PRIMATES WILL ACT TO DISCIPLINE PRESIDING BISHOP AND ECUSA

By David W. Virtue

DALLAS, TX—A leading evangelist in the Episcopal Church who is in touch with a number of Primates in the Anglican Communion, says the archbishops will intervene in the Episcopal Church when they meet next week in Lambeth, and move to throw Frank Griswold and the Episcopal Church out of the Anglican Communion.

The lightning rod issue is the confirmation and consecration of activist gay bishop Gene Robinson to the Diocese of New Hampshire in November, he told Virtuosity.

Speaking on grounds of anonymity, he said that the Primates are determined to act and the majority have already closed ranks and will demand that Rowan Williams discipline Griswold by suspending him from the Communion unless he can persuade Robinson to step down. Williams was successful in persuading Jeffrey John not to be consecrated the Bishop of Reading.

"The last line in the sand has been drawn. There is no going back. There will also be some kind of pastoral oversight for persecuted orthodox parishes in the US," he said. When questioned he would not elaborate.

Other sources have also told VIRTUOSITY that the CAPA (African) bishops are of one mind and will make a "strong statement" though no one will confirm that the matter of how they will act is a done deal.

A number of orthodox ECUSA bishops have slipped across the Atlantic this week to meet with a number of orthodox Primates to discuss what the future might look like post Lambeth. They will meet before and after the Primates have met and then they will meet with the Archbishop of Canterbury.

VIRTUOSITY has also learned that recent revelations that Canon John Peterson of the Anglican Consultative Council was trying to manipulate the agenda of the upcoming Primates meeting has infuriated the Primates, and they are moving to make sure that he is not present at any of the meetings, and that they will set their own agenda. "They are furious they were being manipulated. They have seen Peterson doing this before, but they will not tolerate it this time," a source told Virtuosity.

Virtuosity has also learned that Peterson's replacement will be the Rev. Dr. Ian T. Douglas, Professor of World Mission and Global Christianity at Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass, ECUSA's most liberal Episcopal seminary.

This will be a disaster for the Communion, said a source who is in regular touch with the Primates. He will be no better than Peterson because theoligically he is not where the majority of the Primates are at, said the source.

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