 45 bishops among them -- describe themselves as "orthodox Anglicans." They are expected tomorrow to issue a statement calling for the archbishop of Canterbury to intervene in the Episcopal Church, which is the US branch of the Anglican Communion. A draft statement circulating at the conference suggests that the church should "create a new alignment for Anglicanism in North America" in which orthodox bishops would play a leading role.
"We come from a deaf church . . . with lots of sorrow and heartbreak, with relationships that have been broken, but we come knowing that our church has embraced schism and heresy," said Bishop Robert W. Duncan of Pittsburgh. Duncan called the denomination's August convention in Minneapolis, where the gay bishop was affirmed, "schismatic." He said that, as he bid farewell to bishops who supported the election, he felt heartbroken because "we knew we would not be in the same church."
In a clear sign of their alienation from the national church, the organizers of the Dallas conference refused to allow the denomination's presiding bishop, Frank T. Griswold, and the president of the denomination's House of Deputies, George Werner, to send a delegation of observers, which was to include two bishops, a seminary president, and a priest.
In August, Griswold supported the national convention's decision to affirm the Rev. Canon V. Gene Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire, after Robinson was elected to that post by New Hampshire Episcopalians. Griswold was traveling in California yesterday and could not be reached for comment on the Dallas convention, but he told the Episcopal News Service that he had wanted to send an observer delegation to Dallas to "bring a greeting and to listen with care and the ear of the heart to the voices of those present." Conference organizers said they were not allowing any observers other than the news media.
A number of bishops who supported Robinson's election sent aides to Dallas to remind reporters that a majority of the nation's Episcopal bishops, priests, and lay people supported the decision to elect a gay bishop and recognize same-sex unions.
The Rev. Daniel J. Webster, director of communications for the Diocese of Utah, said the Dallas gathering was out of character for a church which seeks to accommodate differences.
"This conference," he said, "is a departure from what traditional Anglicanism has been about, which is living in the tension of diverse opinions, but still being able to come to the same table."
The two sides disagree over what fraction of the Episcopal Church would break away if given the opportunity to join a more conservative Anglican province, although both sides agree it would be a minority. Critics of Robinson's election contended that many of the nation's largest Episcopal parishes have sent delegations to Dallas. But Robinson's supporters suggested that few of the 46 bishops present actually head dioceses -- many are retired or serve in auxiliary capacities -- and that the bishops who protested the actions of the August convention represented just 13 percent of the nation's Episcopalians.
Yesterday, inside Trinity Conference Center at Wyndham Anatole Hotel, the gathered Episcopalians cheered as their own denomination was blasted by theologians, bishops, and priests.
"We are a church under judgment," said the Rev. Kendall S. Harmon, an Episcopal theologian from South Carolina. "The Episcopal Church is now a church where people are officially led away from Christ. This is why we need a realignment."
Harmon said "a way of life which is in contradiction to holiness was celebrated and blessed" at the Episcopal Church's general convention in August.
The 48-hour gathering of conservative American Episcopalians in Dallas is a prelude to an emergency session next week of the 38 primates of Anglican provinces around the world, who have been summoned to London by the leader of the Anglican Communion, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams.
The conservative Episcopalians gathered in Dallas have a variety of viewpoints about what should happen now, but want Williams to find some way to declare that those parts of the Episcopal Church that support a gay bishop have erred and that those that oppose a gay bishop are the true Anglicans in the United States.
"The church convention has erred and must be rebuked, rejected, or corrected in some way," said the Rev. David H. Roseberry, rector of Christ Church in Plano, Texas.
Roseberry and others attending the Dallas conference plan to travel to London to talk to the archbishop of Canterbury.
The American conservatives are clearly in the minority within the Episcopal Church. But they have aligned themselves with Anglican primates in the developing world who have said they oppose the increasing acceptance of homosexuality in Western culture and in Western churches, and have denounced the decision by the Episcopal Church, which is the American province of the Anglican Communion, to elect a gay bishop. A majority of Anglicans now live in the developing world; just 2 million of the estimated 70 to 80 million Anglicans in the world live in the United States.
Michael Paulson can be reached at mpaulson@globe.com.
