A tale of three bishops: Ideologies of Chineseness and global cities in Vancouver's Anglican realignment

• Main Author: TSE, Justin Kh
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2016
• Subjects: Asian Studies; Religion
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soss_research/3096; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/soss_research/article/4353/viewcontent/A_Tale_of_Three_Bishops_Chineseness_and.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

Most accounts of the 2002 departure of some conservative Anglican parishes from Vancouver’s Diocese of New Westminster (DoNW) over same-sex blessings seemed to fit the narrative of a battle over sexuality in the global realignment of the Anglican Communion. However, attention to the consecration of two new Chinese Anglican bishops—Silas Ng Tak-yin and Stephen Leung Wing-hong, both from Hong Kong—reveals that their split from the DoNW’s Bishop Michael Ingham had more to do with an ideology of cultural pluralization deploying “Asian values.” I, therefore, argue that the schism in Vancouver was a division over the three bishops’ imaginations of global futures with “Chineseness” and “Asian values” as proxy words for this ideology. This paper contributes to the study of Chinese Christianities—as well as other religions—by examining “Chineseness” as an empty category that can be deployed for a variety of ideologies.