The existence of conflict in the church is a sign of health and vitality, the head of the Episcopal Church told a live web audience Wednesday.
"If there's no conflict, it means that we're dead," said Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori. "There has always been push and pull in the church. It's a sign that the diversity among us is passionate and that is a gift from God, not something to be squelched."
Jefferts Schori was speaking in the first of a series of webcast conversations, which have been designed to foster better understanding in the church and to address current issues.
Jefferts Schori had just returned from a meeting in London involving a number of Anglican primates – chief bishops of the Anglican Communion's 38 provinces – and others on the Standing Committee. During the July 23 to 27 meeting, committee members rejected a proposal that the Episcopal Church be separated from the rest of the global body. Cutting the US church would inhibit dialogue on issues of human sexuality and therefore would be unhelpful, they agreed.
"There was ... a clear reflection by members of the group that the Episcopal Church's presence is important to that dialogue, an unwillingness by the group to exclude us even though one member called for that because of that commitment to dialogue even when we don't agree on something," Jefferts Schori said during the webcast.
Noting the significance of staying united, the Episcopal leader said the Church could serve God's mission more effectively together.
The proposal for the US Church's separation was made after it ordained its second openly homosexual bishop in Los Angeles despite calls for restraint by the wider Anglican Communion. The ordination caused uproar as conservative Anglicans called it another act of defiance by the US body of Scripture and the 77 million-member communion. The Episcopal Church consecrated its first openly gay bishop in 2003.
When asked by a viewer of the webcast, "Has the Anglican Communion abandoned us, have we abandoned them?" Jefferts Schori responded, "Nobody's abandoned anybody.
