DURHAM, N.H. -- In one of the most controversial moments in the U.S. Episcopal Church's recent history, the Rev. Canon V. Gene Robinson yesterday became the 993rd bishop consecrated by that body and its first openly gay prelate.

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In a late afternoon ceremony at the Whittemore Center at the University of New Hampshire and one that may splinter the Anglican Communion around the world, Robinson vowed to guard the faith, unity and discipline of the church.

As he knelt before the altar, some 56 bishops, who had traveled from as far as El Salvador and Sweden, gathered around him and laid their hands on him to approve him as bishop. His parents cloaked him in orange, gold and green silk robes decorated with the leaves of New Hampshire, and his longtime companion, Mark Andrew, and his two grown daughters presented him with his bishop's mitre.

Robinson fought back tears as he thanked the more than 3,000 people who gathered at the hockey arena at the Whittemore Center.

"This is not about me. It's about so many other people who find themselves at the margins," Robinson said. "Your presence here is a welcoming sign for those people to be brought into the center."

"There are people, faithful wonderful Christian people for whom this is a moment of great pain and confusion and anger," Robinson continued, addressing the controversy that has consumed the Anglican Church since his election as Bishop of New Hampshire in June. "Our God will be served if we are hospitable and loving and caring toward them in every way we can muster. And they must know that if they must leave, they will always be welcome back into our fellowship, and in the meantime, we will do everything we can to reach out to them."

Outside the center, the chasm between those who opposed the consecration and those who support Robinson had essentially been reinforced by police who separated the two groups on either side of the path into the building. As university police kept watch from the building's roof, a dozen protesters waved fluorescent anti-gay signs denouncing Robinson.

One man repeatedly screamed Robinson was "a pervert," as the other side tried to drown him out with applause for Robinson. The more than 100 supporters held signs saying "God loves everyone" and "I'm straight but not narrow," as they sang "Amazing Grace." Many wore rainbow armbands and T-shirts that had been distributed by a campus group that said "Gay? Fine by Me."

About 400 opponents attended an alternative Communion at a borrowed church.

Despite protests and warnings worldwide, the Episcopal Diocese of New Hampshire "arrogantly and unilaterally said 'We're going to do it anyway,' " the Rev. Kendall Harmon of South Carolina said in his sermon.

The American Anglican Council, a network of churches and church officials moving to break with the denomination over Robinson's consecration, issued a statement calling the ceremony "a grievous day in the history of our church."

The service was held at the Durham Evangelical Church. Some of that church's members were among 100 to 200 non-Episcopalians who held a candlelight prayer vigil outside during the service.

Early in the consecration service, as is customary in all bishop consecration ceremonies, the presiding bishop and primate of the U.S. Episcopal Church, the Most Rev. Frank T. Griswold III, asked if anyone knew of "any reason why consecration should not proceed," and three members of the Episcopal Church spoke in protest.

The first to speak was the Rev. Earle Fox of the Pittsburgh Diocese, who walked onto the arena floor from a side entrance signaling his objection by waving his arm. Fox spoke of the sexual acts that homosexuals engage in, describing them in explicit detail, until he was interrupted by Griswold, who asked him to spare the audience the details and get to the substance of his objections.

"There are approximately 6,000 images of a loving God in this arena," Fox continued. "Both reason and love would tell us that persons made in that loving image could not widely engage in, bless or consecrate such behavior.

The Right Rev. David J. Bena, Bishop of Albany, N.Y., read a statement from 37 bishops who said Robinson's chosen lifestyle was "incompatible with the life of this church."

Another objector, Meredith Harwood from New Hampshire, said consecrating Robinson would be a "defiant and divisive act of a deaf church" because she said the scriptures say "sexual activity outside of marriage is wrong for the people of God."

"The vast majority of Anglicans worldwide have told us not to take this step," Harwood said. "It will tear us apart at our deepest level. This is foundational tearing, the most painful rupturing, which humans can experience."

The service that followed was constructed explicitly around the theme of unity: from the hymns -- one with the line: "where generation, class or race divide us to our shame, [God] sees not labels but a face, a person, and a name" -- to the readings to the sermon of the current Bishop of New Hampshire, the Right Rev. Douglas E. Theuner.

"Because of your presence, the episcopate will be more a symbol of unity than it ever has been," Theuner said to Robinson during his sermon, adding that he would "bring into fellowship [people] hitherto unacknowledged."

The crowd, which was overwhelmingly in support of Robinson, gave him a standing ovation as the long procession of bishops and clergy filed out.

"This is a historic moment and I think only positive things are going to come from it," said attendee John V. Cunney of Boston. "More people are going to be included in the church. I think this a moment of growth."

Robinson will officially become head of the diocese when Theuner retires on March 7.