Wellington - A gay vicar who caused a row in the Anglican Church by going through a wedding ceremony with his boyfriend in London has handed in his clerical licence after returning home to New Zealand, according to news reports Wednesday.

David Lord, who exchanged vows and rings with the Reverend Peter Cowell, a hospital chaplain, on May 31 at the 12th-century Church of St Bartholomew the Great, surrendered his licence to practice as a priest to the bishop of Waikato, Archbishop David Moxon, at the weekend in Hamilton, the reports said.

The ceremony has been labelled the Anglican Church's first gay wedding, defying the Archbishop of Canterbury's ban on formal blessings of same-sex partnerships.

The Bishop of London, Richard Chartres, has ordered an investigation into the ceremony, which has provoked a row between the church's liberal and conservative wings, already divided over homosexuality.

Lord has gone to ground after reportedly resuming duties as a doctor at Waikato Hospital, Hamilton, and the New Zealand Herald said that church officials were refusing to comment on the issue. (dpa)