With Fear And Trembling

The conflict broke open in 2003 when the U.S. Anglicans consecrated Gene Robinson, the first openly gay bishop—a move that horrified African Anglican clergy. Dissident Anglican leaders, dominated by a contingent of African bishops, met in Jerusalem last month, in advance of the Lambeth Conference, to register their discontent and debate an alternative future for Anglicanism. In a speech, Nigerian Archbishop Akinola, who is viewed as a torchbearer of African Anglicanism, made pointed references to "inhuman physical slavery in the 19th century" and the "political slavery of colonialism" in the 20th century. He vowed that he and his followers "will not abdicate our God-given responsibility and simply acquiesce to destructive modern cultural and political dictates." The attendees drew up a ringing 14-point declaration of beliefs, including a rejection of homosexuality and a condemnation of the "false Gospel" of liberalism.

The question now, as the Lambeth Conference gets underway, is whether the Anglican community can bridge this chasm. The absence of a central authority means there is little scope for imposing a solution. Despite his 1,400-year-old title, the Archbishop of Canterbury can deploy no more than soft power over the 38 national and regional churches that together make up the Anglican Communion. "The Communion doesn't have the same kind of discipline as the Catholics do," says Andrew Brown, a British expert on church affairs. "You can't simply sack a priest or a bishop."

The champions of unity at the Lambeth Conference will also have to confront the fact that conservative sentiments are not limited to Africa. Some North American clergy, as well as others in Asia and Australia, are just as unhappy with the liberal drift of the religion, and blame that drift for tumbling U.S. attendance figures, which have dropped 30 percent since the 1960s to 2.2 million per week. But a complete rupture remains unlikely. Simon Barrow, of the religious think tank Ekklesia, says a schism would endanger the credibility and influence the Africans get from being a part of a larger grouping as envisaged by the Jerusalem Conference. More likely, the Anglican family of churches will morph into a still looser grouping. Yet it is increasingly clear that conservatives in the former colonies are becoming the real power in the Communion. With their numbers growing, the traditionalists don't want mere toleration inside this Anglican family: they want it to follow their path. The era of compromise, in other words, may soon be over.

With Andrew Bast in New York

© 2008