On Wednesday, June 21, 2006, its final day of legislative business,The General Convention of the Episcopal Church passed Resolution B-033, a response to the request of the Windsor Report that the Episcopal Church observe a moratorium on the ordination of any additional gay or lesbian bishops until a broader consensus on the appropriateness of such action were achieved throughout all the provinces (autonomous national churches) of the Anglican Communion. This request was the result of the 2003 General Convention’s approval of the election of V. Gene Robinson, an openly gay and partnered priest in the Diocese of New Hampshire, to be the Bishop-Coadjutor (that is, to succeed the Diocesan Bishop, who retired some months later). The election and subsequent consecration of Bishop Robinson have resulted in a straining of the relationships between the Episcopal Church and some other Anglican provinces around the world, especially in Africa and the Global South. In a previous attempt to convey the seriousness with which the Episcopal Church viewed the disagreement and long for reconciliation, its bishops observed a self-imposed three-year moratorium on all episcopal elections and consecrations, until the 2006 General Convention could act.

Initially, the Convention seemed to indicate it did not want a moratorium on gay and lesbian bishops. The House of Deputies, one of the two legislative chambers of Convention, and which must concur with the House of Bishops to pass resolutions, decisively voted down a proposed resolution imposing such a moratorium. However, on the final day of Convention Presiding Bishop Griswold called an unusual special Joint Session of Convention to offer Resolution B-033, reprinted below. The House of Bishops subsequently passed it without amendment. Shortly thereafter the House of Deputies concurred, in an emotional process that included a highly-unusual address to the House of Deputies by Presiding Bishop-elect Katharine Jefferts Schori, to urge its passage. All three bishops from the Diocese of New York voted in favor of the resolution.

The text of Resolution B-033:

Resolved, the House of Deputies concurring, that the 75th General Convention receive and embrace The Windsor Report's invitation to engage in a process of heaing and reconcilation;

and be it further Resolved, that this Convention therefore call upon Standing Committees and bishops with jurisdiction to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecreation of any candidate to the episcopate whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion.

The response of the Wardens, Vestry, and Clergy of the Church of the Holy Apostles is represented below.