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Leaders of the American Anglican Council (AAC) have spoken for much of this year about a possible realignment of the Anglican Communion. During their "Place to Stand" conference Wednesday at the Wyndham Anatole hotel in Dallas, AAC leaders began to put more flesh on the skeleton of that concept.

Bishop Robert Duncan of the Diocese of Pittsburgh delivered the most solemn address of the day as he described what themes he anticipates from the primates—particularly from outspoken orthodox archbishops in Africa, Asia, and South America.

Duncan, a soft-spoken bishop who has often taken risks in defending besieged conservative clergy, predicted that any realignment of the Anglican Communion will be messy and will require patience. "All of us in this place are having a hard time waiting just now," Duncan said.

The 38 primates (archbishops) of the Anglican Communion will meet on Oct. 15 and 16 in London to discuss responses to the Episcopal Church's approval of an openly gay bishop and of widespread blessings for same-sex couples.

"God willing, the defining battle for the soul of Anglicanism will be fought next week," Duncan said.

Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, "will require the wisdom of Solomon so that the true mother of the living child may take him away to raise him," Duncan said. "In his humanity, his grace will surely seek a compromise. But compromise will just as surely rend the baby into two pieces."

If the primates do not confront the Episcopal Church with a godly rebuke and a call to repentance, "the Archbishop of Canterbury would become little more than the titular head of a declining American, Canadian, British, and Australian sect," Duncan said. "For Rowan Williams, the last British Empire is his to lose."

But even if the primates do issue a call to repentance, Duncan is confident it will prompt an arrogant American response. Duncan called on the more than 2,700 conference participants to keep their eyes on what he called "Magnificat truths."

"Like the fall of the Soviet Union, the Lord will cast the mighty from their thrones and will lift up the lowly," he said. "Count on it."

As the Episcopal Church rebuffs calls for repentance, Duncan said, a network of confessing parishes and dioceses will emerge. Funding will flow into that network, just as bishops will flow from it.

Duncan said members of this network will be accountable and submitted—both to one another and to their fellow Christians in the Global South. And it will be "irrepressibly missionary," he said. "If our first concern in this movement is not to share the gospel of Jesus Christ, then let's quit now."

Earlier in the morning, the Rev. Canon Bill Atwood of the Ekklesia Society described what he has heard while building relationships with primates across the world.

He quoted one archbishop: "When the missionaries came here, they introduced us to Jesus. Now we do not have to travel to the west to ask him what he thinks."

And another: We cannot be in a position of condoning evil."

And another: "ECUSA [the Episcopal Church USA] will have to repent and become fully, biblically faithful—or a new ECUSA will just have to emerge."

In case a new ECUSA indeed has to emerge, AAC leaders offered sessions that encouraged on redirecting funds away from the Episcopal bureaucracy and preparing for possible separation from liberal bishops.

Speakers discouraged parishes from declaring themselves out of communion with the Episcopal Church, or taking any other action before consulting the AAC's legal task force.

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October (Web-only) 2003, Vol. 47