Episcopalians get rebuke over gay bishop

An international commission intent on stopping the splintering of the worldwide association of Anglican churches rebuked the U.S. Episcopal Church on Monday for electing a gay bishop and called on it to apologize and to refrain from promoting any other openly gay clergy.

But the commission, created last year to heal the global rift caused by the consecration of V. Gene Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire, stopped short of disciplining the U.S. church and of challenging the validity of Robinson’s election, as conservatives had sought.

It also criticized conservative African bishops for meddling in the affairs of U.S. dioceses and asked them to apologize.

Trying to reconcile the world’s bitterly divided 77 million Anglicans, Irish Anglican leader Robin Eames, head of the commission, pleaded Monday for both sides “to look for healing, not division.”

The panel’s report, he told a news conference in the crypt of London’s historic St. Paul’s Cathedral, “does not offer any easy judgment on the situation, … and it does not offer any easy solution either.”

Since Robinson, an openly gay priest, was elected the first gay bishop last year, the Anglican Communion, which traces its roots to the Church of England, has been bitterly divided over issues of homosexuality and biblical authority. The split has been largely along geographic lines between more liberal churches in North America and England, and the rapidly expanding, more conservative churches in Africa and the Southern Hemisphere.

The mission of the 17-member commission was to find ways to seek unity in a church whose bonds are entirely voluntary, unlike those, for instance, in the Roman Catholic Church. But only a few hours after the release of its unanimous, 93-page report, liberal and conservative partisans showed little inclination to offer olive branches to one another.

“I don’t see any need to apologize,” said Long Island, N.Y., Bishop Orris Walker, a strong supporter of Robinson’s who participated in his consecration ceremony last year. “I think we in good faith followed our conscience and came to certain conclusions. If our decisions have offended folk, I’m sorry for that, and I ask they would engage us in conversation so they might understand more fully why we arrived at the decisions we arrived at.”

Walker and others suggested the report could put the Episcopal church in the position of having to choose between ordaining gays and remaining in the Anglican Communion.

“I don’t think in the Christian tradition we can marginalize anyone,” said Walker, whose diocese includes Brooklyn and Queens as well as Long Island. “And that’s what this report seems to attempt to ask us to do.”

Similarly, Frank Griswold, leader of the 2.3 million member U.S. Episcopal Church, expressed “regret” for how “difficult” and “painful” the election of Robinson was to some congregants. But he said he is “obliged to affirm the presence and positive contribution of gay and lesbian persons to every aspect of the life of our church.”

On the other side, activist conservatives expressed disappointment that the report did not punish U.S. leaders or offer recognition to dissenting congregations that have sought to align themselves with African bishops.

“We have strong concerns about the fact that they call only for the Episcopal Church USA to ‘express regret’ and fail to recommend direct discipline,” said the Anglican Communion Network and the American Anglican Council. The two groups represent traditional Episcopalians who have formed a network of dissenting congregations in a challenge to U.S. church leaders.

Yet some said they remained optimistic that once digested, the report would promote healing.

“I believe that God is working in all this turmoil,” said New York Bishop Mark Sisk. “I think this report is saying to those on the liberal and the conservative sides of this issue, ‘Think again. And always remember, you’re part of something larger than your local experience.’ And I believe that things will work out.”