A Service of Celebration

“The service… drew an assembly of Bishops, senior clergy, political figures, and worshippers who gathered in thanksgiving and reflection”.

No, not that service in Canterbury, but a probably more notable one involving another Primate that took place almost simultaneously 3,000 miles away.

On 25th March 2026, the very day Most Revd Rt Hon Dame Sarah Mullally was installed as Archbishop of Canterbury, a service took place in Abuja, Nigeria to recognise the sixth anniversary of the enthronement of the Most Revd Dr. Henry Chukwudum Ndukuba as Metropolitan and Primate of All Nigeria. Unlike the service in Canterbury, it was a solemn Holy Communion and focused therefore, not on the archbishop or any individual, other than Jesus Christ.

The service was significant because Abuja was the venue for the recent meeting of, what is now, the Global Anglican Communion. Accordingly, it is the actual and also spiritual home of the “Abuja Affirmation” which, amongst many other things, says, “We reject the so-called Instruments of Communion, namely the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lambeth Conference, the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC), and the Primates’ Meeting, which have failed to uphold the doctrine and discipline of the Anglican Communion.”

The two services on the same day cannot but prompt reflection on where the locus of global Anglicanism now lies.

It is because of the stance reflected in the Affirmation that twelve of the world’s Anglican Primates refused to attend the installation of the new Archbishop of Canterbury. The Abuja Affirmation says, “Leaders who hold office in the Global Anglican Communion must not attend future Primates’ Meetings called by the Archbishop of Canterbury, nor attend the Lambeth Conference, nor attend ACC meetings or participate in Commissions of the ACC”. The Abuja Affirmation expects, “A full and public disengagement from…” the Canterbury-aligned structures. And, so strikingly, that is what happened today in Canterbury, the home of the former Mother Church.

The Church of England will spin that the Primates of twenty-four provinces (out of forty-two) attended, two others sent a representative, and three more could not attend through force of circumstance. Yet those who attended were from provinces like Scotland, Ireland, New Zealand, Aoteroa & Polynesia, the West Indies, Mexico and so on, that are so small they essentially don’t register on the dial of Anglican church attendance.

The active membership in the Church of Nigeria (a country with a population less than four times that of England) on the other hand, is between twenty, or more likely forty, times that of the Church of England. Its attendance is so many times more than, for example, the Church in Wales, that the latter’s is essentially irrelevant in the conversation.

Delivering the sermon at the service in Abuja, the Rt Rev’d Dr Duke Akamisoko, Bishop of Kubwa Diocese, “…praised the Primate’s firm leadership in navigating global ecclesiastical challenges… the Primate has shown ‘courage, clarity and conviction’ in preserving the doctrinal integrity of the Church of Nigeria amidst shifting theological trends worldwide” and “…pointed to the expansion of the Church through the creation of new dioceses, describing it as evidence of both spiritual vitality and effective administration”.

Dame Sarah too now has six years in post. There is little chance that she will live-up to the standards and successes of Archbishop Ndukuba and so will prove that the Global Anglican Communion was correct to take over “stewardship” of worldwide Anglicanism.

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