Two archbishops will represent the Anglican Church of Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia at next week’s meeting of the primates and moderators of the Anglican Communion in Canterbury, the church has announced. On 2 Jan 2016 the church’s press office released a note stating “Archbishops Philip Richardson and Winston Halapua will be among 37 Primates at the historic meeting called by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby.”
Alone among the churches of the Anglican Communion, the ACNZP, is divided along racial lines into separate but equal churches with three co-primates. As the international debate over South Africa’s apartheid policies took shape, the church in New Zealand began an internal self-examination of its own history. Critics of the existing power structures noted that since the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840 between the British colonial government and the Maori people, the Maoris had been dominated by European culture.
To overcome this political history, the church in 1992 revised its constitution splitting it into three equal partnerships or Tikanga — one for whites, one for Maoris, and one for Polynesians. Each Tikanga was given its own church buildings, clergy, and language for liturgy. The church’s seminary saw the appoint of three co-equal deans, overlapping dioceses in New Zealand (one for whites and one for Maoris), and three archbishops.
“…one for whites, one for Maoris, and one for Polynesians. Each Tikanga was given its own church buildings, clergy, and language for liturgy.”
And I thought the New Zealand church would stand against racism!!!