US: There was general pessimism last night that the Windsor Report could help prevent a split in the 78 million worldwide Anglican Communion. It has been given a less than enthusiastic reception among those North Americans whose actions prompted it.
Bishop Frank Griswold, primate of the 2.3 million US Anglicans (Episcopalians) said it strove for a "containment of differences" but that "unless we go beyond containment . . . we will do disservice to our mission".
Bishop Gene Robinson, whose appointment to the diocese of New Hampshire provoked the current crisis in the Anglican Communion, said he would not be responding to the report until tomorrow.
The Bishop of Limerick and Killaloe, Right Rev Michael Mayes, who attended the consecration of Canon Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire last November, was abroad and unavailable for comment.
Bishop Michael Ingham, the bishop of Canada's New Westminster diocese in British Columbia, who caused a furore last year by agreeing to bless same-sex ceremonies, said he was sorry for causing dismay but not for the decision. "I express regret for the consequences but not for the actions themselves," he said.
In a statement yesterday, the titular head of the worldwide Anglican Communion and Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, hoped "everyone with the well-being of our Communion at heart will now take time to study the report and to pray and reflect on its proposals which . . . offer neither easy nor simple solutions to real and demanding challenges".
African Anglicans applauded the report. "Homosexual behaviour is deviant, unbiblical, unChristian and unnatural," said Archdeacon Oluranti Odubogun, secretary general of the Church of Nigeria Anglican Communion.
Archbishop Greg Venables, a conservative leader of Anglicans in southern South America, said the report "gives us the minimum tools to be able to get things on track". "But whether or not we can get to the point of dialogue will depend on whether the churches in the US and Canada are prepared to accept its proposals," he added.
The Evangelical Alliance, representing conservative British groups, expressed concern that the report called for a moratorium on gay blessings rather than prohibition.
British gay rights campaigner Mr Peter Tatchell described the report as "undisguised homophobia", but the Rev Martin Reynolds, spokesman for the Lesbian Gay and Christian Movement, said "the tenor of the document is itself conciliatory".
