A period of turmoil in the Anglican Church of Canada (which quickly spread into the worldwide Anglican Communion) began in 2002 when the Diocesan Synod of New Westminster, B.C., asked its Bishop, Michael Ingham, to authorize the blessing of same-sex unions and he did so. In the following year, on 2 November 2003, the area of turmoil widened when the Episcopal Church of the U.S.A. (ECUSA) consecrated as bishop a divorced priest who was openly living in a homosexual partnership. These actions were taken in the face of a reaffirmation of traditional Christian sexual morality by the 1998 Lambeth Conference of the leaders of the worldwide Anglican Communion.

As a result, a number of parishes in both countries declared themselves out of communion with their bishops and some have withdrawn themselves from the ACC and ECUSA and transferred to the oversight of traditionalist Primates in the Global South who are also out of communion with the revisionists. Bitter legal battles over church property have ensued. Many individuals also have left ECUSA and the ACC and there has been considerable disruption in New Westminister, B.C., and throughout the U.S.A.

In January 2004, the Anglican Communion Network (ACN), a coalition of orthodox Episcopal churches in the U.S.A., was formed to oppose the revisionist policies of ECUSA.

At the Canadian General Synod in 2004, the ACC decided to refer the subject of same-sex blessings to the Primate's Theological Commission for study and to defer a decision on the matter to the next G.S. in 2007. Illogically, it then virtually pre-empted the Commission's report and the decision of the next G.S. by declaring that homosexual unions have "integrity and sanctity." At the end of GS 2004, 10 orthodox bishops solemnly dissented from this declaration and warned the members of General Synod that in this departure from God's word they had gravely erred.

In October 2004 The Lambeth Commission, established in 2003 by the Archbishop of Canterbury at the request of the Primates, published the Windsor Report in an effort to seek ways of maintaining unity in the face of such profound disagreement.

In February 2005, the Primates of the whole Anglican Communion met in Northern Ireland and discussed the crisis brought about by the unilateral actions of its two North American member churches. The two unrepentant churches were asked to refrain from taking part in the forthcoming meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council.

In April 2005, our Canadian House of Bishops declared a moratorium on the blessing of same-sex unions. This was taken to mean that no additional parishes should be authorized to do such blessings, though those already so authorized were not inhibited.

In May 2005, the Primate’s Theological Commission submitted its St. Michael Report on the issue of same-sex blessings to the Council of General Synod. The Report stated, with many qualifications, that the Commission had found the blessing of same-sex unions to be a matter of doctrine and not just of pastoral care as its proponents had argued.

In June 2005, representatives of the ACC and ECUSA appeared before the Anglican Consultative Council in Nottingham, England, and unsuccessfully attempted to explain the unilateral actions that had so badly disrupted the unity of the Anglican Communion. They were asked to spend the time until the next Lambeth Conference in 2008 carefully considering whether they wished to remain part of the Anglican Communion, or preferred to "walk apart" from it in future.

Also in June 2005, the Essentials movement, launched in Montreal in 1994 to oppose revisionism in the ACC, reorganized itself as Anglican Essentials Canada (AEC) and launched its two constituent departments – the Essentials Federation and the Anglican Network in Canada.

In September 2005, the traditionalist Primates of the Global South held an Encounter at the Red Sea in Egypt, to which the Primates of ECUSA and the ACC were not invited, but the Network moderators of those two Churches were invited and treated as though they were Primates. Moreover, at that Encounter, the Archbishop of Canterbury recognized the two Networks (ACN and ANiC) as “faithful members of the Anglican Communion.”

In February 2006, three Ottawa churches voted at their annual vestry meetings to join the ANiC.

In June 2006, ECUSA held its 75th General Convention, at which it changed its name to The Episcopal Church (TEC) and elected a new Presiding Bishop (Primate), Katharine Jefferts Schori, who is a strong supporter of TEC’s revisionist policies. GC2006 also failed to comply with the requirements of the Windsor Report.

Immediate results were the attempts of several whole dioceses to withdraw from TEC and arrange for alternative traditionalist oversight, and an acceleration of the exodus both of individuals and parishes from TEC. The Primate of Nigeria also established a Nigerian mission in the U.S. under Bishop Martyn Minns.

In September 2006, a Meeting of the Global South Primates at Kigali, Rwanda, advocated the creation of “a separate ecclesiastical structure of the Anglican Communion in the U.S.A.” for traditionalist Anglicans alienated by TEC’s revisionism.

In October 2006, The Anglican Gathering of Ottawa (AGO), formed in September 2004 to strengthen and encourage traditionalist Anglicans in their opposition to revisionism in the ACC, decided to apply to become a local chapter of Essentials (AEC) as Anglican Essentials Ottawa (AEO).

In February 2007, the Primates Meeting in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, required TEC to undertake to comply with the requirements of the Windsor Report by 30 September, if it wished to remain a member of the Anglican Communion. It also addressed the needs of traditionalist Anglicans for traditionalist episcopal oversight. The Meeting also worked on the draft of a Covenant, to be signed by the Primates to ensure unity and greater accountability in the Anglican Communion, which is to be dealt with at the next Lambeth Conference in 2008.

What effect the Primates’ decisions will have on TEC and the ACC remains to be seen. For example, the Primates urged the cessation of the legal battles over Church property, but there seems little likelihood that their strictures will be heeded by TEC. The Bishop of Ottawa’s Pastoral Letter in the current issue of Cross Talk indicates that in similar circumstances the situation here would be much the same as there.