January issue shares news and reflection from CoGS, Sacred Circle, COP26

Updates from the Council of General Synod (CoGS), the 10th Indigenous Anglican Sacred Circle and the COP26 climate conference anchor the January issue of the Anglican Journal.

Our coverage of the November meeting of CoGS starts with the primate’s address, in which Archbishop Linda Nicholls calls for “realistic hope” as the Anglican Church of Canada weighs the toll of the COVID-19 pandemic. We discuss church finances that forecast a surplus for 2021, but uncertainty ahead. The Governance Working Group prepares resolutions for General Synod that could change the latter’s rules for membership and voting. And a report from the Anglican Council of Indigenous Peoples culminates with CoGS joining a call against the forcible disciplining of children. Sacred Circle also met in November to continue its work refining key documents for the self-determining Indigenous church within the Anglican Church of Canada.

In other news, devastating floods that hit southern British Columbia prompted prayers and support from Canadians Anglicans to affected residents. The Journal speaks to a United Church of Canada minister, chaplain and marathon veteran who uses “mindful running” as a way to teach transcendence and self-awareness, and the Anglican Church of Canada’s new treasurer and CFO Amal Attia details how she was drawn to the church through its mission to help others.

Just as Christians are called to create positive change in the world, so they are encouraged to do so within themselves through introspection, and this month’s opinion section includes reflection on both. Our latest Anglican Voices column is by the Rev. Alecia Greenfield, who served as a virtual delegate at COP26. Greenfield writes of her disappointment in the climate conference, and how the church must engage moving forward. National Indigenous Archbishop Mark MacDonald, who attended COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, pleads in his January column for a spiritual revolution that will see people choose life over consumption at a time of crisis. And as the season of Epiphany approaches, Primate Nicholls in her column reflects on Jesus’ call to inner sight as a means of finding truth.

Read the January issue of the Anglican Journal at anglicanjournal.com or in digital PDF.