Anglican Church in a 'mess' over gay bishop row

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/05/29/nchurch29.xml

[The Daily Telegraph] 30 May 2007--The Primate of the Southern Cone in South America, Archbishop Gregory Venables, told The Daily Telegraph: "It is a mess. Unless there is a major shift there are going to be significant absences from Lambeth."

The conservative "Global South" primates, who are mostly from Africa and Asia, are furious because they believe Dr Williams has been unduly lenient with the liberal leadership of the American branch of Anglicanism.

Many of them had expected that all the liberal American bishops would be excluded from the Lambeth Conference unless they reversed their unilateral pro-gay agenda.

The US bishops were given until September 30 by the Anglican primates to declare a moratorium on the consecration of gay bishops and same-sex blessings and to approve a "parallel" Church scheme for American conservatives.

So far the Americans have rejected the scheme and seem unlikely to fulfil the other requests. Dr Williams, who begins his extended leave on Friday, appeared to offer them unconditional invitations to the Lambeth Conference last week.

Archbishop Venables, who is a leading member of the Global South group's steering committee, said: "The fact that Gene Robinson isn't going to be at Lambeth is important. But the gesture towards the liberal American bishops is far, far more significant."