Will the last Anglican please turn out the lights?

Bad jokes don’t tell the whole truth. Back in November 2019, headlines declared that the Anglican Church of Canada was in sharp decline.

Church of Canada may disappear by 2040, says new report

A new report from the Anglican Church of Canada projects that the denomination may cease to exist in the next two decades if its current decline continues.

Religious News Service headline, Nov 18, 2019. Article by John Longhurst.

And then a global pandemic! How are the Anglicans doing?

I’m not an Anglican, just a Mennonite with liturgical longings. A Mennonite who writes and teaches about stewardship.

I’ve participated in many stewardship discussions with Anglicans. Anglicans are very much alive. Here are three quotes from Archbishop Linda Nicholls, Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, from a spirited forum on Pew and Beyond yesterday. I offer them as encouragement to church people everywhere:

“We are more resilient than we thought.”

“Our job is to be faithful in this moment.”

“Hope, adventure and promise.”

I am delighted to hear the gratitude, the energy and the joy in the conversation. I particularly like “hope, adventure and promise” as touchstones for the journey. Where there’s hope, there’s life. And our hope is in God, our Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer. God has not changed, even when our circumstances have. Our hope remains very much alive.

Hope, adventure and promise. Words to live by! Not nostalgia for a past that will not return - falling prey to nostalgia could trap Anglicans into thinking that turning out the lights is the only option. Bad jokes don’t tell the whole truth. Hope does not disappoint us.