Conservative Anglicans reluctant to break away

Thu 26 Jun 2008, 15:51 GMT

JERUSALEM, June 26 (Reuters) - Conservative Anglican leaders meeting at a rebel summit expressed frustration with the church's leadership on Thursday but indicated that an outright schism might be avoided.

The Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON), a week-long convention of hundreds of conservative bishops and clergy, opened on Sunday amid talk that it was a first step towards a split between conservative and liberal wings in the 77-million-strong Anglican Communion.

The Communion is divided over issues such as homosexuality and biblical authority.

But mid-way through the conference, conservative leaders spoke only of making GAFCON a "movement", without indicating how such a process would be handled and if there was enough support among the bishops to initiate a split.

"There is a sense of betrayal and abandonment by the existing leadership and Communion structures," Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi of Kenya said at a press conference.

But he added that "there is a genuine desire to continue to reach out to other Anglicans around the Communion who share our common faith."

When asked whether worshippers would be able to belong to both the new movement and the Anglican Communion, Nzimbi said: "This is something which should emerge clearly at the end of GAFCON."

The conservatives, who claim to represent 35 million Anglicans, mostly in developing countries, have been hinting at a split within the Communion since Anglicanism's first openly gay bishop was consecrated in the United States.

However, it seems that they might now shy away from that step.

"They are trying to back down from the difficult position they put themselves in, as gracefully as possible," said Jim Naughton, Canon for Communications with the diocese of Washington.

GAFCON comes a month before the Lambeth conference, the once-in-a-decade Anglican summit hosted by Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams that agrees on guidelines for member churches. Conservative bishops from Nigeria, Uganda and Kenya have said they will boycott the Lambeth Conference. GAFCON said it would read a first draft of a mission statement to participants on Friday, which would be finalised before the conference ends on Sunday. (Writing by Ari Rabinovitch; Editing by Keith Weir)

Editor's Note: Naughton says exactly what we would expect him to say. Liberals have been labeling Anglicans as schismatics for at least since liberals started the unraveling of the Anglican Communion in 2003. The primates at GAFCON have consistently said that they weren't meeting to separate from the Anglican Communion, but the liberals have their own storyline and they're sticking to it. When reality doesn't fit their storyline they have the gall to blame it on others!