Bishop Ron Cutler, of the diocese of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, has been elected metropolitan (archbishop) of the ecclesiastical province of Canada.
Cutler received the required majority in the Houses of Laity, Clergy and Bishops of the Electoral Synod during an electronic vote taken May 2-6, according to a news release announcing his election. He succeeds Archbishop Percy Coffin, bishop of the diocese of Western Newfoundland, who was elected in 2014.
Ordained as deacon and priest in 1981, Cutler became the diocese of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island’s suffragan bishop in 2008, coadjutor bishop in 2013 and diocesan bishop in 2014.
“I believe that if the provincial expression of our church is to have any relevance to the ongoing faith life of Anglicans in Eastern Canada, we must take seriously the ways in which the political, economic, educational and social dimensions of our lives have been changing,” Cutler said.
Cutler said he envisions provincial gatherings to be “the place where we share the ways in which we are seeking to engage God’s mission in these times and how we might best resource the faith communities where disciples are made, nurtured and formed.”
Reflecting on his episcopal ministry, Cutler said his experience has been “one of journeying with people in transition…Working with those discerning a call to leadership both lay and ordained, with communities experiencing demographic shifts and parishes struggling with what it means to be faithful in this time and place.”
Cutler, who grew up in Montreal, earned his bachelor of theology at McGill University. After his ordination as priest, he served in the parishes of Twillingate and Smith’s Sound, in the diocese of Central Newfoundland. He later moved to Nova Scotia and served the parish of Trinity, Sydney Mines, and the churches of St. Peter and St. John in Baddeck, from 1991 to 1996. He then became rector of St. John the Evangelist in Lower Sackville, where he served until his election as suffragan bishop in 2008.
The date of Cutler’s installation as metropolitan has not been set.
The ecclesiastical province of Canada consists of the dioceses of Central Newfoundland, Eastern Newfoundland and Labrador, Fredericton, Montreal, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, Quebec and Western Newfoundland.
