The Panel concluded the following: They could not recommend the transfer of jurisdiction, which the orthodox were seeking. An agreed scheme of extended ministry was indeed required but that the Anglican Church in Canada needed to provide such a scheme, and that an acceptable Bishop be appointed for an initial period of 3 years and this person should be given delegated authority to perform visitations and confirmations. Orthodox bishops should be involved in appointing and ordaining, but alongside the heterodox Bishops. Disciplinary and legal action against orthodox clergy and parishes should be stopped and written assurances given. Parishes looking for oversight should get involved again in synodical government with and financial giving to heterodox dioceses and bishops.

Based on this evidence orthodox parish priests around the world might just as well impale themselves on Maasai spears for all the good this will do them.

Wrote one orthodox priest; "The seeds of the total disintegration of the Cantuar-centered Anglican Communion are to be found [in this report]. It is illogical to ask for structural remedy because the Church of England is still in full communion with New Westminster and its bishop. The Church of England is not in diminished communion with anyone."

Reaction to the POR decision was immediate. Around the world liberals rejoiced while orthodox priests and primates were stunned and disappointed.

The Archbishop of the Southern Cone, the Most Rev. Gregory Venables said it was too little late. He wrote: "Given that the Panel of Reference process has taken twenty painfully slow and drawn-out months to do what was considered desperately urgent at the onset, it is now tragic to receive a report that fails to address the crisis in New Westminster adequately. It simply does not reflect the depth nor the severity of the crisis that has been precipitated by Michael Ingham's actions.

"While the Windsor Report had the stated aim of "a mutually agreed commitment to effecting reconciliation," the last two years have merely and obviously seen an entrenchment of the attitudes and commitments of those whose actions have "torn the fabric of the communion." Whilst Kingdom values call us to be open to the possibility of repentance, it is unreasonable and irresponsible to continue to wait for what has been so clearly refused. There is not the tiniest indication that Michael Ingham might have any intention of turning away from pursuing an agenda that the instruments of Unity of the Communion have already rejected as being outside the boundaries of the Christian faith."

His views were echoed by West Indies Primate Drexel Gomez who wrote: "the Panel has failed to understand the political and theological reality of the situation in which the applicants find themselves. Consequently, in my opinion, the recommendations of the Panel do not respond adequately to the real situation. In addition the Panel seems to have ignored the present situation in the Communion as described by the Archbishop of Canterbury in his 14th of September, 2006, letter:

"It is clear that the Communion as a whole remains committed to the teaching on human sexuality expressed in Resolution 1.10 of the 1998 Lambeth Conference, and also that the recommendations of the Windsor Report have been widely accepted as a basis for any progress in resolving the tensions that trouble us. As a Communion, we need to move forward on the basis of this twofold recognition."

A statement from the Anglican Network in Canada (ANiC) whose parishes and priests are most immediately affected by the Panel's ruling, said "the recommendations fell short," and in an Open Letter from the Network signed by Bishop Donald Harvey, Moderator of the ANiC & Director of Anglican Essentials Canada (AEC), The Rev. George Sinclair, Chair of the ANiC & Co-Chair of AEC Canada and The Rev. Charles Masters, National Director of AEC Canada, they asked the Anglican Church of Canada to prayerfully consider the consequences of continued disregard for the spirit and teaching of the Scriptures "which is our heritage as an Anglican Communion. Anglican brothers and sisters have upheld this apostolic tradition with its doctrines - even at the cost of their own lives."

"Our prayer is that all of us in the Anglican Church of Canada will demonstrate true repentance, embrace Biblical teaching, and restore unity in the Communion. BUT IF NOT", we are committed to ensuring faithful Canadian Anglicans are able to stay with the Anglican Communion and uphold the gospel within the Anglican Communion and uphold the gospel within the Anglican tradition."

But a group of Orthodox Canadian Anglicans who broke away from the Diocese of New Westminster over four years ago felt a sense of vindication by their actions and said in a press release that the ANiC were sold down the river by the Panel of Reference has clearly 'dropped the ball' after such a long period of procrastination.

"The Panel of Reference does not seem to realize the level of trauma that faithful Greater Vancouver Anglicans have endured during their stand for biblical truth and traditional Anglican morals. This has not been a Sunday school picnic. Many faithful Anglican congregations in Greater Vancouver have been closed, taken over, decimated, or forced to 'move overseas' to Africa to obtain new Anglican jurisdiction and oversight."

"The POR's suggestion that Holy Cross Abbotsford and Church of the Resurrection, Hope should go back to the diocese, reveals that the POR does not really comprehend the level of spiritual abuse that these two congregations have been through."

"The POR is encouraging the four remaining ACiNW parishes still in the New Westminster diocese to repay their withheld assessments and go back to the very Synod they courageously walked out from four and a half years ago. In return, all they are offering is a temporary visiting bishop with no jurisdiction. Nowhere does the POR challenge the diocese of New Westminster to repent of its apostasy and immorality. The POR has given the ACiNW a stale crust of bread."

In June 2002 the Diocese of New Westminster voted 215-129 in favor of blessing same-sex unions. Bishop Ingham gave his consent. Following that, eight parishes with their clergy and laity withdrew from the diocese and appealed for Alternate Episcopal Oversight (AEO). Over time the number of parishes appealing for AEO grew to 11. The Most Rev. Emmanuel M. Kolini, Archbishop of Rwanda and bishop of Kigali, and more recently, one of two renegade archbishops consecrated four 'missionary' bishops in the Episcopal Church in the United States, to minister to traditional Episcopalians who objected to women priests and other moves toward a more liberal church.

Perhaps the most telling paragraph in the 11-page report is par. 21 where it urges applicants to remain "in full communion with the Church of England throughout the world." The claim is not in relation to the Church of England but 'the Church of England throughout the world,' that is, the Communion. It is clear that many provinces are not in communion with the bishop of the diocese and so the Panel needs to make clear how they can fulfill their clear declaration to 'remain in communion with those whom they regard as faithful' as long as they are under the jurisdiction of the diocesan bishop.

The Panel cannot have it both ways. There are numerous clergy and dioceses of the Communion that are in impaired communion with their own provinces, and by definition the Church of England wants to stay "in communion" with both heterodox and orthodox elements in the church. But that is impossible.

How can orthodox parishes be in full communion or structural fellowship with Bishop Ingham or indeed with a bishop like Charles E. Bennison of Pennsylvania who cannot uphold apostolic faith and order?

Archbishop Venables believes that these parishes should have been cut free from New Westminster altogether and put under the pastoral guidance of a Global South Bishop. That is not going to happen.

The liberals, however, were ecstatic by the Panel's ruling.

Dean Peter Elliott, acting bishop (commissary) while Bishop Michael Ingham is on sabbatical wrote: "The Diocese of New Westminster welcomes the report of the Archbishop of Canterbury's Panel of Reference, and hopes it can be a basis of reconciliation with parishes that have protested the Diocesan Synod's 2002 decision to ask the bishop to authorize a rite for the blessing of same sex unions. I do hope the four parishes who have chosen not to participate in the life of the diocese will be open to full re-engagement with the Diocese and the Anglican Church of Canada."

Parishes currently at odds with the diocese are St. John's Shaughnessy, (the largest parish in Canada), Good Shepherd, St. Mathias and St. Luke, all of Vancouver, and St. Matthew, Abbotsford. While they remain full members of the Dioceses, (they are also member of the Network) though they seldom participate in diocesan affairs or pay their financial apportionments.

Now the odds of them being reconciled with Ingham are zero to none.

The liberal Archbishop Andrew Hutchison, Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada praised the report saying that the need for alternate episcopal ministry in the four parishes as a temporary measure, "until the presenting issue is resolved and theologically sustainable reconciliation is achieved."

"The report also upholds the appropriateness of the Shared Episcopal Ministry process developed by the Canadian House of Bishops in 2004 (and passed with near unanimity). The panel recommends some additional safeguards to take into account the special circumstance of this case, inviting the diocese and newly formed missions associated with the dissenting parishes to explore how a formal relationship might be established. . Archbishop Hutchison indicated that these safeguards were within the spirit of the original document."

The Panel was flawed from the beginning. The head of the panel, former Australian Anglican Archbishop Peter Carnley had already gone on record saying that the gay issue would never split the church. He also said that same-sex relationships would, in time, be "recognized", and said the issue was "not really addressed" in the Bible.

But Nigerian Archbishop Peter Akinola in Abuja recently, addressing issues of corruption and immorality took a major swipe at the Anglican Communion saying, "We have been through physical slavery, we have been through economic slavery, political slavery and now spiritual slavery, and the latest attempt to bring in immoral practices into the Anglican Church by some western countries is bound to crumble."

It would appear that the global reconfiguration away from the Church of England now seems almost inevitable. The actions of the Panel will only empower the recent meeting of CAPA bishops in Kigali to hasten alternative structures for North American orthodox parishes under siege. Eight American dioceses want alternative primatial oversight, and it would appear in this week's ruling by the Panel that they are unlikely to get it.

There can be little doubt now that if the Archbishop of Canterbury does not act decisively to exclude heterodox bishops from attending the Lambeth conference in 2008, Akinola will hold his own parallel 'Lambeth' on African soil. If that happens, the Anglican Communion will have, in his word, "crumbled."

END