“The Windsor Process”

The Anglican Communion web site's Windsor Process pages note that the Windsor Process has "four main elements: an Anglican Covenant, the Listening Process, the Panel of Reference and the Windsor Report 2004." Each element has its own web page and links to relevant materials.

While these pages are a tremendous resource to the Communion at large, the Windsor Process pages at etdiocese.net are meant to assemble the major resources and news reports to assist East Tennessee Episcopalians as they follow and interpret the controversies.

Four "Instruments of Communion" guide relationships among the Anglican Communion's member provinces. They are the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Anglican Consultative Council, the Lambeth Conference of Anglican bishops and the Primates' Meeting. Information about each is available through links from the main Web page of the Anglican Communion.

Membership in the Anglican Communion is a matter determined by each province's direct formal relationship with the See of Canterbury. The Episcopal Church is among 38 member provinces of the Anglican Communion, which has 77 million members in 164 countries.

At its General Convention in 2003, the Episcopal Church gave its consent to the election of the Rev. V. Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire. Robinson is an openly gay man in a long-term committed relationship with another man. The General Convention also recognized "that local faith communities are operating within the bounds of our common life as they explore and experience liturgies celebrating and blessing same-sex unions," and it committed the church to continued study and discernment on the issue, including the compilation of existing resources by a special commission.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, in response to uproar in other Provinces over these actions and decisions of other Provincial members on similar matters, appointed a Lambeth Commission on Communion. This 17-member international panel was to explore the nature of communion and look specifically at how interrelationships are maintained amid differing views and practices among Anglicans, including varied understandings of human sexuality. The Commission released the final report of its work, the Windsor Report, on Oct. 18, 2004.

Discernment and Response
Reverse Chronological Highlights

A report of the Anglican Consultative Council's June 2005 meeting and a snapshot of the Episcopal Church and Anglican Church of Canada's invited presentations

House of Bishops' Covenant Statement and a Word to the Church (March 2005)

Report of an international group of Anglican bishops who were called by the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1999 to hold conversations on the topic of human sexuality (March 2005)

Primates' Meeting Communique (Feb. 24, 2005) and presiding bishop's statement (Feb. 25, 2005)

Our Commitment to Partnership in the Gospel: A Word to the Church from Executive Council (Feb. 14, 2005)

A Word to the Church from the House of Bishops and a supplemental statement from group of 21 bishops (January 2005)

Presiding Bishop's thoughts on first review of the Windsor Report (Oct. 18, 2004)

The Windsor Report, written by the Lambeth Commission on Communion, whose members were appointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury at the request of the Anglican Primates. (Oct. 18, 2004)

A group of Windsor resources were gathered as an aid to East Tennessee Episcopalians.

Sources: Episcopal News Service, the Episcopal Church, Anglican Communion News Service, the Anglican Communion

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