Anglican Church of Southern Africa

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The Anglican Church of Southern Africa (formerly the Church of the Province of Southern Africa) is the Anglican province in the southern part of Africa, including dioceses in Angola, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, Saint Helena, South Africa and Swaziland. The primate is the Archbishop of Cape Town. The current archbishop is Njongonkulu Ndungane. His predecessor was Nobel Peace Prize laureate Desmond Tutu.

In 2006, by way of avoiding historic confusion as to its ambiguous name, the church has changed its name to the Anglican Church of Southern Africa.

The province has an Anglo-Catholic ethos and is regarded as the most liberal Anglican province in Africa, particularly on issues such as ordination of women and homosexuality.

Contents 1 History 2 Dioceses and bishops 3 Bibliography 4 External links

[edit] History

The first Anglican clergy to minister regularly at the Cape were military chaplains who accompanied the troops when the British occupied the Cape Colony in 1795 and then again in 1806. The second British occupation resulted in a growing influx of civil servants and settlers who were members of the Church of England, and so civil or colonial chaplains were appointed to minister to their needs. These were under the authority of the governor.

The first missionary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (SPG) arrived in 1821. He was the Revd William Wright. He opened a church and school in Wynberg, a fashionable suburb of Cape Town. Allen Gardiner, a missionary of the Church Missionary Society (CMS) went to Zululand, and arranged for a priest, Francis Owen to be sent to the royal residence of King Dingane. Owen witnessed the massacre of Piet Retief, the Voortrekker leader, and his companions, who had come to negotiate a land treaty with Dingane, and left soon afterwards.

The Anglican Church in Southern Africa at this time was under the Bishop of Calcutta, whose diocese effectively included the East Indies and the entire Southern Hemisphere. Bishops en route for Calcutta sometimes stopped at the Cape for confirmations, and occasionally ordination of clergy, but these visits were sporadic. It became apparent that a bishop was needed for South Africa, and in 1847 Robert Gray was consecrated as the first bishop of Cape Town in Westminster Abbey. The new bishop landed in Cape Town in 1848.

A breakaway group, the Church of England in South Africa separated after 1870 and was constituted in 1938. It is a separate church body of conservative evangelical orientation and is not part of the Anglican Communion although it is strongly supported by and has close ties with the Anglican Diocese of Sydney.

[edit] Dioceses and bishops

• Diocese of Cape Town - Archbishop and Metropolitan: Njongonkulu Ndungane
• Diocese of Angola - Bishop: Andre Soares
• Diocese of Christ the King - Bishop: Peter Lee
• Diocese of False Bay - Bishop: Mervyn Castle
• Diocese of the Free State - Bishop: Patrick Glover
• Diocese of George - Bishop: Donald Harker
• Diocese of Grahamstown - Bishop: Thabo Makgoba
• Diocese of Highveld - Bishop: David Beetge
• Diocese of Johannesburg - Bishop: Brian Germond
• Diocese of Kimberley and Kuruman - Bishop: Itumeleng Moseki
• Diocese of Lebombo - Bishop: Dinis Sengulane
• Diocese of Lesotho - Bishop: See is Vacant
• Diocese of Matlosane - Bishop: David Nkwe
• Diocese of Mpumalanga - Bishop: Leslie Walker
• Diocese of Namibia - Bishop: Nathaniel Nakwatumbah
• Diocese of Natal - Bishop: Rubin Philip
• Diocese of Niassa - Bishop: Mark van Koevering
• Diocese of Port Elizabeth - Bishop: Bethlehem Nopece
• Diocese of Pretoria - Bishop: Jo Seoka
• Diocese of Saldanha Bay - Bishop: Raphael Hess
• Diocese of St Helena - Bishop: John Salt
• Diocese of St John's - Bishop: Sitembela Mzamane
• Diocese of St Mark the Evanglelist - Bishop: Martin Breytenbach
• Diocese of Swaziland - Bishop: Meshack Mabuza
• Diocese of Umzimvubu - Bishop: Mlibo Ngewu
• Diocese of Zululand - Bishop: Dino Gabriel

[edit] Bibliography

• Elphick, Richard & Davenport, Rodney (eds). (1997). Christianity in South Africa: a political, social and cultural history. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-20940-0

• Hinchliff, Peter (1968). The church in South Africa. London: SPCK. ISBN 0-281-02277-1. 

• Page, B.T. (1947). The harvest of good hope. London: SPCK. 

[edit] External links

• Anglican Church of Southern Africa