As I look back at this past year, we continued to confront our deficiencies regarding race, racism, and racial reconciliation. As a province, we are listening, but we are continuing to act intentionally, as we stated back in 2015. You may remember a number of us met in North Charleston, South Carolina, hosted by Bishops Al Gadsden and William White at New Bethel EMC Church. We met after the Ferguson shooting, just after a policeman shot a black man in North Charleston, not long after the tragic shootings at Mother Emmanuel Church in Charleston, and in the midst of ongoing protests and riots in Baltimore. At that gathering, we said the following about our intentions as the Anglican Church in North America:
To this end we:
- Ask each congregation to pray and work for racial reconciliation in their community,
- Intend to develop a Provincial team to lead our multiethnic ministries and we encourage the development of regional networks to support those who are called to multi-ethnic church planting, evangelism, and discipleship,
- Invite dioceses and parishes to consider how they might actively develop more effective multi-ethnic leadership pipelines,
- Invite dioceses and parishes to make a financial commitment to supporting multi-ethnic leadership.
Out of this meeting came AMEN, the Anglican Multi-Ethnic Network, which is now led by Fr. Taylor Ishii. He took over from Canon Lawrence McElrath, who served as the Archbishop’s Canon and Chaplain but was called up to active duty and service in Afghanistan. AMEN’s purpose is stated as follows: “The Anglican multi-ethnic network (AMEN) is a group within the ACNA dedicated to encouraging the church to better embody the universal saving power of the gospel through planting multi-ethnic churches or increasing the presence of people of color in existing churches.”
"'The College & I are very excited to welcome Bp-elect Hawkins & Bp Love…Both are godly men & will be wonderful additions to the College.'” – @ArchbishopFoley
Read more at https://t.co/13CenX3fXU#Anglican pic.twitter.com/IgNeL7iHy9
— ACNA (@The_ACNA) June 17, 2021