On the evening of November 7, the ACNA announced that Sutton recused himself from the Wood matter “to ensure the utmost objectivity in these proceedings,” and that Sutton had appointed the Rt. Rev. Julian Dobbs to appoint, in turn, a three-member panel of bishops to “review and approve the composition” of the already-selected Board of Inquiry.

“If the Board of Inquiry has already been impaneled, we have every reason to believe that Bishop Sutton was involved, [and] we have no reason to believe that such a board is trustworthy,” Miller told TLC. “As eager as we are to see this move quickly, a new board, organized without the involvement of the archbishop’s staff, nor of Bishop Sutton, will have to be appointed.”

“There’s no good moving quickly if you’re headed in the wrong direction,” he said, adding that Sutton’s recusal and the three-member panel’s future review of board members would be a “step in the right direction” if the panel members were known.

In addition to these new charges, the complainants’ cover letter criticizes communications by the ACNA’s provincial office and by some individual bishops that suggested the complainants took their allegations to the Post before attempting to use the canonical disciplinary channels of the church.

A timeline in the letter outlines the process the complainants say they followed. Claire Buxton, who alleges that Archbishop Wood made continual sexual advances toward her, alerted one priest of her complaint four days after Wood’s election in June 2024, and another priest a month later, who informed the Rt. Rev. Chip Edgar, Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of South Carolina, the document said. Edgar’s diocese overlaps with Wood’s Diocese of the Carolinas.

Read it all.

New for @Livng_Church: Complainants say they tried to canonically advance accusations against ACNA Archbishop Steve Wood for more than a year, and question the possibility of a fair hearing while he retains his powers.https://t.co/pDcdtrUhGE

— Arlie Coles (@ArlieColes) November 8, 2025

(Why WaPo and ACNA continue to emphasize these incidents did not occur during Wood’s archbishopric baffles; the issue here is moral and character, not when who did what.)

I have too much experience with this kind of story not to have guiding lines of thinking.

Believe the victims as whistleblowers rarely lie; the accused will deny the allegations; there’s more to the story than is published; often more victims will come forward; the establishment will act to protect and to believe the priest/pastor; local congregations will fracture and fissure and sometimes fall apart; nearly all congregations will believe the pastor/priest and not the accuser/victim; spin will arise that confuses all over what actually happened; the establishment will gather round the priest/pastor and will rig the system against the victims; whistleblowers will suffer blow after blow that re-traumatize; the system will not show compassion and empathy; strategies will develop that favor one side and bias people against the other side; those in power will rig the system so independent investigators can be avoided. I could go on. Read A Church called Tov.

I was more than (happily) surprised with Andrew Gross: “Unfortunately, the problems at the highest levels of the ACNA are deeper, wider and more entrenched than many of its own parishioners realize,” said Andrew Gross, an Anglican priest who was the Anglican Church’s communications director from 2013 until early this year. “The ACNA has never before had to deal with serious allegations of misconduct by the archbishop. This is a crisis without precedent, and how these concerns are handled will determine the future trajectory of the denomination and its credibility.” I was mocked by the establishment for saying much the same when the Stewart Ruch/Church of the Rez story first broke. Gross is right: Not only has ACNA bungled the Ruch story but they are set up to bungle this one too. What they do will determine ACNA’s future.

Reread it all.

Drive far from thy church, O God, the spirit of clerical ambition, that all whom thou dost call to lead thy people might do so in the order to which they have been truly called. Grant that like thy servant Ammonius we may refuse to conflate ordination and leadership and may never confuse rank with holiness. In the name of thy son Jesus Christ our Lord, who alone is our great High Priest. Amen.

Ammon was a 4th-century Christian ascetic and the founder of one of the most celebrated monastic communities in Egypt. He was subsequently declared a saint. He was one of the most venerated ascetics of the Nitrian Desert pic.twitter.com/qCR8A1rDy3

— Duncan Irvine (@DuncanIrvine1) October 4, 2023

O God, who orderest the common things of the common day, dignify by thy presence and aid the trivial round and routine tasks of thy servant whose hope is in thee, that least duties may be grandly done and all activities marked with the seal of thy righteousness; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

–Robert W. Rodenmayer, ed., The Pastor’s Prayerbook: Selected and arranged for various occasions (New York: Oxford University Press, 1960)

Morning everyone I hope you are well. The old packhorse bridge crossing the River Brathay. Have a great day.#LakeDistrict pic.twitter.com/xAsQYVtrZ7

— Rod Hutchinson (@lakesrhino) November 8, 2025

Then he made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but the boat by this time was many furlongs distant from the land, beaten by the waves; for the wind was against them. And in the fourth watch of the night he came to them, walking on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, “It is a ghost!” And they cried out for fear. But immediately he spoke to them, saying, “Take heart, it is I; have no fear.”

–Matthew 14:22-27

pic.twitter.com/PeyMeDt8oE

— Thomas Mikkelsen (@ThomasM73576526) November 8, 2025