The Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) has formally disapproved of the recent election of the Right Reverend Cherry Vann, an openly lesbian priest, as Archbishop of Wales, terming it as being against biblical teachings and contrary to the unity of the global Anglican Communion.
In a strongly worded Monday statement issued by the Primate of the Church, Most Rev. Henry Ndukuba, the Nigerian Anglican Church reaffirmed its opposition to what it refers to as “the normalization of same-sex relationships within the Church” and condemned the appointment as “a tragic departure from the clear teachings of Scripture.”
“We cannot walk alongside churches that have made the decision to bend God’s word to fit contemporary liberal agendas. The election of a lesbian bishop as Archbishop is a profound offense to the orthodox faith passed down by the apostles,” the statement stated.
Archbishop Vann, who is Bishop of Monmouth since 2020, was elected last week by the Church in Wales. She is the first female and first gay cleric to be installed as Archbishop in the Welsh province.
While the appointment has been greeted in some quarters of the Anglican world as a gesture of welcome and progression, it has renewed tension between liberal Western provinces and conservative churches in Africa, Asia, and Latin America — a divide that was breached twenty years ago with the ordination of openly gay bishops in North America.
Nigeria, home to one of the largest and strongest Anglican provinces, has taken a leading role in the Global South’s resistance to what it sees as the degeneration of the Church in the West both in doctrine and morals.
The Church of Nigeria affirmed that it stands in solidarity with the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON), a movement committed to preserving traditional Christian orthodoxy on marriage and sexuality. The Church also issued a warning that further provocations by liberal Anglican provinces would lead to an even more conclusive split in global Anglicanism.
Efforts at bridging the growing gap in the Anglican Communion have so far seen limited success. Onlookers now fear that such controversies will continue to split up one of the world’s biggest and oldest Christian world bodies.
As disputes regarding inclusion, sexuality, and biblical authority continue to test the Anglican Communion to its limits of cohesion, the query is whether the Communion can survive its more divergent paths.
