Wednesday, February 06, 2008

Sydney bishops boycott Anglican summit over gays

One of Australia's most powerful Anglican leaders on Sunday said bishops from Sydney would boycott the church's peak world meeting in England this year after siding with opponents of gay bishops and same-sex marriages.

Archbishop of Sydney Peter Jensen, a leading church conservative and opponent of the ordination of gay Bishop Gene Robinson in the United States, said he and five other bishops would not attend the church's Lambeth Conference in August.

"With regret, the archbishop and bishops of the Diocese of Sydney have decided not to attend the Lambeth Conference in July," Jensen said in a statement.

Robinson, the gay bishop of New Hampshire, has split the church following his controversial 2003 consecration by the US Episcopal Church.

The still-simmering controversy threatens to overshadow the Lambeth summit, which brings together around 800 Anglican bishops from around the world once a decade. This year's conference will take place in Canterbury from July 20 to August 3.

Jensen said he had told the church's global head, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, that Sydney bishops "sense that attending the conference at this time will not help heal its divisions".

The church had been "shaken by huge dissent over biblical authority, particularly as it works out in the area of human sexuality," Jensen told the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper.

Jensen's declaration follows the announcement of boycotts by Nigeria, Uganda and Rwanda, announced by the head of the church in Nigeria, Archbishop Peter Akinola.

Akinola and Jensen were instead organising a rival June conference in Jerusalem by church conservatives, called the Global Anglican Future Conference.

Jensen is considered one of Australia's most conservative church leaders, along with the country's head of the Catholic Church, the Archbishop of Sydney, Cardinal George Pell.

Both share similar views opposing pre-marital sex, abortion, euthanasia, gay marriage and the ordination of females or homosexuals.
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