A GetReligion reader north of the border — not one of the Web Elves — dropped me an interesting note a day or two ago about the unfolding drama within the Anglican Communion.

This reader would like reporters to know that there are Anglican conservatives north of the border. In fact, some of them recently released a statement reacting to the Anglican primates conclave in Ireland and posted it at their very own website, which is quite easy to find. The organization is called Anglican Essentials Canada and here is its brief statement:

The message is as clear as it can get. In an unprecedented action, the Anglican world was changed last Thursday, February 24. The actions of the Anglican Church of Canada and the Episcopal Church of the United States have resulted in the Primates putting them on notice. Simply put, there is no more dramatic action that could have been taken than to request a Province of the Church to remove itself from the table. Clearly, there is before the Anglican Church of Canada the need to make a choice. Restoration to full communion requires repentance. The failure to do so implies the choice to walk alone outside the worldwide Anglican Communion.

In the days ahead Anglican Essentials Canada will be posting further reflections arising from these developments. May we all recall that the kindness of God leads us to repentance. (Romans 2:4).

Why, you ask, is this statement important?

For one very simple reason. If you have been reading a typical Canadian newspaper — The Globe and Mail, perhaps — you would not know there are any conservative Anglicans up there. The lack of balance in the coverage has been quite amazing. Consider, in particular, the work of Globe and Mail reporter Michael Valpy, as reflected in his weekend story with the headline “Top cleric faces rift among Anglicans.” Here is the opening:

Canada’s Anglican primate faced accusations from his own clergy yesterday that he betrayed gays and lesbians by endorsing a proposal to suspend the Canadian and U.S. churches from a key body of the worldwide Anglican Communion because of their acceptance of homosexuality.

Archbishop Andrew Hutchison acknowledged he will have to work to convince many Canadian Anglicans that the proposal, agreed to by all the primates, or senior archbishops and bishops of the communion, is necessary to stave off schism within the world’s third-largest Christian faith.

He voiced regret over the treatment of homosexuals by the global church’s leaders. He said in an interview: “I feel very sorry for them that there’s no recognition of their plight.” The primates’ statement reiterated the communion’s rejection of blessing same-sex unions and ordaining practising homosexuals as priests.

So far so good. And what happens next is good — Valpy quotes the views of several leaders on the Anglican left, which is the strongest choir north of the border. But what happens after that is bad. It does not appear that there is a single Anglican voice, not even a rustic priest from a tiny prairie town, who supports the actions taken by Anglicans in the Third World who do not want to modernize the sacrament of marriage. Perhaps these Anglicans are so old-fashioned that they do not have telephones.

Come to think of it, I can’t find a dissenting conservative voice in Valpy’s earlier report on the actual decision in Ireland. Maybe someone on the copy desk is cutting out this crucial part of the story. Maybe.

Anyway, if Valpy or any other reporter in Canada would like to talk to one or more conservative Anglicans while attempting to do accurate and balanced coverage of this hot-button issue, the leaders of the Anglican Essentials network can be reached at 1-866-883-7328.

Anglican-beat reporters, please repeat after me once again: The Africans pray, the Americans pay and the British write the resolutions.

And the second truth of Anglican corporate life is like unto this: The British will do their bloody best to write those resolutions in such a way that Americans get to keep writing checks.

Thus, to the surprise of no one, MSM reports about this week’s Anglican primates meetings are all over the map. No one can agree on who actually said what and if the words they said actually mean what they appear to mean. Ah, those British resolution writers are the best.

Let’s work at this backwards for a moment. Right now, the most important story on the news wires comes from up in Canada:

Canadian and U.S. Anglican officials denied media reports suggesting they have temporarily withdrawn from an international council at the request of leaders who condemn their position on homosexuality.

They have not yet made any decisions in response to the request, Archdeacon Paul Feheley, Principal Secretary to the Primate, told CTV.ca in a phone interview from Northern Ireland where the meetings between the leaders took place this week.

“We’re members of the Anglican Communion, we will continue to be members of the Anglican Communion,” he said, noting that the talks were much like a family dispute during which family members “step back for breathing space, to sort things out.”

[The] Rev. Jan Nunley of the U.S. Episcopal Church Center also denied media reports in an email to CTV.ca inquiring about the church’s response.

“No, no decision has been made on the request for voluntary temporary withdrawal from the Anglican Consultative Council,” Nunley wrote.

These denials are in response to early Associated Press stories that opened like this sample from The Miami Herald:

LONDON (AP) — Anglican primates agreed late Thursday that the U.S. Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada would withdraw from a key body of the global Anglican Communion after failing to overcome internal church disagreements about the election of a gay bishop in the United States and the blessing of same-sex unions there and in Canada.

A statement from leaders of Anglican national churches who met this week in Northern Ireland also called on the two churches to explain their thinking on gay issues at another Anglican meeting in June. . . . The two churches would temporarily step away from the Anglican Consultative Council, a key body for contact among the national churches and one of the four “instruments of unity.”

Some reports stated even more clearly that the Canadians and Americans had been forced out.

Whence comes this confusion? The answer is found, of course, in the work of those British resolution writers and the wiggle room found in the actual communique that is the foundation of all of these stories in the MSM and the blogosphere. Here is the crucial passage. This should be read with a strong Oxford or Upper West Side Manhattan accent for the proper effect.

14. Within the ambit of the issues discussed in the Windsor Report and in order to recognise the integrity of all parties, we request that the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada voluntarily withdraw their members from the Anglican Consultative Council for the period leading up to the next Lambeth Conference. During that same period we request that both churches respond through their relevant constitutional bodies to the questions specifically addressed to them in the Windsor Report as they consider their place within the Anglican Communion.

And the key word? Righto, that would be voluntarily. Thus, this is yet another document asking the North American progressives to repent — if they choose to do so. Stronger action may or may not take place in the future. St this point, the North Americans are still smarting from a slap on the collective wrist, but nothing more than that. If there were stronger actions suggested, they remained behind the tightly closed doors of the conclave and, thus, they will have no effect until they are reported in the pages of sacred scripture.

So what did the progressive leader of the U.S. Episcopal Church say, in response to this public rebuke? As often happens with the bookish pronouncements of Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold, it is hard to tell precisely. Perhaps his words were written by scribes trained by the learned British. Here is the key passage that reporters are trying to parse at the moment:

Some will not be pleased with the request from the primates . . . that the Episcopal Church, along with the Anglican Church of Canada, “voluntarily withdraw” our members from the Anglican Consultative Council “for the period leading up to the next Lambeth Conference.” This request, together with the opportunity for a hearing with the Anglican Consultative Council (paragraph 16), gives space for speaking and listening. During this time the Episcopal Church will be responding to the questions addressed to us in the Windsor Report, as the primates have requested. We will have the opportunity to speak out of the truth of our experience. I welcome this opportunity knowing that the Episcopal Church has sought to act with integrity in response to the Spirit, and that we have worked, and continue to work, to honor the different perspectives very much present within our church.

What does this mean? Clearly, lots of learning, sharing and Spirit-filled negotiating will go on in the months and years to come. But did he say the Episcopal Church would heed the majority of the world’s Anglicans and stand down?

Inquiring reporters want to know. They may wait a long, long, long time for a clearly written resolution on that question. That’s the point.

UPDATED: After doing some digging (I work on three different computers), I found the email with the URL for the Associated Press story by Robert Barr that caused so much buzz in the early hours of this global story. Here is how it opened:

The U.S. Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada withdrew Thursday from a key body of the global Anglican Communion under pressure from conservative church leaders distressed by the election of a gay bishop in the United States and the blessing of same-sex unions in the two countries.

Though the suspension of the two churches was said to be temporary, it marked the first formal split in the communion over the explosive issues of sexuality and biblical authority.

Here is another example of a clear Barr lead on this issue, only this time it has a clear attribution to its source:

The rift over homosexuality that threatens to split the 77 million-member Anglican Communion cannot be resolved without someone admitting they’re wrong, the church’s spiritual leader warned Friday — a day after leaders asked the U.S. and Canadian churches to withdraw temporarily from a key council.

The election of a gay bishop in the United States and the blessing of same-sex unions there and in Canada have opened a potentially unbridgeable division between Anglican liberals — many of them in North America — and conservatives, who are strongest in Africa and Asia.

Facts are such pesky things. Every now and then one gets in the brain and just sticks there.

Earlier this week, religion reporter Jonathan Petre reported in The Telegraph that the global showdown of the Anglican primates might include some potent and poignant protests — in part centering on actions that will or will not be taken by U.S. Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold (left) and Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams (right, in the photo). Here is some of that story, with the familiar politics-of-sexuality references trimmed since Anglican-beat watchers already know all of that:

Conservative archbishops attending Anglican crisis talks this week will demonstrate their anger with their liberal counterparts by refusing to receive Communion alongside them, The Telegraph has learned. . . .

Insiders say that Archbishop Peter Akinola, the primate of Nigeria, has warned him that the conservatives will boycott the daily church services during the conference if the liberals are there. The problem could become most acute when Dr. Williams presides at Communion — a sacrament supposed to symbolise the unity of the Church — as Archbishop Akinola is thought to represent up to half of the 38 primates.

Now this is what I call a pesky fact.

Every since reading this, I have been going to Google News and typing in the words Rowan, Griswold and communion, with few results that tell me much of anything. There have been, of course, daily reports from the conservative cyber-scribe David Virtue, the fiery activist who has, in his own unique way, done much to yank many private Anglican events into the open. Everyone knows where Virtue is coming from, sort of like the reports from the official Episcopal press.

This Communion story may seem like an “insider” detail. But this pesky fact concerns a symbol that is also a Sacrament and, well, they are supposed to call it the Anglican Communion for a reason. I will keep looking, even though I realize that the Brits are doing everything they can to lock reporters out of every aspect of these meetings.

Nevertheless, please let us see if you see MSM coverage of the Eucharist issue. On the theological level, it is more important than the on-paper resolutions.

On a related topic, check out the following BBC item. This appeal for web-based feedback has to have one of the most biased headlines I have seen in a long time. Here is the item:

Will Africa split the Anglican Church?

Leaders of the 70 million-strong Anglican Communion have been meeting this week near Belfast in Northern Ireland to discuss an ongoing crisis that threatens to split the church.

The 38 primates will consider the so-called Windsor Report, published after the consecration of gay bishop Gene Robinson in America and the blessing of same sex unions in Canada.

African and Asian leaders have started a campaign to restore order and to discipline an American Church which, they say, has departed from the Bible and Anglican tradition.

Would you back African bishops if they walk out of the meeting? Would you even ask the bishops to leave and create their own Church? Is the unity of the church not more important than disagreements over homosexuality? Shouldn’t the Anglican church modernise and accept that society is changing?

Let us know your views. . . . A selection of your comments will be broadcast on the BBC’s Focus on Africa programme on Saturday 26 February at 1700GMT.

Note the assumption: A stand to defend the ancient doctrines claimed by the overwhelming majority of Anglicans worldwide may split the church, not the innovations approved by the relatively small churches in North America. Why not stay neutral and say that the sexuality conflict might divide the Communion?

UPDATE: On the Google watch, there are two or three reports online with new information. One interesting detail: Williams made a strong appeal for unity, in an Evensong service that did not, of course, include Communion. There is quite a bit of new information in this fresh Church of England Newspaper report. Here is the money quote, from the leader of the American church:

Bishop Griswold entered the Primates’ meeting in a defiant mood, delivering a thinly veiled defence of his decision to consecrate Canon Gene Robinson in a sermon in Belfast Cathedral. He used coded theological language to compare the American Church’s action to the ‘White Martyrs’.

“We find ourselves overtaken by a compassion, which because it is of the Spirit and not the result of our effort or imagination, knows no bounds and can enfold all persons and all things. It is a compassion, which in the words of St Isaac of Syria, embraces not only humankind but the birds and the beasts, the enemies of truth, those who wish to do us harm and ‘even the reptiles’, which may be seen as representing those slithery aspects of our own humanity which we are loath to admit to the company of our ‘better’ selves and therefore often displace on to others as evil.”

I wonder if the “reptile” quote will be unpacked in the MSM.

“Church ends taboo on mercy killings,” crowed the headline on Sunday’s Observer, and the story that followed, by social affairs editor Jamie Doward, carried on in the same excited manner:

Canon Professor Robin Gill, a chief adviser to Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, said people should not be prosecuted for helping dying relatives who are in pain end their lives. Last week Gill was sent by Williams to give evidence to a parliamentary committee investigating euthanasia.

Gill’s stance marks a major shift by the Church of England and was welcomed by groups campaigning for a change in the law to allow for people to be helped to die under strictly limited circumstances.

‘There is a very strong compassionate case for voluntary euthanasia,’ Gill told The Observer. ‘In certain cases, such as that which involved Diane Pretty [the woman who was terminally ill with motor neurone disease and who campaigned for the right to be helped to die], there is an overwhelming case for it.’

His claims were last night seized on by pro-euthanasia groups as evidence that the archbishop is prepared to engage in a debate on an issue that has long divided the clergy.

Though Doward quoted Gill as claiming “the majority of churchgoers” would like to see the euthanasia law amended, while their bishops would not, there is no other hint at what the Archbishop of Canterbury has already said on the matter.

UPI took the trouble to ring up a Church of England spokesman for comment:

Arun Kataria, a spokesman for the Anglican Church, said Gill’s personal opinions did not signal a change in the church’s policy.

“We firmly oppose the legalization of euthanasia,” he said.

The Telegraph, which recently took flak for its headline suggesting that Williams doubted God’s existence because of the year-end tsunami, also dug deeper than the Observer:

A spokesman for the Church of England last night distanced it from Prof Gill’s views. They did not reflect those of anyone else in the church, he said.

“The Church of England made a joint submission with the Roman Catholic bishops on the Assisted Dying Bill, opposing the legalisation of euthanasia,” he said.

In a document he released in September with Cormac Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor, the Archbishop of Westminster, Williams was clear:

It is deeply misguided to propose a law by which it would be legal for terminally ill people to be killed or assisted in suicide by those caring for them, even if there are safeguards to ensure it is only the terminally ill who would qualify. To take this step would fundamentally undermine the basis of law and medicine and undermine the duty of the state to care for vulnerable people. It would risk a gradual erosion of values in which over time the cold calculation of costs of caring properly for the ill and the old would loom large. As a result many who are ill or dying would feel a burden to others. The right to die would become the duty to die.

The Bill is unnecessary. When death is imminent or inevitable there is at present no legal or moral obligation to give medical treatment that is futile or burdensome. It is both moral and legal now for necessary pain relief to be given even if it is likely that death will be hastened as a result. But that is not murder or assisted suicide. What terminally ill people need is to be cared for, not to be killed. They need excellent palliative care including proper and effective regimes for pain relief. They need to be treated with the compassion and respect that this bill would put gravely at risk.

Satirist Harry Shearer makes explicit the comedic Stonehenge elements of the Episco-Druid story during Apologies of the Week (requires RealPlayer) on Le Show, his weekly broadcast of music, comedy and sketches.

After reading news reports’ common disclaimer that the Rev. William Melnyk and the Rev. Glyn Lorraine Ruppe-Melnyk did not return phone calls seeking comment, Shearer cracked, “They were busy heading for Stonehenge [full beat] to say they weren’t druids.”

Shearer played Spinal Tap’s bassist, Derek Smalls, so he knows his campy Stonehenge references.

For those who don’t have This is Spinal Tap handy, here are the lyrics to “Stonehenge”:

Stonehenge
Where the demons dwell
Where the banshees live and they do live well
Stonehenge
Where a man is a man and the children
dance to the pipes of Pan
Stonehenge
‘Tis a magic place where the moon doth rise
with a dragon’s face
Stonehenge
Where the virgins lie
and the prayer of devils fill the midnight sky
And you my love, won’t you take my hand
We’ll go back in time to that mystic land
Where the dew drops cry and the cats meow
I will take you there
I will show you how

Newspapers in greater Philadelphia have begun reporting on the past Druidic interests of the Rev. William Melnyk and his wife, the Rev. Glyn Lorraine Ruppe-Melnyk, but some have lost the story’s finer distinctions.

"The online editor of Christianity Today magazine accused the church of ‘promoting pagan rites and pagan deities’ and the Melnyks of idolatry," David Bernard of the Chester Daily Local wrote on Nov. 6.

The same sentence appeared again three days later in a story attributed to "Staff and Wire Reports."

Ted Olsen of Christianity Today Online focused his critiques both on the rites composed by the two priests and on one rite’s distribution through the Episcopal Church’s Office of Women’s Ministries website. These are the only two paragraphs, in his varied comments on the rites, in which Olsen used the word idolatry:

But in this case, we’re not talking about something that’s merely unorthodox, or even heresy. We’re talking about pagan worship of Old Testament idols. We’re talking about a mock Eucharist, the center of Christian worship, that directly references a biblical text about idolatry–and stands proudly, "defiantly," with the idolaters.

One would have thought that the Episcopal Church USA might have argued whether it was really practicing a different religion. Instead, their challenge to [Nigerian Archbishop Peter] Akinola’s statement might be that it’s not new at all: Their idolatry has been around since Old Testament times.

Olsen wrote pointed critiques of the Melnyks’ rites, and wondered online whether Bishop Charles Bennison would have anything to say about the matter. But it should be clear to anyone who read Olsen’s articles that he saw the problem of idolatry as more widespread than the activities of two priests in the suburbs of Philadelphia.

Further, both Olsen and Erik Nelson of the Institute on Religion and Democracy — who first called the rite’s attention to several bloggers — both commended the Melnyks for their letters of repentance to Bishop Bennison.

"I will not allow this situation to turn into a witch hunt of any sort," Bennison said in his first statement (PDF) on the conflict.

It never was a with hunt. It was, instead, another case of the blogosphere being a few weeks ahead of mainstream media in breaking and reporting a news story.

The story of Episco-Druid rites has moved from the Anglican blogosophere to print, and in two very different forms.

Julia Duin of The Washington Times reports the story, adding the detail of Bishop Charles Bennison’s statement (PDF) about the controversy.

Religion editor Shirley Ragsdale of the Des Moines Register writes a column that praises the Women’s Liturgy Project by the Episcopal Church’s Office of Women’s Ministries but does not mention the rite attributed to the Rev. Glyn Lorraine Ruppe Melnyk, or the firestorm of criticism it attracted from conservatives.

Ragsdale begins with this description of the liturgical landscape:

Women make up more than half of churchgoers, but so much of their lives is ignored in terms of religious rites, rituals and ceremonies.

There are ceremonies to baptize their babies, but no rituals to mark the passage from girl to woman or to celebrate conception or pregnancy. There are few rituals to mark losses such as miscarriages or passages such as menopause.

. . . The intent is to create liturgy that can be used within the context of a Sunday morning service to mark menstruation, conception, pregnancy, any form of pregnancy loss, childbirth, menopause and other changes or loss. Having passed almost all of those female milestones with little fanfare from my faith tradition, the idea that a woman’s church family might pay attention to some of them is appealing.

As a teen, I probably wouldn’t have appreciated an announcement in church when I got my first period, but I can imagine that a coming-of-age service where a number of girls could be recognized for reaching young adulthood might be something to be proud of.

Actually there are liturgies to mark “the passage from girl to woman” (and the passage from boy to man). For liberal Episcopalians, Journey to Adulthood offers spiritual formation, pilgrimages and a churchwide service called Rite 13.

I’ll leave aside the question of whether prayers about menstruation or menopause ought to become part of a Sunday service.

Ragsdale is strongest in telling the story of a Presbyterian woman who joined her sisters in persuading their mother to give up her car keys for the sake of her safety:

After dinner, one daughter said a prayer: “God, we are truly grateful for our mother and grandmother and friend. She has always been there for us. So many times she put each of our needs before her own. We ask you to be with her now in this time of sharing and in the days ahead when she will be sad because she cannot do the same kinds of acts of neighborliness and mercy that she could do when she was able to drive. Bless her and us, for this is a day of endings and beginnings.”

There were stories about the kindnesses the mother had performed, including emergency trips to the hospital and reliable transportation to church. Then they volunteered to make the mother’s transition easier. Grandchildren and teenaged neighbors offered to drive for her. Daughters committed to mother-daughter outings.

When the stories and promises concluded, the mother reached into her purse and with tears in her eyes handed the car keys to her daughters. It seems likely that the mother’s bitterness about giving up her independence was tempered by the sweetness of the prayer and ritual performed by her family and friends. I like to think that because of the ritual, the family was more likely to follow through on their promises.

It isn’t exactly liturgy. But it could be. The congregation could recognize the mother’s contribution to the church and join in the promise part.

That’s one way of looking at it. Here’s another way: Isn’t it amazing that this woman’s family rose to the liturgical and pastoral challenge without an official Service of Diminished Driving Capacities? And could it be that this mother and grandmother might prefer not to make her painful transition the focus of a corporate service?