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SOUTHERN CONE PRIMATE GIVEN FREE HAND TO RESCUE ECUSA PARISHES
Resolution of Provincial Synod of the Southern Cone,
Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia,
2-4 November 2004
As a synod we give thanks for the Windsor Report and all those that were committed to its preparation. It offers valuable tools to the Communion with which our serious problems can be addressed regarding the authority of the Scripture, order in the Church and the crisis over human sexuality that two provinces of the Communion have created by taking "rebellious and unilateral actions".
Nevertheless it worries us that the report has not made a clearer call to repentance on the part of the Episcopal Church of the United States and the Anglican Church of Canada. They are the ones that have clearly taken decisions and endorsed practices against the Holy Scriptures and the apostolic tradition of two thousand years of ethical teaching of the Church and against the clear voice of the Communion. This synod insists on what our bishops said in their pastoral letter of February 2004, that our relationship with these provinces "can only be restored through repentance, pardon and love".
In addition it is our hope that the Primates will set down mechanisms and limits by which the unity of the Communion can be assured in the future.
This synod, conscious that the next meeting of the Primates, that will take place in Ireland in February of 2005, will need clear consultation from all over the Communion and observing the need that those parts of the Church, especially in the Americas, that have remained faithful in their life and testimony - as many dioceses, bishops, parishes and individuals have - should receive adequate pastoral care, give our Primate, the Most Reverend Gregory Venables, our full and total support in his responsibilities, consultations and tasks. We pray that the Lord will be with him and fill him with grace and wisdom.
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