Archdeacon Jennifer Gosse-Vingerhoeds was elected bishop ordinary on June 23
The new bishop ordinary of the Anglican Military Ordinariate (AMO) anticipates a growing need for chaplains in the armed forces as the federal government boosts Canada’s military spending to its highest level in generations.
Anglican military chaplains elected and confirmed Archdeacon Jennifer Gosse-Vingerhoeds as bishop ordinary of the AMO on June 23, succeeding Bishop Nigel Shaw who retired after a decade in the position. The bishop ordinary serves as spiritual leader and pastor to members of the Anglican Church of Canada serving in the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF), including military chaplains.
Prime Minister Mark Carney has committed Canada to increasing its total military spending to five per cent of GDP by 2035. With a major recruitment effort bringing an influx of new personnel into the Canadian military, Gosse-Vingerhoeds says, the chaplaincy expects to see a significant increase in requests for chaplain support in the coming years. The bishop-elect notes that chaplains who work in training institutions are typically very busy with requests to help new recruits adjust to military life.
“Chaplains can play an instrumental role in these early years of members’ careers, so an increased requirement for chaplain support will be a normal consequence of the recruitment drive,” Gosse-Vingerhoeds says. “This will then have the carry-on effect of necessitating the recruitment and hiring of new chaplains.
“We have already seen chains of command across the CAF asking for new chaplain positions, and we expect that trend to increase in the coming years. More than ever, the CAF will need highly motivated, fit, mature and experienced religious/spiritual professionals to serve as chaplains in the care of CAF members and their families.”
Gosse-Vingerhoeds’ election as bishop ordinary followed an earlier election on April 11, in which, after eight ballots with no change in the last four, none of the candidates had received the necessary majority of 50 per cent in each of the houses of clergy and laity.
As election chair, Archbishop Shane Parker, primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, chose to suspend the process based on AMO canons and called for a new election. The selection committee provided a revised slate of nominees comprising two returning candidates and four new ones, including Gosse-Vingerhoeds.
Canon Judson Bridgewater, a senior military chaplain who is currently serving as interim archdeacon in support of the bishop ordinary and who helped coordinate the election, says the Holy Spirit was urging the AMO towards further discernment, which chaplains were then able to do before the second election at Christ Church Bells Corners in Ottawa.
“We trust that the Holy Spirit is working through the entire electoral process,” Bridgewater says. He describes the results as expressing who “God meant to be elected [as] the right person at the right time in the life of the AMO.”
‘Our role is always to serve as the primary line of defence for the spiritual welfare and morale of military members’
Gosse-Vingerhoeds is presently command chaplain for the Canadian Army and advisor to the Chaplain General, the head of the Royal Canadian Chaplain Service who advises the Chief of the Defence Staff on religious and spiritual well-being of military members.
Born in Mount Pearl, N.L., Gosse-Vingerhoeds says she felt called to ordained ministry from the age of seven. Ordained as a deacon in 1997 and a priest in 1998, she served as archdeacon of Labrador from 2002 until 2007, when she heard the CAF needed chaplains.
“I saw the opportunity to serve as a military chaplain as a new challenge … It is a wonderful way to minister to so many people who would otherwise never think to approach a religious or spiritual professional for care and support,” Gosse-Vingerhoeds says.
Military chaplaincy saw Gosse-Vingerhoeds serve as a chaplain in the army, navy and air force, including a 2025 deployment to train chaplains in Latvia and multiple deployments at sea lasting several months. The latter included a deployment on the HMCS Fredericton in 2009-10 as part of a counter-piracy operation in the Indian Ocean to disrupt flows of weapons and drugs during the war in Afghanistan.
“No matter where a chaplain serves … our role is always to serve as the primary line of defence for the spiritual welfare and morale of military members,” Gosse-Vingerhoeds says. “We live and work right alongside our members, no matter the location or the danger.”
The bishop-elect views her main role as providing care and support for Anglican and Lutheran chaplains, military members and their families. She also highlights the importance of ecumenical and interfaith relations and an understanding of Indigenous identity and traditions, amid broadening spiritual practices and ever-increasing diversity of CAF members.
Just as chaplains provide confidential support to military members outside their chain of command, she says, the bishop ordinary provides confidential pastoral care and support to military chaplains who may be reluctant to seek support within the CAF.
“Military chaplaincy can be heartbreaking and lonely,” Gosse-Vingerhoeds says. “The demands of the job are such that too many of our chaplains find themselves overburdened and on the brink of compassion fatigue or burnout … I never want any chaplain to feel isolated and alone. As bishop ordinary, I commit myself to being available to any chaplain who seeks support.”
Gosse-Vingerhoeds will be consecrated and installed as bishop ordinary on Sept. 15 at Christ Church Cathedral in Ottawa.
