gafgonabci

Menu

The Global Anglican Communion and the Anglican Orthodoxy

Anglican Church of India and British India

A Rich Heritage and History

  • Preserving the past to revitalize the future!

    The Anglican Church of India underwrites all fundamentality of the various faculties of doctrines of the Christian faith, such as the Trinity, Redemption, Salvation, Water Baptism, Baptism of the Holy Spirit, The Death and Resurrection of Jesus, the Coming Judgement and Eternal Life.

History of ACI

The Church of India (CIPBC) (formerly the Church of England in India) is the original Anglican Church in India. The Anglican presence in India dates back four hundred years ago to 1600, when Queen Elizabeth I, was still on the throne of England. For the next ninety years that is until 1927 the Church of India was a Province of the Church of England, under the authority of the Crown and the British Parliament. Arising from the enactment of the Indian Church Measure, 1927 and the Indian Church Act, 1927 for the dissolution of its legal connection with the Church of England, the Church of India, Burma and Ceylon formed the ecclesiastical Province. It was the time it governed by its own very comprehensive “Constitution, Canons and Rules are binding on all members of the Anglican Church of India, that is all the clergy and lay people as well. It was the Government Church under Ecclesiastical department and Crown was the trustee of the Anglican Church. The Anglican Church in India became autonomous Church body and followed the same Creeds, traditions, the Sacraments and Holy orders of men.
 

CSI was one of the four united Protestant churches in the Anglican Communion, the others being the Church of North India, the Church of Pakistan and the Church of Bangladesh. In 1947, the Church of South India (CSI) was formed in the newly independent India as a united church of Anglicans, Baptists, Basel Mission, Lutherans and Presbyterians. The Church of South India accepted an order of uniformity in worship and practice which was at odds with some aspects of Anglican tradition. Traditional Anglicans in the CSI did not accept this and there was a provision for separation within a period of 30 years from the CSI. Therefore, in 1964, some Anglicans decided to withdraw from the CSI and re-established the Anglican Church of India on 24 August 1964 by the Visionary Abp. Dr. Stephen Vattapara, Kottayam, India.

EPISCOPAL HEADS OF THE ANGLICAN CHURCH

The Anglican Church  follows the Episcopacy from the Early entry of The Church of England to India.

The Epicopacy starts from the Year 1814  wherein the Anglican Church came into existence in India.

  1. 1814 – 1823    Rt.Revd. Thomas Fanshawe Middleton         
  2. 1823 – 1826    Rt.Revd. Reginald Heber
  3. 1827 – 1828    Rt.Revd. John Thomas James                           
  4. 1829 – 1831    Rt.Revd. John Matthias Turner                        
  5. 1832 – 1858    Rt.Revd. Daniel Wilson                                     
  6. 1858 – 1866    Rt.Rev. George Edward Lynch Cotton            
  7. 1866 – 1876    Rt.Revd. Robert Milman                                    
  8. 1876 – 1898    Rt.Revd. Edward Ralph Johnson                      
  9. 1898 – 1902    Rt.Revd. Jambs Edward Cowell Welldon        
  10. 1902 – 1913    Rt.Revd. Reginald Stephen Copleston            
  11. 1912 – 1945    “FIRST INDIAN ANGLICAN BISHOP TO LEAD THE CHURCHES OF ENGLAND in INDIA.
                                 Rt.Revd. Vethanayagam Samuel Azariah”
  12. 1945 – 1955    Rt.Revd. Anthony Blacker Elliott                     
  13. 1947 – 1974    Rt.Revd.Lesslie  Newbigin                                

THE ANGLICAN CHURCHES existed in different territories of India without any administrative heads for some years wherein the Anglican communion was formed after great effort of Most Rev Dr. Stephen Vattapara, Most Rev Dr. Samuel Prakash and Most Rev. Dr Duraising James joined together – united about 37 SCATTERED ANGLICAN CHURCHES together in 1964.

In 1996 the 37 Churches (the ACI & CEEC) formed THE ANGLICAN DIOCESAN COUNCIL and elected Rev. Dr. Rajkumar (1994-2000). As first Bishop of Anglican – Episcopal heads of the ACI who followed the apostolic succession of BP. V. S. Azaria, followed with this Rev. Dr. Ponniah (2000-2002), from here the ACI & CEEC started growing rapidly joining many Anglican churches which were scattered throughout India about 61 Dioces, 2 Synod, 4 Autonomous Synod are very recently joined with GAFCON movement.

Today we stand as one family of the largest main line churches in India.

Under the leadership of Abp. Levi Joesph and Abp. A. John Sathiyakumar

Hidden facts about ACI history

If it is true that the British stumbled into their Indian Empire “in a fit of absent-mindedness,” it is equally true that no plans and aims for the conversion of India to Christ were in the mind of our Church during the inception. Painfully slowly did the missionary idea grow during the eighteenth century, manifesting itself in the interest which the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge took in the work of the German Lutheran missionaries in South India. Then with the revival of religious life in England, largely through the influence of the Wesleys and Whitefield, the Church woke up to its duties overseas as the 18th century came to an end. Mainly through the influence of Charles Simeon, some most devoted and brilliant spirits among the young men at Cambridge, full of missionary zeal, went to India as Chaplains of the East India Company, belonging to the Anglican faith. This was followed by a long struggle in Parliament between those who felt we had a Christian duty towards India and those who were for leaving things just as they were at the beginning of the 19th century. It was a struggle which ended in victory, with the arrival of the first Anglican Bishop to Calcutta in the year 1815.
Clergy and laity, representative of all our dioceses, together with their Bishops, were summoned to Calcutta by the Metropolitan, to discuss plans for the formation of a Synod of Bishops, Clergy and Laity in every diocese, as well as for the creation of a Representative Provincial Synod for all India. The intention of the Representative Council which drew up these plans was that the rules and decisions of these Synods should have a binding force on all members of the Church in India. While, however, matters were still under discussion legal advice was received from England that the formation of such Synods was illegal, because the Church in India was only a part of the Church of England, and no organization with such powers existed in England. Accordingly, for the time being, the idea of a fully constituted Synod was abandoned, and Diocesan Councils and a Provincial Council for all India was formed on a voluntary basis. With the passing of the Church Powers Bill in Parliament, and the formation of a National Assembly of the Church of England, it was decided that the time had come for taking the necessary steps to secure legal independence for our Church in India. As a result of this decision, an Indian Church Measure was drafted in England with the approval of the Provincial Council in Calcutta.
Therefore, the then Anglican Church of India existed as the parental body to all independent Protestant, Free Methodists, Baptists, and Presbyterian churches in India, including the CSI and CNI.

ACI Declared as the Parental Body

In presenting the above statement, the ACI is conscious of neither putting forth anything essentially new; nor having any desire. The truth that ACI wishes to publish is eternal, interwoven in the fabric of British Indian History and that of the Church of England, being fundamental.
 

Oct 15, 2021: On October 15, 2021 the Proposed Council of Bishops, Commissaries, Deacons, Reverends and Clergymen united in solemnly declaring the “Anglican Church of India as the Parental body for all Christian Denominations in India” for the Glory of God. This was duly approved by the Government of India on May 22, 2022. Glory to the Almighty!

Continuing Evangelical Episcopal Communion (CEEC)

The Continuing Evangelical Episcopal Communion (the CEEC) is a communion of the one, holy catholic and apostolic Church. Its identity and self-understanding is rooted in the Anglican spiritual tradition of being Catholic, Evangelical and Protestant.  Standing within the Celtic and Anglican spiritual traditions, the Continuing Evangelical Episcopal Communion was created by a convergence of three great historical expressions of faith and practice: the Evangelical/Biblical, the Charismatic/Pentecostal, and the Liturgical/Sacramental traditions.

Ecumenical Convergence with ACI

The CEEC envisions a communion whose life, ministry, and local churches are fully evangelical, fully charismatic, and fully  sacramental in their worship expression and has converged by ecumenical means with the ACI since 1999, the journey continues…