Storm brews round bishops’ rebuff to Tanzania

http://www.churchtimes.co.uk/content.asp?id=36820

[Church Times] 31 Mar 2007--Responses came thick and fast to the decision by the bishops of the Episcopal Church in the United States (ECUSA) to reject the Primates’ proposal of appointing a Primatial Vicar for dissenting congregations last week (News, 23 March).
Some saw it as the trigger for schism, and the end of the road for any attempt to find a way out of the impasse.

The Presiding Bishop of the Southern Cone, the Most Revd Greg Venables, described the decision as “tragic but predictable. . . In any other context it would be laughed at.” He went on: “It is not possible to maintain relationships when one party unilaterally and coldly departs from previously agreed foundations. Now we must move to separation as quickly and gracefully as possible.”

Canon Dr Chris Sugden of Anglican Mainstream described it as “a declaration of war” by the Episcopal Church on the Anglican Communion. “They know the Archbishop of Canterbury is not going to force them to leave; so it’s a direct challenge to the rest of the Communion to live with them in the Anglican Communion or leave themselves,” he said in a statement.