Anglican time bomb (ii) - Does it matter?

The WORLD magazine artcle (see below) suggests that the Anglican Communion will blow apart and that it is only a matter of time. It also states that "ECUSA(The American Anglican Church )stands to lose many of its largest churches; they are led by conservatives. Even the mother Church of England will shrink. Evangelicals and other conservatives lead many of its most thriving congregations." Indeed Primate Akinola's prominence in all this also has some basis in the fact that the Church of Nigeria is one of the largest Provinces in the Anglican Communion. In Australia, the size of the Diocese of Sydney is often cited as "success", and its prominence in promoting the conservative moral agenda is to be noted.
I actually find it a little disturbing that we are so easily seduced by the equation that size=success.
It is also a trap we fall into when assessing the importance of Islam in our community.
Whilst size is obviously a measure of something, it doesn't seem to me to be a particularly Biblical value.
Were the success of Jesus to be measured by the size of his group of followers, then I doubt we would see him as being particularly successful. Were Francis of Assissi, or Teresa of Calcutta to have been seduced by the language of size then it is difficult to see that they would have had much impact.
They were, after all, radical Christians not economic rationalists.
I do not suggest that the Church should not listen to itself, or that the African Church should be dismissed. I am rather urging us to put aside the many prejudices we have about these issues and to try and listen intently to that the other side is saying.
Let us not say: We are sophisticated, liberal and rich, therefore listen to us.
Nor: We are large, simple and conservative, therefore listen to us.
It may be that the time has come for the Communion to start functioning in a different way. That we have come to the end of the colonialism of the Anglican Communion, just as we have come to the end of Empire.
There will be a certain amount of sadness about all this, and a great deal of risk. But there is also opportunity and challenge.
To relate in a new way. To move in different directions. To return to fundamental principles; even though we might radically disagree what these principles might be.