Chapel of the Cross, Chapel Hill, NC

The final plenary session of the conference was held Saturday noon at St. Paul's Chapel which is located immediately adjacent to "Ground Zero" in lower Manhattan. The forum was that of a panel discussion led by the Rt. Rev. Mark Dyer, The Rev. Dr. John Westeroff and the Rev. William Sachs analyzing the response of the Primates to The Windsor Report which had just been released the night before.

The Windsor Report, consisting of some 60 pages of text (along with 30 pages of appendices), is the work of a commission appointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury to address the serious differences that have arisen in the Anglican Church as a result of the actions of the Episcopal Church in this country in affirming the consecration of Gene Robinson to be the Bishop of New Hampshire. It was released in October, 2004. Thirty-five of the 38 Primates met in Ireland for four days beginning February 21, 2005 to consider the report.

The statement of the Primates acknowledges that the actions of the Church in the USA and in Canada with regard to same sex relations were taken entirely in accordance with the appropriate constitutional processes. Nonetheless, it is apparent that there is substantial disagreement among the Primates about the theological basis for the actions. The Primates ask that the representatives from the USA and Canada voluntarily refrain from participating in the upcoming meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) in light of the deep divisions among the Primates. (Here it should be noted that several of the African Primates refused to share the Eucharist with Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold on Monday at the beginning of the session). The Primates further request that representatives of the USA and Canada appear at the meeting of the ACC in June 2005, to provide a rationale for their actions. The report seeks a moratorium on the public Rites of Blessings for same-sex relations and on the consecration of a Bishop of anyone living in a sexual relationship outside of marriage. It seems to recognize the geographical integrity of the respective Provinces and Dioceses as it includes a pledge to "neither encourage nor initiate cross-boundary interventions". Unfortunately, within days of the release of the report, two conservative Bishops violated this pledge by presiding without authority at services in this country and in Canada.

Overall, the panelists found hope in the document that the world wide Anglican Church might be held together. The Rt. Rev. Mark Dyer, who helped author the Windsor Report, expressed guarded optimism that with time, the process prescribed by the Windsor report might be followed.

In a recent interview, the Archbishop of Canterbury was asked whether the Anglican Communion was headed towards a divorce. He replied that he believed "we are more in a marriage counseling mode than divorce court."

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