By RAYMOND KONGWA, Guardian Senior Reporter

raymond@nasguard.com

It was a decision an autonomous Anglican province made to reflect a lifestyle widely discussed and acknowledged in its own area of influence. But four years after the United States' Episcopal Church appointed an openly gay man, Gene Robinson, Bishop of New Hampshire, that decision and related controversial moves by the Episcopal Church, has become the impetus for deep introspection on how Anglicans the world over should relate with each other.

A year after Bishop Robinson's consecration, the Lambeth Commission said in its Windsor Report 2004 that the Episcopal Church should apologize for the controversial move, which defied a 1998 Lambeth Resolution rejecting homosexuality's compatibly with scripture, or consider parting with the global communion.

In the face of the controversy, the report also called for the church to consider developing a universal covenant that would direct the 38 autonomous Anglican provinces and serve as a common denominator in conflict, such as the one over sexuality.

Last year, Anglican spiritual leader, Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, appointed Archbishop of The West Indies, Drexel Gomez, as president of the Covenant Design Group (CDG), a consortium of ten theologians chosen to establish the framework for the covenant.

Speaking about the work of the CDG, which assembled here Monday and winds up its meeting tonight, Archbishop Gomez, who is also bishop of the Bahamas and Turks and Caicos, noted that its members would approach their work with a focus on "unity within community."

"This is important because... each province of the communion is an autonomous province within the worldwide communion. So while we want to come together and be united, we also have to protect the right of each entity to exercise its autonomy within the body," Gomez explained. "So we will be looking at the theology of unity within diversity, how to hold the two together. Against that background, we will be dealing with what is traditionally called 'Anglican comprehensives.' That is, in Anglicanism, we, up to this point, have been able to hold together certain diverse theological views and still remain as one communion."

Despite the focus on unity within community, Archbishop Gomez admits the grim outlook in some quarters of the Church.

"Some people are saying that a split is inevitable and our hope is that we can avoid a split," he said. "Because if we end up with two kinds of, what I call, subgroups, the question is how do they relate with one another."

The authority of scripture, the way the church exercises it authority, the way it relates with its members and the extent to which it was willing to preserve "bonds of unity" were issues that the CDG would address in addition to sexuality, Archbishop Gomez noted.

The ten-member CDG, which comprises experts in canon law, the nature and mission of the church, ecumenical relations and general theology law hopes to make an interim report to a meeting of Archbishops in Tanzania next year.

Conceding he had not anticipated the responsibility that comes with heading the CDG as his career winds down Archbishop Gomez, who retires at the end of 2008 and expects the groups work to last at least as long said: "Definitely, this is a pivotal moment for the Anglican communion and that's why the Archbishop [of Canterbury] has appointed this group,"