TROUBLE?

Anglicans 'expel' Canada
(Bob Harvey, National Post, June 23rd, 2005)

The fierce battle within the Anglican Church over homosexual clergy and same-sex marriage has brought the Canadian and American branches of the faith to the brink of banishment by the Church's ruling bodies meeting in England.

The controversy flared up at the Anglican Consultative Council session in Nottingham yesterday, pitting the liberal, pro-homosexual Canadian and American congregations against a hardline coalition of African and Asian wings that bitterly opposes homosexual involvement in Church affairs.

At the root of the dispute is the consecration of openly gay clergyman Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire and the decision by the diocese of New Westminster, B.C., to authorize the blessing of same-sex marriage.

The same-sex confrontation in the Church comes as the Parliament of Canada is locked in an equally bitter showdown over government legislation that would make Canada only the third nation in the world to legalize formal same-sex marriage.

Yesterday the Consultative Council rejected the North American rationale for homosexual participation in Church affairs and voted to banish both Canada and the U.S. from the council and its central finance and standing committees.

What trouble?