There was a pause and he sat down. At that point the Primate from Pakistan the Rt. Rev. Dr. Alexander John Malik got to his feet and said, "Archbishop Hutchison I hope you don't mind that when we have the next Primate's meeting that I bring along my four wives. You see in my country the government has passed a law saying it is legal to have four wives. I take it you would have no objection. Clearly it is a justice issue."

According to one archbishop, that particular discussion on gay bishops collapsed. "Hutchison made a fool of himself," said a second archbishop.

Now we may never know the extent of all the conversations that took place at the Irish Catholic retreat center, but clearly it was a make or break time for the Anglican Communion particularly as the Global South Archbishops saw it.

REINFORCING the idea that the communion will never make up its collective mind on the rights and wrongs of homoerotic behavior, Anglican troubleshooter Robin Eames issued a warning this week that all the ingredients are there for schism over the consecration of gay bishops.

In an interview with Reuters, the Archbishop called on conservatives and liberals to lower the temperature of debate and recognize cultural divisions between North America and Africa in particular. "They are not listening to each other," said Eames, author of the Windsor report that sought to find common ground.

There you have it. Eames continues to see the problems as cultural when they are very clearly moral and theological and then adds the fallacy that they are not listening to each other.

NONSENSE. Episcopal Church orthodox have been listening to gays whine about sodomy for 35 years, and the Primates have been listening to it for at least six Primates meetings. They have listened themselves to death, and all the time Frank Griswold and his revisionist bishops have ploughed ahead doing exactly what they intended to do all long - broker in an openly homoerotic bishop to satisfy some phony idea of justice while ignoring the clear prohibitions of Scripture, and then they expect the entire Global South bishops to roll over and play ball while the whole Western church is going belly up and they are rocketing ahead with millions of new converts.

What fool of an African Archbishop is going to roll over to a Griswold, Hutchison, Carnley, Eames, Morgan (Wales) or even Rowan Williams when ALL their provinces are withering and dying and the Global South provinces are seeing millions of new converts!

What sort of stupid fools are going to buy a counterfeit gospel propagated by Griswold and his revisionists bishops who wouldn't know Jesus if they fell over him on 5th Ave. New York and then offer him a buck to buy a cup of Starbucks coffee.

The truth is the liberal Eames thinks the whole Communion should be able to get along if it ignores the prohibitions of Scripture just to satisfy the culture wars going on for his pals Frank Griswold and Andrew Hutchison.

All along there has been an incipient racism in remarks by Griswold that the Africans just don't understand our situation. Really. This is a crock. Most of the African Archbishops have done advanced degrees in the West and there are more earned doctorates held by African bishops than there are in the US, Canada, NZ and Australia put together. I have documented that fact.

So to infer that the Africans are some how backward is a racist insult perpetuated by the likes of Spong and Griswold, and it is they who should be tossed out of the Communion along with Vickie Gene Robinson and leave the Anglican Communion to those who can make it grow with a clear unalloyed gospel message - a message being propagated by the orthodox in ECUSA, the AMIA outside ECUSA and a whole host of continuing churches that know Jesus along with orthodox remnants in Canada.

The Irish Archbishop just doesn't get it, or doesn't want to get it. He can no longer use his considerable charm and persuasive powers to overwhelm the Global South Primates. They are distinctly underwhelmed by him. I know I talk to them.

If Robin Eames really believes that the issues are merely cultural and not theological and moral then he should take a two week tour of the Province of Southeast Asia and spend time on the Malaysian peninsular where on any given Sunday the gospel is presented in five or six languages and to as many cultures and still they proclaim only one gospel and have one very fixed idea of how human beings should behave sexually. It would open his eyes.

The future of the communion hangs in the balance, but at the end of the day it will not be the underwhelming leadership of Rowan Williams who will decide what happens it will be Nigerian Archbishop Peter Akinola and his fellow African bishops who will call the shots. They should. They have the numbers, the faith once delivered and a very clear fix on what the nature and content of the gospel is.

Eames opined: "We are in trouble". For once he is right. The breakup of the Communion is only now a matter of time.

END