The Archbishop of Canterbury urged Anglicans to guard their unity as various provinces consider "unilateral actions" that could be divisive. Archbishop George L. Carey spoke to a conference sponsored by Scholarly Engagement With Anglican Doctrine (SEAD) April 8-10 in Charleston, S.C. Douglas LeBlanc

"It is easy to fragment. But history shows that fragmentation leads to further fragmentation," the archbishop said. "It also shows, as we all know to our cost, how immensely difficult it is to rebuild unity once unilateral action has been taken."

He declined an invitation to elaborate on what actions could harm Anglican unity. Two possibilities loomed most heavily at the conference, however: that General Convention could approve the blessing of homosexual couples, or that archbishops from the Southern Hemisphere could declare certain U.S. dioceses as "missionary districts."

Archbishop Carey spoke sharply on reports that the Rt. Rev. Ronald Haines, Bishop of Washington, linked possible financial support to discussing disagreements about the Lambeth Conference resolution on sexuality.

"We must not intimidate one another, misrepresent one another or despise one another," Archbishop Carey said. "It has been suggested that one bishop has refused aid to another because of the way he voted in the Lambeth debate on homosexuality. This is immoral and deeply un-Christian, and certainly has no place in the Anglican way."

The archbishop affirmed Anglicanism's traditional emphasis on scripture, reason and tradition, and said that "diversity" is not Anglicanism's defining characteristic. "If the only thing we can say about our Communion is that it is diverse, we are in serious trouble," he said.

The archbishop stressed the centrality of scripture: "Sola scriptura has been consistently rejected by our Communion as a theological method but we have never rejected scripture as the pivot and mainstay of theological truth."

He challenged an idea by R. William Franklin, dean of Berkeley Divinity School at Yale, that a new quadrilateral began emerging among African and Asian bishops at Lambeth 1998. The new quadrilateral stresses "growth, freer forms of worship, scripture study and clear moral teaching."

"I wonder if Dr. Franklin has overlooked the fact that the four aspects are not limited to the newer provinces but have striking parallels in the so-called 'historic' provinces. I myself would not have great disagreement with any of the points mentioned."

Archbishop Carey proposed that love, truth and holiness are "a trinity of theological virtues.

"Love without truth is vague and sentimental," he said. "Truth without love is harsh and exclusive. Holiness without love is legalistic and unattractive."