Anglican Church of Tanzania
| Anglican Church of Tanzania | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Primate | Jacob Chimeledya |
| Polity | Episcopal |
| Headquarters | P.O. Box 899, Dodoma, Tanzania. |
| Territory | Tanzania |
| Members | 2,500,000 |
The Anglican Church of Tanzania (ACT) is a province of the Anglican Communion based in Dodoma. It consists of 27 dioceses (26 on the Tanzanian mainland, and 1 on Zanzibar) headed by their respective bishops. It seceded from the Province of East Africa in 1970, which it shared with Kenya. The current Primate and Archbishop is Jacob Chimeledya, who succeeded, after what has been described by some as a controversial election, Valentino Mokiwa, in May 2013.
The Church became part of the Province of East Africa in 1960. From 1970 until 1997, it was known as the Church of the Province of Tanzania. Today it is known as the Anglican Church of Tanzania, or ACT.
The church's origins lie in the Diocese of Eastern Equatorial Africa (Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania) founded in 1884, with James Hannington as the first bishop; however, Anglican missionary activity had been present in the area since the Universities' Mission to Central Africa and the Church Missionary Society began their work in 1864 and 1878 at Mpwapwa. In 1898, the diocese was split into two, with the new diocese of Mombasa governing Kenya and northern and Central Tanzania (the other diocese later became the Church of Uganda); northern and central Tanzania was separated from the diocese in 1927 when the Diocese of Central Tanganyika covering two thirds of Tanzania was created with its See at Dodoma. In 1955, the diocese's first African bishops, Kenyans Festo Olang' and Obadiah Kariuki, and Tanzanian (Tanganyikan) Yohana Omari Majani were consecrated by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Geoffrey Fisher, in Uganda as Assistant Bishops. (Olang as well as Sepeku would be elected the first African archbishops in 1970).In 1960, the province of East Africa, comprising Kenya and Tanzania, was formed with Leonard Beecher as first archbishop. The province of East Africa was divided in two, Kenya and Tanzania, in 1970 and the province of Tanzania was formed with John Sepeku as the first archbishop. In the early 20th century there was also a Diocese of Zanzibar.
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