Anglican Church of Southern Africa
The Anglican Church of Southern Africa, known until 2006 as the Church of the Province of Southern Africa, is the province of the Anglican Communion in the southern part of Africa. The church has twenty-five dioceses, of which twenty-one are located in South Africa, and one each in Eswatini, Lesotho, Namibia and Saint Helena. In South Africa, there are between 3 and 4 million Anglicans out of an estimated population of 45 million.
Thabo Makgoba is the current Archbishop of Cape Town.
Desmond Tutu (1931–2021), former Primate of the Anglican Church of the Province of South Africa, noted pacifist and a leading figure in the successful fight against apartheid
The Anglican Communion is the third largest Christian communion after the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches. Formally founded in 1867 in London, the communion has more than 85 million members within the Church of England and other autocephalous national and regional churches in full communion. The traditional origins of Anglican doctrine are summarised in the Thirty-nine Articles (1571). The archbishop of Canterbury in England acts as a focus of unity, recognised as primus inter pares, but does not exercise authority in Anglican provinces outside of the Church of England. Most, but not all, member churches of the communion are the historic national or regional Anglican churches.
Canterbury Cathedral
Anglican confirmation at the Mikael Agricola Church in Helsinki, Finland, in June 2013
The Chair of St Augustine (the episcopal throne in Canterbury Cathedral, Kent), seat of the archbishop of Canterbury in his role as head of the Anglican Communion