Episcopal ecumenists hopeful about Catholic-Anglican future

Published: 2007-03-13

WASHINGTON (CNS) -- There are good signs in Anglican-Catholic relations, despite current tensions between the two churches and within the Anglican Communion over women bishops and an openly gay Episcopal bishop, two Episcopal bishops said during a break in a meeting of the Anglican-Roman Catholic dialogue in the United States. Bishop C. Christopher Epting, chief ecumenical officer of the U.S. Episcopal Church and retired bishop of Iowa, and Bishop Edwin F. Gulick Jr. of the Episcopal Diocese of Kentucky, Anglican co-chairman of the dialogue, spoke with Catholic News Service during the ARC-USA dialogue's March 8-10 meeting at the North American Paulist Center in Washington. Tensions within either church have an impact on the dialogue, but not necessarily a negative one, Bishop Gulick said. Bishop Epting said the question of the Episcopal Church's decision in 2003 to ordain Bishop Gene Robinson, who is living in an openly gay relationship, as bishop of New Hampshire has been part of the dialogue agenda "for the last several years in one way or another." The question for the dialogue, he said, is "not so much the issue of homosexuality or human sexuality, but the issue of ecclesiology that all of this raises: Who makes decisions for the church and how, and how are they received, and what is a communion-dividing or a church-dividing issue and what is of second tier in importance?"

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