The Anglican Church of Canada is making progress in resolving a massive financial scandal that rocked the denomination last summer.
An $8 million, five-year lease was signed by the Ven. Alan Perry, general secretary, and Amal Attia, treasurer and chief financial officer, without consulting the Council of General Synod, which governs the church between triennial sessions of General Synod.
Archdeacon Perry took a leave of absence just before this transaction was revealed to General Synod in June. Then on September 3, church officials announced that Perry was no longer general secretary, although they did not say whether he was dismissed or resigned. Attia remains the church’s chief financial officer but no longer serves as treasurer.
The two signed a five-year lease agreement that committed the Anglican Church of Canada to renting new office space for its national headquarters from the United Church of Canada, beginning June 1, 2026. Yet to be resolved is whether the Anglican Church can legally leave the signed rental agreement.
Clare Burns, chancellor of General Synod, is hopeful. On November 27 she told the council that the church had hired a law firm to negotiate a departure from the $8.18 million lease on 300 Bloor Street West in Toronto, a space the church would have shared with the United Church of Canada and the Presbyterian Church of Canada.
The denomination operates out of Church House at 80 Hayden Street in Toronto. Rent there costs approximately $425,000 annually, but is offset significantly by the rent paid by two Anglican charities: Alongside Hope and the Anglican Foundation of Canada, which brings costs down to about $250,000 annually.
The annual rent at 300 Bloor West would be $960,00 per year, paid to the United Church as landlord. The lease commits the church to a further $3,980,000 for leasehold improvements during its first five-year term.
There would be no room for the current partners Alongside Hope and the Anglican Foundation, so the annual rental increase (setting aside the leasehold improvements) would be well over $710,000.
Burns said that because the negotiations continue on any exit from the lease, she could not give the council any further details. Once there are some settlement numbers and decisions, they will be presented to the council for a decision.
The chancellor also said that Primate Shane Parker and General Secretary Andrea Mann were working to maintain strong ecumenical ties with the United and Presbyterian churches.
Parker told the council that a team was planning on how best to utilize its Hayden Street headquarters. The four stories owned by the church are occupied by General Synod staff, as well as the offices of the presiding elder of Sacred Circle and the two charities.
The primate said some of the space might be rented out to a commercial enterprise to generate much-needed revenue. The church has contracted a real estate firm to study the site and make recommendations.
“We’re going for highest and best value,” Parker said. “The vision would be for Church House to self-fund as much as possible.”
To make this possible, the staff at Church House would be reduced. Currently there are 37 full- and part-time staff, a contingent already reduced by a series of cuts.
Pathways to a Leaner Church
Streamlining the top-heavy but financially depleted church with its shrinking membership has become a priority for the denomination, which is about a quarter of its size in the middle 20th century.
The primate told The Living Church that “exploring ways to achieve financial sustainability will be part of the work as the church undergoes the transformational change process in this triennium.”
During the summer, General Synod voted to create a working group to develop a proposal for a leaner church structure and the convening of a constitutional convention.
The Synod voted to ask that the primate and council report at least annually on steps taken regarding the six pathways outlined in Creating Pathways for the Transformational Change of the General Synod, which are aimed to adapt the church’s structures to its current size and financial capacity. A cumulative report is due at the next General Synod in 2028.
Though some proposals associated with the pathways have been contested, there wasn’t much debate about them at General Synod, which voted overwhelmingly to allocate up to $2 million in unrestricted funds for the purpose of pursuing them. Synod added: “Any such allocation is to only happen consistent with principles of good financial stewardship.”
Parker told the council that the task forces for each of the six pathways are either complete or being formed. Their work would need to be done in the 2½ years before General Synod meets again in May 2028 in St. John’s, Newfoundland.
Council of the North Spared
The Anglican Church of Canada’s 2026 budget makes numerous cuts, but not to the Council of the North’s grant. The grant, which is usually the largest single item on the church’s budget, supports ministry in nine remote northern dioceses.
Archdeacon Tanya Phibbs, who leads the church’s financial management committee, presented the budget to the Council of General Synod on November 28. It maintains the Council of the North’s grant at $1,950,000 through 2028.
“We shouldn’t be making huge decisions about the Council of the North’s funding while we are still working our way through the pathways documents, and the Council of the North needs to have that surety about what’s going on,” she said.
The move reverses a 2023 decision by General Synod’s officers and managers to reduce the Council of the North’s funding by $100,000 every year, beginning in 2024, until its annual apportionment was equal to 25 percent of the donations the national church receives through diocesan proportional giving.
The nine northern dioceses have promised to each make the full agreed-upon amounts of their proportional contributions to General Synod through 2028. This was a normal condition for the Council of the North dioceses receiving the grant.
The Council of General Synod passed a motion to increase car loans to a maximum of $20,000 for northern clergy, most of whom “aren’t very well paid,” Phibbs said.
Budget Perks
Two offices are receiving significant increases. Funding for the primate’s office is set to increase from $476,826 in 2025 to $533,544 and the general secretary’s office from $906,631 to $1,932,174. Phibbs said the increase for the general secretary was related to the need to resource work being done on the pathways.
The church’s investments posted a gain of about $2.5 million—the result of market fluctuations that could prove fleeting. Most of this income is in the church’s Consolidated Trust Fund and is reinvested, so it is not available to cover expenses.
The council passed a motion asking dioceses to increase their pledges for proportional gifts. About 66 percent of the church’s revenue comes from proportional giving by dioceses, a share that will not be sustainable in the long term, Phibbs said.
Referring to the pathways for change in the church, the primate said, “As we consider our culture and structure and operations and property, we might ask … ‘What have we been relying on? And what do we change so that our church from coast to coast to coast … can more fully see, share, feel, and be Christ’s love in the world?’”
Sue Careless is senior editor of The Anglican Planet and author of the series Discovering the Book of Common Prayer: A Hands-On Approach. She is based in Toronto.
