At the end of the first day of the Anglican Primates Meeting in February in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, news reports were proclaiming that The Episcopal Church (TEC) of America had escaped censure for its actions in ordaining a non-celibate divorced gay man as a bishop.
A report of views gathered from around the Communion presented to the Primates by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams (pictured above), said that TEC had undergone a ‘significant shift’ since the consecration of Gene Robinson in 2003 and its expressions of regret were ‘sufficient’.
The report noted that the General Convention had been unable to follow the Windsor Report’s request because legal advice to the General Convention had been that a moratorium on same sex-blessings was ‘difficult to embody in legislation under the provisions of the Episcopal Church’s constitution’. The reason was the canonical prohibition in the Church’s canons (laws) of any kind of discrimination, including discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation. However, on further examination it is clear that this canon relates to orientation, and the current issue is over practice.
