NEW YORK — The leader of the Episcopal Church denies that a closed-door meeting of world Anglican church leaders this month endorsed the idea of sending special visiting bishops to serve U.S. congregations that oppose their regular bishops' liberal policies on homosexuality.
Such a system of "episcopal visitors," nicknamed "flying bishops," has accommodated parishes in the Church of England that bar women clergy.
In a prepared statement, Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold said "at no time during the primates' meeting was the phenomenon of 'provincial episcopal visitors' discussed." Primates are heads of Anglicanism's 38 national branches, including the Episcopal Church.
"There is no such formal structure" in the U.S. church, Griswold said, although resident bishops have occasionally agreed to invite outside bishops if requested by congregations.
Griswold was responding to Presiding Bishop Maurice Sinclair of Argentina, who said in an Associated Press interview that Griswold and other primates meant to apply the Church of England plan to the U.S. in a joint communique.
The communique said some Anglicans are alienated by acceptance of homosexual activity, so "we have committed ourselves to seek for ways to secure sustained pastoral care for all in our communion." A week later, the U.S. House of Bishops pledged, without elaboration, "to provide pastoral care for all."
Archbishop Drexel Gomez of the West Indies, chair of the committee that wrote the primates' communique, said flying bishops were "not discussed in detail" at plenary sessions.