Anglican head calls for humility in gay clergy row

ZANZIBAR, Feb 18 (Reuters) The spiritual leader of the world's 77 million Anglicans reminded his bishops of the need for humility today in a veiled rebuke to those whose wrangling over gay clergy threatens to tear the church apart.

''Very early in the history of the church there was a great saint who said God was evident when bishops were silent,'' Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams said to some laughter in a packed cathedral in the predominantly Muslim Indian Ocean island of Zanzibar.

''There is one thing a bishop should say to another bishop ... that I'm a great sinner and Christ is a great saviour.'' Anglican Church leaders are meeting in Tanzania to try to resolve a long simmering row over the US Episcopal Church's consecration of openly gay bishop Gene Robinson in 2003, which has set a liberal minority against a conservative majority.

Absent from the service was the leader of the second-biggest Anglican province, Nigeria's conservative Archbishop Peter Akinola, who an official said was ill.

Akinola, together with six other African, Asian and Latin American archbishops, refused to take Holy Communion -- bread and wine symbolising the body and blood of Christ -- on Friday with the head of the U.S. Episcopal Church.

The group snubbed Katharine Jefferts Schori, the first elected female leader of an Anglican province, in protest at her unwavering support for Robinson's elevation and for same-sex unions.

Williams stressed the importance of sharing Holy Communion, a key rite of the church, but at least one archbishop, Rwanda's Emmanuel Kolini, was seen passing the plate on Sunday during the lengthy service in English and Swahili.

Friday's boycott was led by Anglican leaders belonging to a group called the Global South, whose congregations in poor countries are growing rapidly.

Reading the Bible more literally than some Anglicans, they have joined forces to expand their influence against liberal trends often associated with the affluent West.

Akinola, who calls homosexuality an ''aberration'' has organized a parallel conservative movement in the church, rallying traditionalist parishes on Jefferts Schori's own turf.

Akinola's view of homosexuality has strong support in much of Africa, home to more than half the world's Anglicans, where Christians and Muslims often clash and the orthodoxy of one side reinforces the orthodoxy of the other.

The religious rivalry was audible on Sunday when those attending the Christian service heard a call to prayer from a mosque overlooking Zanzibar's Anglican cathedral.

Williams, a thoughtful rather than charismatic leader, urged Anglicans to open their eyes to suffering felt by ''minorities of one kind or another'' in a sermon that also commemorated the end of slavery.

''Today we remember the abolition of the slave trade, and that reminds us that ... for thousands of years, people did not see the evil of slavery,'' he said, standing in the cathedral built in 1874 on the site of Zanzibar's slave market.

Legend has it that the altar was erected above a whipping post where African slaves were bound and flogged to test their fortitude at the behest of their buyers.

Most archbishops in Africa say ordaining gay clergy flouts Biblical commands. Liberals argue that the Anglican church has embraced diverse views during its 450-year history.

REUTERS PDM RK1938