Conservative Anglicans will declare a split from the U.S. Episcopal Church on Sunday, but will stop short of schism with the archbishop of Canterbury, the head of the worldwide Anglican Communion.<\/p>\n
\u201d\u009dThere will be permanent division, one way or the other,\u201d\u009d said Archbishop Peter Jensen of Sydney, Australia, one of the organizers of the weeklong Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON), adding that he expected \u201clong-term consequences\u201d\u009d for the Anglican Communion.<\/p>\n
Archbishop Jensen pinned the blame for the schism on the Episcopal Church, calling its 2003 consecration of a practicing homosexual as bishop of New Hampshire \u201can extraordinary strategic blunder\u201d\u009d that has divided the church.<\/p>\n
In a statement to be released here Sunday morning, the GAFCON churches, mostly from Africa and elsewhere in the developing world, are expected to form a \u201cchurch within a church,\u201d\u009d breaking with the liberal churches of North America that also have permitted the blessing of same-sex unions.<\/p>\n
Relations with the office of the archbishop of Canterbury will not be severed, but it appears likely that they will be qualified in some form.<\/p>\n