The excuse for violating the boundaries of diocesan jurisdictions is that tender consciences have to be protected from "revisionist" bishops and that the provision for Delegated Episcopal Pastoral Oversight is inadequate.

Another tactic has been to ascribe constitutional authority to the Lambeth Conference, and to attribute exaggerated power to the Primates Meeting. This is wishful thinking at best, or devious manipulation at worst.

At the first meeting of the Lambeth Conference, in 1867, the bishops were careful to spell out the role of what, eventually, became to be considered one of the "Instruments of Unity": · It was not a General Synod of churches in communion with the Church of England.

· It did not gather to enact canons binding the churches represented.

· Its role was "to discuss matters of practical interest and pronounce what we deem expedient in resolutions which may serve as safe guides."

As Stephen Sykes and John Booty say in The Study of Anglicanism: "the Lambeth Conference has remained a deliberate body convened solely at the invitation of the Archbishop of Canterbury. Whatever the respect accorded to its deliberations, it has no canonical or constitutional status."

Regarding the Primates Meeting, another of the evolved Instruments of Unity, we have to note that it is the newest development in the Anglican Communion, since it was not until 1978 that the Lambeth Conference called for regular meetings of the Primates.

The 1979 meeting clarified its function: "the role of the Primates Meeting could not be, and was not desired as a higher synod... Rather it was a clearing house for ideas and experience through free expression, the fruits of which the Primates might convey to their churches.

It is sad to realize that some of the Primates themselves are involved in the conspiracy; otherwise it is difficult to explain their venomous assault on the Episcopal Church; unless they just do not understand our polity. Their groping for undue power is an indication of their participation in the seditious maneuvers to change the face of Anglicanism.

If the ultras cannot coerce the Archbishop of Canterbury to expel the Episcopal Church - which he cannot do anyway - some of the Global South Primates will attempt to carry out a coup d'etat that would substitute one of them for the Archbishop of Canterbury as head of the Anglican Communion, thus "successfully escalating an ongoing family fight into an international schism," as Susan Russell says.

In the light of this plausible development, I think it would be time to make some adjustments to the list of the Instruments of Unity, so that we may be more faithful to the Anglican ethos. The new list could look like this:

· The Archbishop of Canterbury
· An Anglican Congress (made up of bishops, priests and lay people)
· The Chicago Lambeth Cuadrilateral
· The Anglican Cycle of Prayer

Let the probable emerging evangelical denomination, if it desires, turn its primates' meeting into a sort of college of cardinals under an omnipotent prelate empowered to speak for the whole body and to impose a single interpretation of what pertains to the faith and practice of the Christian faith.

Sergio Carranza is the Bishop Assistant in the Diocese of Los Angeles