Africa is not only a geographical region but an idea which Westerners, including modern Anglicans, have used ‘to think with’. This includes how accounts of recent Christian growth and decline used by Westerners and Africans alike, and which may require nuance in themselves, have been used questionably in debates about other issues. The real diversity of African Anglican thought and experience offers more complex and enriching possibilities, and should be engaged more directly and fully.

The writings of Thomas Traherne (1637–74) are explored as a source of and model for the idea of Anglicanism. In his concern for a middle way between Roman Catholicism and reformed Protestantism (including interest in Calvin as well as the Fathers), his concern for a national Church, and in emphasizing the importance of a common liturgy, Traherne anticipates what has characterized the later global Anglican Communion and important aspects of what has been seen as characteristic Anglican theology.

This article compares the doctrine of scripture in Richard Hooker’s Lawes of Ecclesiasticall Politie with that of John Calvin’s Christianae religionis institutio (Institutes of the Christian Religion) to assess Hooker’s Reformed credentials in this domain. Hooker departs from Reformed orthodoxy in two ways: first, as is generally recognized, in denying the autopisticity of Scripture; second, though less widely recognized, in decoupling autopistis from the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit. These departures must be weighed against countervailing considerations: the unanimity between Hooker and Calvin on the substance of autopistis and the need for Church testimony in attesting to Scripture; their disparate audiences and exigencies, including, in Hooker’s case, possible Puritan association of autopistis with scriptural omnicompetence; Hooker’s reliance on Article 6 of the Articles of Religion in its entirety in defending scriptural sufficiency; and the silence of Hooker’s contemporary critics regarding his denial of autopistis.

This article provides a current view of Anglican attitudes to the Papacy. First of all historical background is examined in relation to mutual perceptions of Anglicanism and Roman Catholicism going back to the early church and then moving forward through the Reformation to the twentieth century. The period from 1966 onwards saw the visit of Geoffrey Fisher to Pope John XXIII which began to change perceptions. The establishment of the Anglican Centre in Rome in 1966 was a crucial development. The setting up of the Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission, following the Malta Report in 1966 altered perceptions and understandings of Anglican and Roman Catholics mutually. There is still a variety of Anglican reactions to the Papacy.

African women members of the Mothers’ Union in South Africa have forged a neo-indigenous expression of Christianity best expressed in the characteristics of the manyano movement (women’s prayer groups) which include extempore prayer and preaching, extensive fundraising, and the wearing of a church uniform. These women had to resist the restrictions placed upon them by women missionaries and church leadership from England, which included the abolishment of the church uniform during the 1950s. The article traces their struggle of resistance during this period and shows how they fought to wear a uniform and so identified themselves with the movement of women’s prayer unions existing in other churches. It also addresses the significance of the uniform as identified by elderly women from Vulindlela, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa and suggests some of the existing ambiguities of the church uniform in the current church context.

Each Archbishop of Canterbury has a distinctive style of leadership. To some extent, this will always be shaped and framed by prevalent contemporary cultures of leadership that are to be found within wider society. The paper examines and questions some aspects in the development of the current Archbishop of Canterbury's role. It argues that the combination of a certain kind of charismatic leadership, coupled to enhanced managerial organization, may be preventing the prospect of theological acuity and spiritual wisdom playing a more significant role in the continual formation of ecclesial polity in the Church of England, and across the wider Anglican Communion.

This paper explores the use of the Chewa and Nyanja concepts of mbumba and nkhoswe in Central Africa and Southern Africa as interpretive tools for an Anglican ecclesiology and theology of leadership. Following an exposition of these two concepts, it conceptualizes mbumba as a diocese, and bishops as nkhoswe deriving from Christ as Nkhoswe par excellence. These two concepts entail critical values including responsibility, accountability and mutuality, which can be used as a model to enhance the relationship between a diocese and bishop. Conceptualizing a diocese as mbumba and the role of a bishop as that of nkhoswe has the potential to enhance missional practice in Central and Southern Africa.

In recent decades Anglicans have developed a largely unquestioned and unchallenged narrative of global growth and decline. This narrative tells a story of Anglicanism’s success being largely due to growth in developing, postcolonial nations which, according to the narrators, is ongoing and unstoppable. At the same time, first-world, mostly postmodern nations have seen a steep decline in church membership and attendance. Numeric growth and strength have been used to define ecclesial identity and to legitimate understandings of ‘Anglican orthodoxy’. This article offers an up-to-date reappraisal of Anglican Communion membership and, in that process, challenges many of the premises of such a narrative.

The Anglican Church in Tanzania emerged from the work of the Universities’ Mission to Central Africa (UMCA) and the Australian Church Missionary Society (CMSA). The Anglican missions had goals which stood against colonialism and supported the victory of nationalism. Using archives and interviews as sources, this article considers the roles and reaction of the Anglican missions in the struggle for political independence in Tanganyika and Zanzibar, the effects of independence on the missions and the Church more broadly, and the responses of the missions to ujamaa in Tanzania.

The recent, well-publicized, conflict in the Diocese of Pretoria raises questions about the Church as an institution within the new constitutional and democratic South Africa. The analysis of the conflict reveals that all parties exhibit institutional responses which, when considered with reference to Scripture and Tradition, render the organization, structure and authority of the Church anachronistic and, in their promotion of internal community strife, reveal the need for reform that reflects the gospel imperative to embrace incarnational relationships.

In the Anglican Communion today, stress on tendencies such as liberalism and conservatism, evangelicalism and modernism, continues to separate people in Christ from each other. Arguments over sexuality, women’s ordination, gender, inclusive language, and theological differences continue to create division and antagonism in the Church. This article develops the role of embodied community (koinonia) and sacramental participation as the vital centre of shared Anglican unity. It makes use of Paul Avis’s concept of ‘progressive orthodoxy’ as a way of articulating what is shared by the independent churches of the Anglican Communion. The radical demand of the gospel compels us to appreciate and come to terms with Anglicanism, not so much in any specific, well defined theology, nor ecclesiastical bureaucracy, but rather in our mutual participation in the one Lord, one faith, one baptism (Eph. 4.4-6).