(Cairo) The agenda for this week's gathering ofconservative Anglican clerics from the third world includes dialogue with Islamand fighting poverty. But the wider message is expected to be protest: Anotherfrontal attack against gay clergy and same-sex unions that threaten to breakapart the world's 77 million-member Anglican communion.

The six-day meeting, beginning Tuesday in Egypt,will bring together some of the leading opponents of liberalizing trends andhighlight the growing strength of Africa and other places outside thetraditional Anglican spheres of influence in England and North America.

More than 120 conservative clerics and loyalistsare expected from across the so-called Anglican "south" - Africa, Asiaand Latin America - who have increasingly warned they could form independent,breakaway churches. The tensions have become so alarming that the leader of theAnglican communion, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, plans to travel toEgypt in an apparent attempt to calm dissent led by powerful Nigerian ArchbishopPeter Akinola (pictured).

"The establishment is desperate to keeptogether the communion," said George Curry, chairman of the Church Society,a conservative lay and clergy Anglican group based in Watford, England."But the liberals are unwilling to revisit or invalidate the movements thatthe conservatives find intolerable. This tolerance has been stretched to thebreaking point."

An eventual breakup would be the most stunningfallout from struggles over gay issues that also have gripped Roman Catholics,Lutherans and other churches. It would create a range of new congregations ableto veer in even greater conservative or liberal directions and end the Englishguidance over a church founded in the 16th century by King Henry VIII and spreadaround the world by the British Empire.

The divisions reached serious proportions in 2003over the consecration of a gay bishop in New Hampshire by the U.S. EpiscopalChurch, as members of the Anglican communion are called in the United States.Conservative Anglicans also were outraged by tolerance of same-sex blessingceremonies in some places.

In July, bishops in England - the Anglicanbirthplace - decided that gay priests can register for same-sex partnershipsunder a new civil law and stay in good standing if they remain celibate. Thebishops also said lay Anglicans who register civil unions will not be denied thesacraments.

Some conservative bishops have broken ties withmore liberal branches or cut financial links. In Brazil, the dispute led to thedismissal of a conservative bishop in Recife and more than 30 clergymen.

Last Wednesday, Anglican leaders in Sydney,Australia, voted to consider changing ties with the Church of England in protestof its failure to oppose gay priests and same-sex unions. Traditionalists inEurope and North America also have threatened to intensify breakaway efforts.

In September, the Nigerian archbishop warned theAnglican communion will splinter unless the liberals back down and accept thetraditional interpretations of Anglican teachings.

Akinola's voice carries huge weight and issupported by Ugandan Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi. Together their churches have26 million members, nearly a third of the world's Anglicans and equal to theChurch of England. Africa is home to half the world's Anglicans and is dominatedby conservative leaders.

"The demographic center of gravity for theAnglicans has moved to Africa and Asia," said the Rev. Gerald Bray, aprofessor of Anglican studies at the Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, Ala."If the first world churches don't accommodate the (Africans and Asians),they will simply go and establish churches of their own. It seems to be gettingcloser and closer to that point."

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