The Council of General Synod (CoGS) has approved key elements of a strategy for streamlining and updating the church, including a task force dedicated to pursuing the six pathways for change recommended by a primatial commission along with other groups working on the national office’s property, programming and staffing.
Those close to Hamel remember him as a tireless advocate for local, national and international causes. He fought for everything from Indigenous land rights to the abolishment of apartheid to natural conservation and the wildlife sanctuary he helped found near Masset, B.C.
Bishop Mary Irwin-Gibson of the diocese of Montreal will retire Oct. 5 after a 44-year career in the church—including 10 years as diocesan bishop of Montreal.
When St. Clement’s Anglican Church in North Vancouver, B.C. got a request to use their building for filming a TV production going by the name “Megasword” in 2024, says the Rev. Helen Dunn, the church’s rector, it was the church’s first time being approached for a film rental.
This summer, Kristen Deede Johnson became the first non-ordained principal of the University of Toronto’s Wycliffe College, a fact which she says points to the school’s willingness to try new approaches to the traditional work of theological education.
Two prominent Anglican ecumenists were awarded the King Charles III Coronation Medal June 20: Canon Alyson Barnett-Cowan, former president of the Canadian Council of Churches and Archdeacon Edward Simonton, vicar general and archdeacon of the diocese of Quebec. They were nominated by the Canadian Council of Churches and the Anglican Orthodox International Theological Dialogue, respectively.
“The church doesn’t always recognize or value young people. But we are the past, present, and future of this church,” begins a prayer drafted based on table discussions at this summer’s Canadian Lutheran Anglican Youth (CLAY) gathering, held Aug. 21 to 24 in Saskatoon. This year’s event, themed “Rooted and Rising,” brought together around 350 youth from around the country, making it larger than the previous gathering of around 300 in 2023, but with substantially fewer than pre-pandemic highs of around 850, says Sheilagh McGlynn, the Anglican Church of Canada’s animator for youth ministries.
Archdeacon Alan Perry is no longer the general secretary of General Synod, per a press release posted on anglican.ca Sept. 3. The release does not specify a reason for the ending of his employment in the role.
!["[A government lawyer] “[He] came up to Crawley and said, ‘You negotiate very, very well and that’s a skill we didn’t expect from clergy.’ And David said, ‘Well, the thing that I’ve had to do that none of you have had to is negotiate with the mother of a bride during a wedding.’" Photo: Provided by the ecclesiastical province of British Columbia and Yukon](https://i0.wp.com/anglicanjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Screenshot-2025-08-25-154720.jpg?fit=686%2C626&ssl=1)
“David drove change wherever he was. He never accepted the status quo,” says the Rev. Ken Gray, retired dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral, Kamloops, B.C. He’s describing Archbishop David Crawley, former bishop of Kootenay, metropolitan of the ecclesiastical province of British Columbia and Yukon and acting primate, who died Aug. 17 at age 88. Crawley is remembered by friends and colleagues as an intelligent debater, an articulate leader and a passionate and early advocate—even during his early career—for causes that were not always popular at the time.
Born in Edmonton, Archbishop Shane Parker, elected primate of the Anglican Church of Canada June 26, is a former sociologist.
Emancipation Sunday, canonical changes and charitable donation drives: a roundup of other news from the Anglican Church of Canada’s June General Synod.
General Synod passed a resolution June 29 endorsing an open letter to the Canadian government from the Queer Interfaith Coalition, an organization which supports LGBTQ+ acceptance across different religious groups, which says it is “reclaiming the religious voice from those who have sought to weaponize faith [against the 2SLGBTQIA+ community].” The motion passed after some debate surrounding a clause denouncing “the damaging heresy that some people are more deserving of equality than others.” This statement, said an amendment members added to the resolution, would not be understood to condemn Christians who do not believe Scripture permits same-sex marriages.
General Synod has referred to the Council of General Synod (CoGS) a resolution which would significantly curtail the circumstances under which the leaders of General
Archbishop Shane Parker was installed as the 15th primate of the Anglican Church June 29 in a ceremony at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, Ont. Parker was elected June 26 when his name was added to the third ballot after members of General Synod called for additional candidates.
The first of these motions requests the primate of the Anglican Church of Canada to sign a letter from the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative, a nonprofit that aims to rally civil society around the world to phase out fossil fuels. The organization’s faith letter, which General Synod requested the primate sign, calls governments to end expansion of coal, oil and gas production; phase out existing production in a fair and equitable manner, providing for the differing needs of developing countries and more dependent regions; and “ensure a global just transition to 100% access to renewable energy globally,” enabling all communities, including the global South, to flourish.
General Synod has voted to pursue the six pathways for change recommended by a primatial commission over the next triennium—and to allocate up to $2 million of unrestricted funds from General Synod’s Consolidated Trust Fund to do that work. Both resolutions passed with overwhelming majorities.
The General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada has elected Archdeacon Tanya Phibbs, currently its deputy prolocutor, as its new prolocutor and Brian Lee, a lay member of General Synod from the diocese of Brandon, as its deputy prolocutor.
General Synod has voted to add additional advocacy, ministry and communications to the support the Anglican Church of Canada offers to migrant farmworkers. The assembly, which is meeting in London June 23-June 30, heard a presentation from the Rev. Enrique Martinez of the parish of Long Point Bay and director of the Huron Migrant Farmworkers Ministry, which provides meals, spiritual care, mental health support and bicycles to migrant workers in the diocese of Huron; and from Chris Sorio, a member of migrant justice advocacy group Migrante Canada and of the Public Witness for Social and Ecological Justice Coordinating Committee.
The orders of clergy and laity have elected Bishop Shane Parker of the diocese of Ottawa as the new primate of the Anglican Church of Canada. Parker was not on the list of candidates announced prior to the primatial election or on the first or second ballots of the day, but the Order of Bishops—which, according to church canons, nominates but does not vote for primatial candidates—added his name to the list of candidates on the third ballot in response to a motion from the Order of Laity asking for more candidates. He was finally elected on the fifth ballot, on which he appeared opposite only Bishop Ryscilla Shaw of the diocese of Toronto.
Archbishop Anne Germond, acting primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, addressed General Synod, meeting in London June 23-30, with a message of unity and anticipation of major changes. The time ahead will be one in which the Anglican Church of Canada is called to move forward into an uncertain future, she said, comparing the situation to that of the people of historical Israel returning to Jerusalem after exile. In doing so, she said, the church will need to be able to give up its internal divisions and see its way to cooperation.