The Anglican Church of Canada should consider making major cuts to the size of its governance gatherings and committees, says the report of a commission tasked with reimagining its future.
The church is about a quarter the size it was in 1967, but its governance groups remain the same size, the commission’s chair, Archdeacon Monique Stone, told Council of General Synod (CoGS March 7. The report makes the same point, and asks, “How can the size of church governance structures in the Anglican Church of Canada be reduced by 75 per cent?” Stone told CoGS this figure was intended more as a conversation-starter than a fixed target—but maintained that the report envisaged serious transformation.
“This is not just tweaks, this is big change,” she said.
The document she presented to CoGS recommended General Synod 2025 give the officers of General Synod—including the primate, general secretary, chancellor, prolocutor and deputy prolocutor—the mandate and resources to propose a major revision to the church’s organization which they would present and begin implementing at the following General Synod in 2028.
“Current institutional structures are larger than necessary at every level (General Synod, ecclesiastical provinces, and the number of dioceses),” the document, titled Creating Pathways, reads. “This top-heavy structure focuses human and financial resources on maintaining outsized institutions rather than proclaiming the gospel in local communities.”
The cuts called for in this section of the document, Stone told the Anglican Journal, are intended to apply to the number of members on committees and to the number of church members at governance gatherings like CoGS and General Synod. They are not, she said, necessarily intended to apply to the relatively small number of church staff.
The commission, convened by former primate Archbishop Linda Nicholls in 2023, recommends six processes for the church to begin work on to fulfill the mandate of adapting the church to the needs of a smaller membership and a 21st century social and political landscape. Its report is based on feedback—in the form of 297 responses to an online survey as well as interviews and Zoom meetings with staff at church house and Anglicans across the country—regarding a set of seven conversation-starting “hypotheses” for the future of the Anglican Church of Canada that the commission put forward in 2023. CoGS voted March 7 to commend the six pathways to June’s General Synod gathering for discussion and action.
The central question of these recommendations is what form the church’s governance structures would take if they were being designed for the first time to meet the needs of the church today, said Stone. In addition to changes at the General Synod level, that may involve restructuring at the diocesan and provincial levels, which General Synod does not have the authority to mandate directly, she notes. What it can do, however, is play a leadership role in the conversation, encouraging regional governance bodies in the church to cooperate on a unified vision for what the new shape of the church will be.
The six pathways along which the document recommends the church proceed are:
- Organizational structure, dealing with the governance gatherings and committees of the church
- Management overview and restructuring, with suggestions for the transparency, accountability and organization of the office of General Synod and its staff
- Inclusion and diversity in decision making, responding to calls for greater and more equal accessibility of participation in church governance
- Communications, involving discussions on the future of the Anglican Journal as well as the national church’s overall strategy for disseminating information and connecting members across the country
- Walking in partnership with the Indigenous church
- Ministry in remote northern communities
Read it all in the Anglican Journal
