More bishops back Anaheim statement: CEN 8.28.09 p 7.

Two more American bishops have endorsed the Anaheim Statement of dissent from the actions of the 76th General Convention, which voted to walk apart from the Anglican Communion by ending the ban on gay bishops and blessings.

The Rt. Rev. Charles Jenkins, Bishop of Louisiana, and the Rt. Rev. Harry Shipps, retired Bishop of Georgia have raised the total number of bishops who have pledged their loyalty to both the Anglican Communion and to the Episcopal Church to 36.

The Communion Partners group, the “loyal opposition” of parishes within the Episcopal Church has also grown in recent weeks and as of Aug 11 represents nearly 60,000 at worship on Sunday. The Rev. Russell Levenson, Jr., rector of St Martin’s Episcopal Church told The Church of England Newspaper the group’s members now number 66 parish rectors, whose congregations range in size from his Houston parish of 8500 members to the Church of the Incarnation in Lafayette, Louisiana with 20 members.

The Rev. R. Leigh Spruill, rector of St George’s, Nashville, Tennessee, and the group’s new administrator told CEN the Communion Partners were not a protest group, but a “missional fellowship committed to reviving classical Christianity” within the Episcopal Church.

The weeks following the Anaheim General Convention had produced a “heightened anxiety” among many clergy, Mr. Spruill said. The Communion Partners provided a refuge for those “committed to remaining within the Anglican Communion and the Episcopal Church,” while also offering “theological and spiritual support.”

“We are not just another group poised to split off,” Mr. Spruill said. “Because of our ecclesiology” as clergy committed to the Anglican way, we believe that working towards the Archbishop of Canterbury’s goal of building an Anglican Covenant is a “reasonable” and “solid theological place to stand.”

The “Anglican Communion is not an idol for us, but a gift from God,” he said. The Communion Partners “offers us a way forward for us” to be faithful to “our vows” as priests, and to our faith, Mr. Spruill said.