A resolution seeking the expulsion of the Episcopal Church and Anglican Church of Canada from all “official entities of the Communion” until Lambeth 2008 has been brought to the floor of the meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) in Nottingham, England. Debate in closed session began at 2:30 p.m. local time, 9:30 a.m. EDT.

A coalition of delegates from Southeast Asia, Nigeria, Congo, Kenya, the Southern Cone, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, England, Pakistan and the Sudan submitted the resolution to committee on June 18. It was released from the resolutions committee on Tuesday evening and presented to the delegates Wednesday morning.

The move to bring the North American issue to a speedy resolution came at a point when the Anglican Communion appeared to have reached a stalemate following presentations by the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada Tuesday afternoon.

Following the three hours of presentations by the two teams, the ACC cancelled a scheduled evening session devoted to discussion of the North American presentations. A spokesman for the ACC told The Living Church the delegates were tired and wished to inwardly digest the reports. He noted that the delegates did not present any comments or questions.

The mood of the gathering was anxious in the run up to the start of the presentation panels Tuesday. Accusations of foul play were also traded that morning among the visitors to the meeting with poor relations among the rival American camps at Nottingham in evidence.

The American Anglican Council (AAC) released a statement decrying the activities of the observers from the Episcopal Church, saying the observers were not complying with the primates’ request to step back, but were actively lobbying the delegates.

The air conditioning in the University of Nottingham Business School broke down before the session started, and as the 73 delegates and 100 visitors and members of the press filed in to the room through a phalanx of security guards checking badges, the atmosphere in the room thickened, becoming close and humid.

The U.S. and Canadian teams were equally skittish before the start Tuesday. The Rt. Rev. J. Neil Alexander, Bishop of Atlanta, said he was conscious of the moment, while Archbishop Andrew Hutchison of Canada told TLC he was jet-lagged, having arrived in England that morning. Other than pleasantries, they all had no comment.

Presiding Bishop Frank T. Griswold opened the American presentation with prayer. The Rt. Rev. Catherine S. Roskam, Bishop Suffragan of New York, gave an overview of the controversy in America, followed by a theological reflection by the Rev. Michael Battle, academic dean and vice-president of Virginia Theological Seminary. The Rev. Susan Russell, associate rector of All Saints’ Church, Pasadena, Cal., and president of Integrity, and Jane Tully, founder of C-FLAG, offered personal observations while Bishop Jenkins and Bishop Alexander spoke to institutional concerns.

The Episcopal Church’s presentation that the 2003 General Convention actions were prophetic was followed by a presentation by the Anglican Church of Canada.

The Rt. Rev. Susan Moxley introduced the delegates and spoke to her attachment to the Communion and to the ACC. The Rev. Stephen Andrews, president of Thornloe University, gave a historical and theological analysis of the issues from a traditionalist perspective; Toronto lawyer Robert Falby spoke to canon and secular law issues; Maria Jane Highway gave a personal reflection, and the Very Rev. Peter Elliot, dean of Christ Church Cathedral in Vancouver gave a progressive theological critique and spoke of his experiences as a “partnered gay man.”

Archbishop Hutchison closed the session, telling delegates of the “profound Canadian commitment to the Communion and its partnerships around the globe.”

He had “made his best efforts to comply with the requests of the primates” he said. “Everything that is in that communiqué, Dromantine, everything has been complied with.”

While the outward face of the council at the close of business was one of exhaustion and stasis, the resolutions committee met at 8:00 p.m. local time yesterday and afterward made public the resolution sponsored by Stanley Isaac of Southeast Asia, calling for the expulsion of the Episcopal Church.

Following Morning Prayer on Wednesday morning, as the delegates returned to the auditorium, they were handed a letter from Nigerian Archbishop Peter Akinola and a “Global South statement regarding the request for listening.”

Archbishop Akinola, the Nigerian episcopal delegate to the ACC, wrote “we are all here as representatives of our various provinces and a primary concern for the people whom we serve is the outcome of this current controversy that has divided our Communion at its deepest level.”

He stated, “We dare not go forward from here without at least some indication of what comes next after listening to yesterday’s presentations from ECUSA and the Anglican Church of Canada.”

The North American question was the most “pressing matter” facing the Communion and he asked that a closed meeting be held to “sort out the best way forward.” The “Global South” statement sponsor’s said they were unmoved by the presentations given by the U.S. and Canada as they “did not explain that thinking with reference to the teaching of the Anglican Communion as expressed in Lambeth 1.10” among others.

The statement argued the Episcopal Church had chosen to “depart from the received and agreed teaching of this Communion … ignore all four instruments of unity … disregard the processes by which we come to a common mind … and overlook the specific request” of Windsor Report paragraph 141, which advised against the “development and approval” of rites for the blessing of same-sex unions.

The Global South group asked the ACC to endorse the Lambeth 1998 resolutions on human sexuality and confirm the communiqué released by the primates after their February meeting in Northern Ireland.

At the close of the Wednesday morning session, ACC chairman Bishop John Paterson, put Archbishop Akinola’s request to close the 2:30 meeting to a vote. It passed by a large majority.

The dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, the Very Rev. John H. Moses, who had voted against closing the meeting, rose to ask the chair “that given the impact of the resolution on the Anglican Communion” of expelling the U.S. and Canada until Lambeth 2008, “perhaps it would be better to have a two-thirds majority vote” on the issue.

Bishop Paterson took the issue under advisement.

(The Rev.) George Conger is in Nottingham, England reporting for The Living Church from the triennial meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council.

Full Coverage From the ACC Triennial:

· Council Somber After Vote to Exclude North Americans

· ACC Suspends North American Churches

· Vote on Resolution to Expel North Americans Scheduled

· Communion's Spotlight is on Presentation Panels

· Archbishop Says Common Ground Still Exists

· Status Quo at ACC Holds on Second Day

· Withdrawn Status of North Americans Noted

· ACC Opening Session Surprise

· ACC Meeting Opens with Dinner and Orientation

· Bishop Roskam to Serve in Two Capacities at Nottingham

Photos from Nottingham

· U.S., Canadian representatives seated apart

· The Rev. Canon Kenneth Kearon, ACC secretary general

· The Rev. Canon Michael Burrows of Ireland

· New Zealand Bishop John C. Paterson, chairman of the ACC

· Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams

· Bishops Moxley and Roskam

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