Sydney-trained Archdeacon Ross Nicholson and Dr Chris Jones have been ordained as assistant bishops as part of Tasmania's new mission strategy.
At a service on Tuesday in St David’s Cathedral Hobart, the first assistant bishops the state has known since 1996 were consecrated as part of a fresh direction in ministry and mission for the diocese.
The Anglican Church of Tasmania’s Bishop John Harrower launched The Imagine Project at a special synod in November last year.
The Project provides for these two new appointments, called missioner bishops, which are expected to free up Bishop Harrower to spend more time in frontline parish ministry.
The Imagine Project is a three-year initiative aimed at seeing Bishop Harrower directly involved in grassroots mission and experimental outreach projects happening around the Diocese, especially in areas currently beyond the reach of existing church ministry.
Bishop Nicholson - who trained at Moore College and was rector of Willoughy at St Stephen’s Willoughby from 1998 to 2005 - says the project will improve knowledge-sharing throughout the diocese so that individual churches and ministries can learn from each other's mission projects.
"It's an opportunity to sharpen our mission and evangelism focus and try new things or experiment with new ministries that local churches may not normally be able to do," he says.
"The way the Imagine Project is established and my episcopal role in it is not just to be mentoring and encouraging, but to take what we learn from these projects and pass this to the wider Diocese."
Tasmania’s ‘risk’ appointments
Bishop Harrower described taking on these two new appointments as a "risk" Tasmania "needs to take" to further the mission of the church.
Bishop Jones' responsibility will be the stewardship of resources for mission, while Bishop Nicholson will coordinate mission projects, which will see project teams actively trying new methods of building relationships and communicating the gospel.
These projects include an outreach ministry in the Huon, a new families’ congregation in Somerset, and a Chaplaincy to the University of Tasmania’s Launceston campus.
Bishop Nicholson and Bishop Jones will carry out their new roles part-time, as they maintain their current positions as rector at St John's Launceston and CEO of Anglicare Tasmania respectively.
