COME MONDAY
My Episcopalian friends are all sitting on the edges of their pews, waiting for the Monday release of a report that will define the future direction of the Anglican Communion and the how the Episcopal Church USA will be allowed to relate to it. Many are convinced that the Episcopal Church is going to get kicked out. I have my doubts about that, but I suspect that there will be stern words, a call to repent, and some kind of mechanism for recognizing the alternative Anglican bodies which have emerged in response to this protracted hermeneutical crisis in North America. The report will be online on Monday.

Addition (10:15 p.m. PDT, Friday) David Virtue is releasing a story tonight written by Ruth Gledhill of the Times, indicating that the report to be released on Monday contains the following sorta' specifics:

1. The ordination of practicing homosexuals in the Anglican Church is to be outlawed.

2. "Anglican provinces are to be told they must sign an unbreakable unity agreement which would prevent dioceses and provinces from ever ordaining gay bishops such as Gene Robinson in the US again."

3. An adjudicatory will be set-up to police the policy.

4. Churches which violate the policy will be seen as having suspended communion between themselves and the Anglican Communion.

5. "The Windsor Report is also expected to propose a system of 'alternative episcopal oversight' for those conservative evangelical parishes in the US and Canada unable to accept the ordination of Bishop Robinson or same-sex blessings.

"The US church will only be disciplined if it refuses to allow parishes to opt for alternative oversight and take their property with them. The 'star chamber' will be set up to decide whether a province has breached the covenant. Each province will also have its own committee to make sure it does not breach the bonds of unity."

So far, nothing I've heard says anything about what they're going to do with Gene Robinson or if the American Episcopal Church is to be considered immediately out of communion. It sounds like not since there is the alternative episcopal oversight provision.

I'm not sure that this will bear any kind of weight for the Episcopal Church USA -- which I suspect will reject it and put itself outside the Communion rather than subject itself to outside rules. That is, after all, the American way (for better and worse).