Internal Feud Threatens Protestant Union In Pakistan

(UCA News) — A simmering feud in Pakistan’s Protestant churches over alleged corruption and warps in elections of bishops worsened recently after a diocese independently ordained its bishop, pushing the communion to the verge of a split.

The crisis in the Church of Pakistan, a  union of Anglicans, Presbyterians, Methodists, and Lutherans, began to deepen last month when the Anglican diocese of Lahore defied the Synod of the Church of Pakistan and ordained Reverend Nadeem Kamran as its bishop on Jan. 18.

Ordinarily, the Church’s synod, the supreme decision-making body of the union, selects bishops for all eight dioceses of the union, officials said. Some officials suspect the ordination move may end in the Lahore diocese splitting off from the union.

The Lahore ordination was “an attempt to sabotage the system of the Church of Pakistan, our ecumenical union,” Majid Abel, moderator of Presbyterian Church told UCA News on March 8.

The Lahore “diocesan council has elected a bishop” against the established conventions of the union and the international partners “should intervene” to save the union, he said.

As Church leaders seek their international heads to intervene to keep the union intact, the case of ordination became entangled in a civil suit.

Lahore diocesan priest Samuel Barkat of Saint John’s Church approached the court of Senior Civil Judges in Lahore seeking a “permanent injection” banning the newly ordained bishop from working in the diocese. His petition claimed the bishop was illegally ordained.

The court on March 2 restrained the newly ordained Bishop Kamran from “exercising the powers” as bishop of Lahore.

Protestant Pastor Reverend Emanuel Khokhar, dean of the Church of Raiwind diocese, also called the ordination of Kamran illegal.

Kamran “does not represent the Church of Pakistan. His actions and statements as a bishop of the Church of Pakistan have no legal value and are not endorsed by any bishop of the united church,” Khokhar told UCA News.

“Only the moderator of the Synod of the Church of Pakistan can ordain a bishop. All communication by unauthorized persons should be considered void and illegal,” Khokhar said.

“This is detrimental to the unity of the church. Rigidness will limit the Lahore diocese,” the Protestant Pastor said alluding to the possible split in the church.

However, retired Bishop Irfan Jamil of Lahore, who with another two retired bishops, ordained Kamran, rejected the allegations of illegal ordination.

“We shall deal with courts. Many people don’t know the facts. He was ordained per our constitution,” Jamil told UCA News.

The Lahore diocese decided to “break the silence” and “take a major diocesan decision” for the ordination “so that certain values, traditions, unity, integrity, and witness of the Church are safeguarded,” said a letter from Anthony Lamuel, general secretary of the Church of Pakistan.

Lamuel, also a member of the Lahore diocese, in the letter explained the illegal moves of the synod and presented his own case as one of the several examples. He was dismissed from the office of general secretary and a new person was appointed in December 2022. But he petitioned a civil court, which reinstated him on Jan. 17.

Trouble began at least 25 years ago when a synod executive committee in its minutes spoke about the “negative role of the synod in the elections of bishops of different dioceses.”

The synod was playing a “deplorable role” in selecting the bishops, said the letter addressed to all members of the Lahore diocese and all top leaders of the Church of Pakistan and international leaders including Archbishop Justin Welby of Canterbury, the ceremonial head of the Anglican Communion.

The Synod was “only interested in politicking for the election of bishops and so has been indulging in very unethical and un-Christian like manners to influence the election of a bishop to suit the interest of certain members,” the letter said quoting from the 1998 minutes.

Under the circumstance, some dioceses would reconsider being a part of such a synod. “If things did not improve, some dioceses may find it expedient not to have anything to do with the synod in its present form,” Lamuel said in the letter quoting the minutes.

The synod continues to violate its various rules and regulation “at will, and in some cases, even the basic qualifications of the candidate of the election of the bishop have been deliberately ignored” in the selection process, the letter alleged.

The Lahore Diocesan Council “due to the deplorable, unacceptable, and unethical role of the synod in the election of the bishops,” in a Jan. 18 meeting “unanimously resolved… to hold the election of the bishop of Lahore on its own and as per its registered constitution, the letter said justifying the section and ordination of Reverend Kamran.

Lahore diocese is “committed” to being part of the Anglican Communion but the synod has been making “vigorous efforts… to join the international breakaway groups” of the Anglican Church, the Global Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, a network of conservative Anglican churches formed in 2008.

The Lahore Diocesan Council’s executive in its meeting on Jan. 18 resolved “to stand firmly with the See of the Archbishop of Canterbury and not to align itself with” a breakaway group of the Anglican Communion, Lamuel said.

According to Kanwal Feroze, who regularly attends Sunday service at the Cathedral Church of the Resurrection in Lahore, the Protestant Church is heading toward destruction.

“Sadly corruption has seeped into church hierarchy. Only a few worshippers attended the inaugural prayer by the new bishop last month at the cathedral,” Feroze said.

The Church of Pakistan will stay united even “if Lahore diocese separates,” said Feroze, who holds a doctorate in journalism.

Lahore Diocese Vice President Reverend Emmanuel Lorraine recommended adopting a process of nominating bishops like Catholic and Anglican Churches, in a Jan. 20 letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury.

“Profiles of senior priests should go to the Archbishop of Canterbury and after interviewing them, based on merit one should be nominated as the next bishop,” Lorraine said.

He also urged to defrock the newly ordained Reverend Nadeem and the three retired bishops, who ordained him.