Canadian Anglicans receive honorary doctorates

Two Canadian Anglican priests have been granted honorary doctorates of divinity by the University of Toronto’s Trinity College.

Archdeacon Paul Feheley, principal secretary to the primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, and Canon John Gibaut, director of Unity, Faith and Order in the Anglican Communion, received the honours at a ceremony Tuesday, May 9 at Trinity College, whose faculty of divinity offers theological training in the Anglican tradition.

Feheley earned his master of divinity degree from Trinity College in 1978, with a thesis in communications. He was ordained a priest in 1979 and was appointed principal secretary to then-primate Archbishop Andrew Hutchison in 2004. He is priest-in-charge and musician at St. Chad’s Anglican Church, Toronto and serves as national director of the Anglican Fellowship of Prayer. From 2013 to 2014, he also served as interim managing editor of the Anglican Journal.

Feheley has been an “influence for good in the life of the Anglican Church in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and the world as a musician, communicator, a pastor, a reconciler, administrator, visionary and man of God,” Philip Poole, retired bishop of the diocese of Toronto, wrote in a citation for the ceremony.

Gibaut also earned a master of divinity degree at Trinity, graduating in 1984. He completed a doctorate of theology degree, also at Trinity, in 1994. He then taught theology at Saint Paul University in Ottawa until 2008. He has served on a number of Canadian and international bodies, including the Anglican-Roman Catholic Dialogue of Canada, the International Commission for Anglican-Orthodox Theological Dialogue and the Inter-Anglican Standing Commission on Ecumenical Relations. In 2008, he was appointed director of the Commission on Faith and Order. He has served as director for Unity, Faith and Order in the Anglican Communion since 2015.