Is the Anglican Covenant an instrument to castrate conservatives, or a stick to beat liberals?
The third, Ridley draft of the Covenant is one of the main items under debate.
The future unity of the Communion depends on this instrument, to which all provinces that want to be in full communion with each other will have to sign up, and which contains the germs of a disciplinary process to penalise those who go against its fundamentally Biblical norms on doctrine and practice.
In other words, it implies that no province that wishes in future to consecrate gay bishops or bless gay marriages with an authorised liturgy, will be able to do so.
This is why, understandably, liberals in The Episcopal Church in the US are extremely wary.
Ultimately, a lot will depend on what happens at The Episcopal Church's General Convention in July. Although the Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori has ruled out discussion of the covenant for another three years, giving dioceses and parishes time to debate it properly.
Rumours of attempts in July to overturn or eclipse the GenCon06's Canon BO33, which in the name of the international unity so desperately courted by the Archbishop of Canterbury, imposed a moratorium on the move to equal rights for homosexuals in the Church, will not go away.
If that happens, the Covenant process will be finished.
More here-
http://timescolumns.typepad.com/gledhill/2009/05/covenant-is-this-an-instrument-to-castrate-gafcon.html
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