CEN 5th October
The Cape Town diocesan electoral assembly on Sept 25 selected the Bishop of Grahamstown, the Rt Rev Thabo Cecil Makgoba, as Archbishop of Cape Town and Metropolitan and Primate of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa.
Bishop Makgoba will succeed the Most Rev Njongonkulu Ndungane as archbishop, and will assume office on Jan 1. The Dean of the Province, Bishop David Beetge of the Highveld will serve as interim primate until Bishop Makgoba assumes office.
Viewed as a conservative on issues of human sexuality, the new archbishop is expected to move the South African church closer to the other African Anglican provinces, while maintaining the Province’s support of HIV/AIDS ministries, economic empowerment and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
The spiritual reconstruction of the Church and of South African society will guide his tenure as Archbishop, Bishop Makgoba told the South African Broadcasting Corporation.
The 47-year-old Bishop of Grahamstown was elected on the second ballet by the Cape Town electoral assembly. His name will now be submitted to the Province’s House of Bishops for confirmation.
Delegates from each of the Provinces’ 25 other dioceses and Cape Town chose Bishop Makgoba from a field that also included the Rev Nyameko Barney Pityana, Vice Chancellor of the University of South Africa and the Bishop of Pretoria, the Rt. Rev.Johannes Thomas Seoka.
Bishop Makgoba was educated at St Paul’s Theological College in Grahamstown, and earned a Master’s degree in Psychology from the University of Witwatersrand. Elected Bishop of Grahamstown in 2004, he had previously served the diocese as a parish priest, archdeacon and suffragan bishop. He is currently on sabbatical leave, studying at Harvard University.
The new primate has been active outside the Province, and has served as a member of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Lambeth Conference Design Group. In interviews with the South African press following his selection, Bishop Makgoba stated he would be his own man as Archbishop. While he valued the witness of former Archbishops Desmond Tutu and Njongonkulu Ndungane, “it will be my own spirituality”