Delegates from the Anglican Church of Canada recently met with their counterparts from other Anglican Communion provinces for the first Conference of the Anglican Churches in the Americas in Mutual Responsibility and Mission in San José, Costa Rica. 

Archbishop Fred Hiltz, primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, said, “It was just a wonderful opportunity for all of the provinces in the Americas to come together and talk about mission.” Primates from the provinces of the Anglican Church of Brazil, the Anglican Church of the Central Region of America (IARCA), The Episcopal Church, and the Anglican Church of Mexico were all in attendance along with other clergy and lay representatives. The primates of the West Indies and the Southern Cone of America did not come to the conference but gave their permission for individual dioceses to attend, and the dioceses of Uruguay, Peru and Cuba sent delegates. The province of the West Indies is in the process of electing a new primate and did not send its acting primate or other delegates. Archbishop Gregory Venables has accepted clergy and congregations leaving the Anglican Church of Canada and The Episcopal Church – largely over the controversy surrounding the blessing of same-sex unions and the ordination of a gay bishop – into his jurisdiction in the Southern Cone and has been accused of cross-border interventions in other provinces.

But the Canadian delegation reported that controversy was not given much attention. “The fact that we met – and the focus was mission – sends a really wonderful signal to the rest of the Anglican Communion that the churches in all of the Americas are really wanting to focus their energy on mission,” said Archbishop Hiltz. “I just think that, given the tensions in the communion and particularly the way that The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church of Canada are sometimes viewed by other folks in the communion, it just sends all kinds of good signals that mission is our top priority.”

Henriette Thompson, director of the Anglican Church of Canada’s partnerships department, said the conference was a good opportunity to discuss “the pressing matters and priorities facing the churches in the Americas and the Caribbean….We have a certain affinity and areas of work that we share that are driven by our political, economic and social contexts,” she said, mentioning the impact of trade liberalization as an example of a common issue. “These are realities within which our churches live and work, and so the need for us to come together to share experiences, stories and approaches for how we need to work together is fairly important,” she said.

Each province gave a presentation based on the five marks of mission and how they are being addressed in their province. (The marks of mission, which were formulated by the Anglican Consultative Council, are: to proclaim the good news of the kingdom; to teach, baptize and nurture new believers; to respond to human need by loving service; to seek to transform the unjust structures of society; and to strive to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of the earth.) A Canadian proposal for a sixth mark of mission, “peace, conflict transformation and reconciliation,” was well-received by participants who in a joint communiqué called on the Anglican Consultative Council to accept the proposal being considered at its meeting in Kingston, Jamaica in May 2009.

Other Canadian delegates were Archdeacon Michael Pollesel, general secretary of the Anglican Church of Canada; Isaac Kawuki-Mukasa, co-ordinator for dialogue: ethics, congregational development and inter-faith relations for the Anglican Church of Canada’s faith, worship and ministry department; Judy Oatway, a board member of the Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund; and Jonathan Schmidt, a Lutheran pastor and ecumenical member of the standing committee with the partnerships group.

Mr. Pollesel said he was impressed by the ministry work the visitors saw in Costa Rica, such as the work of one mission church that focuses on helping single mothers in a poor neighbourhood of San José and runs a day care centre for 120 children. He said meeting other conference participants helped build bridges between people and provinces. “Definitely, that was one of the main aims … to establish one-to-one contact and to really put faces to the mission and ministry work that happens in other parts of the Americas.”