London, Ont.
Updated with new information June 27
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.
In a speech to the assembled members of General Synod, Parker shared one of his earliest memories—of playing outside the church of St. Mary Magdalene church in Fort Nelson, B.C. in the batts of fiberglass insulation going into the church. As a result, while he had been part of the Anglican church all his life, he joked, “I’m quite sure I carry a piece of the Anglican church in my lungs.”
But the image of a church full of insulation struck him as significant to the Anglican Church of Canada’s situation today, he said. While insulation can be helpful, he told General Synod, “It can insulate us from God. We can be insulated from each other. We can even be insulated from our truest selves. Our church at this time needs to remove a lot of insulation.”
The next few years will be a time for removing the barriers between the church and the outside world and between people within the church, he said. “We need to feel the cold and the heat and the wind and the fire. We need to understand our context without the insulation that has built up over so many years … so we can feel the Holy Spirit, so we can feel and hear one another and so we can have the courage to be the church we must be at this point in time.”
In a follow-up interview with the Journal, Parker added that he planned, as primate, to continue down the route of change set up by the listening process that brought forth the transformational commitments and the primate’s commission’s pathways—the set of recommendations calling for dramatic change in the church.
“A lot of people make the mistake of thinking that it is strategic or operational change when in fact it’s cultural change” that’s needed in the church now, he said. “We need to think differently and behave differently.” The rest of this week’s meeting of General Synod (running June 23-June 29) will determine the shape that change takes, he said.
His understanding of the primacy is twofold, Parker said: First, the primate is an archbishop of their province of the Anglican Communion with a duty to reflect, represent and be a pastor to their church. “But a core component is that you are canonically the CEO of the organisation known as the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada, which is a not-for-profit set up to do a piece of work on behalf of the whole church,” he said. “This [triennium], it will be important to lay hold of the role of being the person who governs and leads the organisation that we refer to as the General Synod.”
Parker also told General Synod it had been a difficult process of discernment to decide whether he would allow his name to stand as a candidate for primate. In the interview, he said the process had brought him to the core aspect of the Christian faith, “which is ultimately about entrusting your life to God and laying down yourself in order to serve.” When it became clear to him it was time to give himself up for candidacy, he added, he felt a sense of peace. This was not the first time he had been approached to let his name stand during the nomination process, he said, and he had gone through the process of filling in a biographical profile already as part of the process of testing out the road, but he had not made the decision to be a candidate until the call for more names came from the order of laity. It will be a difficult transition for the people in the diocese of Ottawa, who were not expecting their bishop to become primate, he said.
Born in Edmonton to Irish parents, Parker grew up in Western Canada. He spent several years working as a labourer before earning undergraduate and graduate degrees in sociology from Carleton University to become a professional sociologist. Shifting career paths, he studied theology at Saint Paul University and in 1987 was ordained as a priest in the diocese of Ottawa, going on to serve as a parish priest and the diocesan archdeacon. In 1999 Parker was appointed dean of Ottawa and rector of Christ Church Cathedral and in 2020 was elected the 10th bishop of Ottawa.
Parker remained active in academia during his ministry. He served as a part-time professor of pastoral ministry and theology at Saint Paul University and currently chairs the seminary’s Anglican Studies Advisory Committee. From 2005 to 2020 Parker was a member of the Research Ethics Board at Carleton University. A prolific writer, he served as a longtime contributor for the Ottawa Citizen column “Ask the Religion Experts,” with a collection of his essays published in a book, Answering the Big Questions.
In 2010 Parker received the Interfaith Ottawa Award, which recognizes residents who have contributed to greater understanding between local faith groups. An associate member of the Ontario Association of Family Mediators, which accredits mediators in the province, Parker has spoken about reconciliation at events such as the Anglican Church of Canada’s 2017 national consultation on Indigenous self-determination, “The Road to Warm Springs.” In 2018 he appointed Albert Dumont as Algonquin spiritual teacher in residence at the cathedral, and later as Indigenous advisor to the bishop.
Parker is married and has two sons, a daughter and three grandchildren.
The original candidates in the election were national Indigenous Archbishop Chris Harper; Archbishop Greg Kerr-Wilson, metropolitan of the ecclesiastical province of Northern Lights; Bishop Riscylla Shaw of the diocese of Toronto; and Bishop David Lehmann of the diocese of Caledonia. None of these had received the necessary majority-plus-one of votes in both houses of clergy and laity during the first two ballots. When the second ballot came back without a winner chosen, Canon (lay) Ian Alexander, prolocutor of General Synod, announced Lehmann’s name would be removed from the ballot according to canon requirements for the bishop on the second ballot with the fewest votes.
At this point, Alexander explained the procedure by which the assembly could petition the Order of Bishops to bring forth one or more additional names for the ballot and left a five-minute break for members to discuss if they would like to bring one forward. After that break a member of the Order of Laity moved a motion formally requesting that it did. The motion passed 53 to 49 in the Order of Laity, the assembly broke for lunch and after it reconvened, the bishops replied with Parker’s name.
Rebecca Michael, a youth member of General Synod from the diocese of Ontario, was the mover. She later told the Anglican Journal she brought the motion because she was concerned two of the candidates whom she saw as the more progressive choices among the original slate might split the vote between them, resulting in another of the candidates, whom she saw as more conservative, taking the lead. She spoke to the Anglican Journal on the condition that it not reveal the names of the candidates she was referring to.
She and other youth delegates also told the Journal that at a June 24 youth dinner held with the primatial candidates, they asked the candidates a set of questions to decide who they would vote for. Among these was one asking the candidates to name some concrete ways in which they had helped the cause of LGBT people in the church. Michael said two of the candidates had given the youth answers they considered to be clear and relevant while she felt two others had said little of substance.
Parker has spoken out publicly in support of LGBT people before, including as a signatory to the Global Interfaith Commission on LGBT+ Lives 2020 declaration, Declaring the Sanctity of Life and Dignity of All. In a 2023 letter Parker commended the commission and its work to his diocese amid what he described as an alarming increase in hateful words, actions and political posturing against LGBT people. “Not everyone or every parish in our diocese participates in Pride events, but each of us are called to participate in making a safe, loving space for 2SLGBTQI+ people, and to build meaningful connections with one another,” he said.
Speaking with the Journal after the election, Parker told the Journal he believed deeply that all people are made in the image of God. “The expression of who we are, who we find ourselves to be, ultimately, is rooted in our creator.” He said he believes homophobia and discrimination are still active problems both in society and in the church, and added that Christians are called to stand against them in accordance with the gospel values of peace, love, acceptance and justice for people who are persecuted for who they are.
At the same time, Parker said, he is aware that there are strong differences of opinion in the church and believes in the calling for Christians to live in communion even when they disagree, and in the transformative power of God to bring them closer together, even across divisions. “As I said in my remarks, the insulation between us needs to be ripped away so that we can see and hear and feel the image of God and one another and then leave room for the Holy Spirit to inform exactly how we would proceed as a church,” he told the Journal.
In subsequent rounds of voting, Harper asked to have his name removed from the ballot after receiving the fewest votes in the third vote and Kerr-Wilson did the same on the fourth, leaving the final decision between Shaw and Parker.
With only two candidates remaining, the Rev. Christopher Samson, a member of the house of clergy made another motion for more candidates. He and a group of fellow clergy, he said, felt they could not in good conscience vote for either Shaw or Parker, though he did not explain why. While he spoke, an observer seated in the observer’s gallery called out “Shame!” several times. This motion for more candidates failed and Parker was elected on the fifth ballot. Samson declined further comment.
Not having expected to be on the ballot, Parker said he had not had long to consider how he and his family would adapt to the requirements for the primate to spend time at the General Synod office in Toronto. Part of his considerations, he said, would be to limit the time he spends commuting and to work on an understanding of how much travel is required in the role and how much of that travel he might cut back on in order to focus on the critical work on church structure.
Asked what message he wished to convey to Anglicans who were not present at General Synod, he said he wanted them to know how deeply he knew and cared about the church.
“I’ve been a part of this church since I was born. I’ve lived in different parts of the country. I’ve experienced the church from the perspective of being a dean of a cathedral and from being a parish priest. I’ve experienced it from the perspective of being a child whose father died at a very young age, and I’ve been a pastor for a long, long time,” he said. “So I know and love this church. I believe God loves this church, and I feel and understand that we are in a degree of confusion or pain or deep concern about the structures, the relationships, the culture of our [church.] I hope people would understand that that’s something that will be very much in my mind as I serve as the primate of Anglican Church of Canada … If we don’t guide change, we will be changed anyway. So let’s choose to guide the change that we’re called to make.”
Born May 22, 1958, Parker will turn 70, the mandatory retirement age for primates in May of 2028, the year of the next General Synod. However, Burns said during the election, the church can set the date of the Synod such that he is able to complete the triennium before he retires.
Parker will be installed as primate during the closing worship service of this session of General Synod, on June 29.
Matthew Puddister also contributed to this report.
This story has been corrected to reflect that Bishop Shane Parker has three grandchildren.
