Visit by Anglican Bishop Draws Episcopal Anger

The New York Times

By: NEELA BANERJEE

WASHINGTON, April 27 —The Anglican archbishop of Nigeria, a fierce critic of the Episcopal Church for its acceptance of homosexuality, is arriving next week to install a bishop to lead congregations around the country that want to break from it.

Episcopal leaders say the visit threatens to strain further the already fragile relations between their church and the rest of the worldwide Anglican Communion. But Episcopal traditionalists say there is a growing desire among them to break away. A decision by the Episcopal Church in 2003 to consecrate an openly gay priest, V. Gene Robinson, as the bishop of New Hampshire profoundly alienated those theological traditionalists, and most of the Anglican Communion overseas, who contend that the Bible condemns homosexuality.

The Nigerian archbishop, Peter J. Akinola, will preside over a ceremony in Virginia on May 5 installing Martyn Minns, former rector of an Episcopal church there, as the bishop of the Convocation of Anglicans in North America, an offshoot of the Nigerian church.

The convocation was created in part to oversee congregations that no longer want to be in the Episcopal Church but would like to remain in the Anglican Communion.

Katharine Jefferts Schori, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, said in a statement that Archbishop Akinola’s acceptance of “an invitation to episcopal ministry here without any notice or prior invitation” was not in keeping with “the ancient practice in most of the church” that bishops minister only within their own jurisdictions.

“This action would only serve to heighten current tensions,” the statement said, “and would be regrettable if it does indeed occur.”

Archbishop Akinola is the primate of the largest region, or province, in the 77-million-member Anglican Communion. He is also the leader of an increasingly successful alliance between theological conservatives in North America and those in the developing world that is pushing the Episcopal Church to renounce its acceptance of gay men and lesbians or face exclusion from the communion.

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