THE ordination of openly homosexual bishops in the Anglican Church is to be outlawed under proposals to be published next week.

Anglican provinces are to be told they must sign an unbreakable unity agreement which would prevent dioceses and provinces from ordaining bishops such as Gene Robinson in the US again. A “star chamber” will adjudicate when provinces are accused of breaking the agreement.

If deemed to have done so, they will in effect be suspended from membership of the Anglican Communion. In some cases this will mean little more than the withdrawal of invitations to meetings such as the Lambeth Conference and the annual meetings of the primates. In extreme cases, rebel churches could be denied the right to claim they are “in communion” with the Archbishop of Canterbury.

The recommendations will be published on Monday in the Windsor Report, the 126-page document of the Lambeth Commission set up by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, to resolve the crisis over gay clergy. They will be discussed by the primates next February.

Each of the world’s 38 Anglican provinces will be asked to adopt the covenant to save the Church from schism. It will state: “No ecclesiastical authority shall act in a manner inconsistent with the terms of communion, the bonds of unity, shared by the churches of the Anglican Communion.”

The Windsor Report is the work of a commission chaired by Lord Eames, the Primate of All Ireland, and whose members are from provinces around the world and from across the evangelical, liberal and Catholic wings of the Church. They were asked to examine the nature of communion and to find a way of maintaining church unity.

Evangelicals from England, the US and the “Global South” churches had demanded the suspension or expulsion of the US Anglican church for permitting the ordination of the Right Rev Gene Robinson, who is homosexual, as Bishop of New Hampshire. They wanted the New Westminster diocese of Canada to be disciplined for authorising same-sex blessing rites. Under the proposals, such churches would in effect suspend themselves were they unable to sign up to the new covenant.

The Diocese of Sydney is expected shortly to vote through “lay celebration”, permitting the celebration of Holy Communion by non-ordained lay people. Although apparently not as sensational as the ordination of practising homosexuals, lay celebration is in “ecclesiological” terms an even more radical development.

The Windsor Report is also expected to propose a system of “alternative episcopal oversight” for those conservative evangelical parishes in the US and Canada unable to accept the ordination of Bishop Robinson or same-sex blessings. The US church will only be disciplined if it refuses to allow parishes to opt for alternative oversight and take their property with them.

The “star chamber” will be set up to decide whether a province has breached the covenant. Each province will also have its own committee to make sure it does not breach the bonds of unity.

Dr Williams had been envisaged as the final authority in deciding whether the covenant had been breached. He is understood to have resisted such a role and to have fought any development towards a papal structure for the Anglican Church. Dr Williams could nevertheless be appointed to chair the “star chamber”.

One evangelical insider said: “This could save the communion but it is a high-risk strategy because any province could in effect put itself out of communion with the rest, even the Church of England.”

Liberals said that provinces would be unwilling to surrender any autonomy.

The Rev Martin Reynolds, of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement, said: “There will be many churches that will not be comfortable with this. If this is the only thing that will hold the Anglican Communion together, the result will be a body that is not what we now understand to be the Anglican Communion.”

The covenant will be the fifth “instrument of unity” in the Anglican Communion. The first four are the Archbishop of Canterbury, the ten-yearly Lambeth Conference of all Anglican bishops, the Anglican Consultative Council which brings together bishops, priests and laity and the annual meetings of the primates, the bishops and archbishops at the head of each province. The covenant would have first to be authorised by the synods of all 38 provinces in the worldwide church.

The conservative evangelical David Virtue said: “This confirms the truth that there is a still a biblical standard that must be maintained on all matters of faith and morals.”

Explore UK News

• Crime News

• Education News

• Health News

• Scotland News

Times Recommends

• A vicar’s wife: ‘There is no one to fight for us’
• Every little helps at the supermarket
• Ugg or Fitflop? The battle of the boots