A new Archbishop was in place in Rwanda and shots had been fired internally about alleged missing money from the Kolini era. As I revisit these materials in 2025 there are a jumble of pieces to put together, but the next major event in the timeline seems to be the Rwandan House of Bishops meeting on March 31st 2011. In hindsight it looks like at that time there were at least two divisions within the Rwandan House—on one side Bishop Alexis, on the other, Archbishop Rwaje. Both sides seem to have been dissatisfied with how Archbishop Kolini had run things, but they had not come to any common understanding of what they were dealing with and of a way forward.
At the March meeting Archbishop Rwaje said that there was “a need to get together as Rwandan House of Bishops with AMiA’s leaders, to discuss about our respective roles in the ministry of AMiA in order to have a “common understanding” of the ministry we are all involved in, and to get to know each one’s role in this ministry. I wrote a letter to Bishop Chuck Murphy about that resolution.”1 From Alexis’ point of view, Archbishop Rwaje tried to avoid the financial issue and move on to other things. Other bishops were now curious and joined Alexis in wondering what had happened to the money. These bishops told Archbishop Rwaje that they would not let the matter rest and insisted that he press the AMiA for specifics.
Archbishop Rwaje told the House that Chuck Murphy, Kevin Donlon, and H. Miller would be coming to a June House of Bishops meeting to explain everything. The Rwandan bishops apparently did not like this arrangement. Alexis anticipated that Murphy would let H. Miller explain what had been done with the money in general terms and that Kevin Donlon, a canon lawyer, would explain how, canonically the House of Bishops had no right or need to know further details. Bishop Alexis did not want more explanations, he wanted to see the specific wire transfer documents that would show exactly where the money, supposedly given to Rwanda, had gone.
Meanwhile in the United States, Jon Shuler’s New Anglican Missionary Society (NAMS) “Strategic Global Assembly” took place in April. The leader of NAMS, Jon Shuler, briefed Chuck Murphy “on our strategic plan to reach all the nations of the earth.”2 Murphy told Shuler that if Shuler was a bishop with “letters of authority” from the Province of Rwanda, similar to Murphy’s, “…it would greatly enhance our NAMS ministry for the Lord. He said: “Just like I have authority for America, you would have authority to go to the world.” Bishop Chuck Murphy then encouraged NAMS to ask you (Rwaje) to consider the possibility of setting me apart to lead the global ministry of NAMS as a consecrated bishop (Primatial Vicar) under the terms of the Rwandan Provincial Canons.” Shuler added, “I do not approach you with this request on my own behalf, but solely because Bishop Murphy has suggested it.” Shuler conferred with the NAMS “Global Leadership Team” of Wick Van Wagenen, Helen Van Wagenen, Dan Alger, Alan Hawkins and Moses Tay, who agreed that this would be a good idea, and then Shuler wrote Archbishop Rwaje on May 19, asking to be made a bishop.
In light of what AMiA attempted to do later in 2011 this looks like Bishop Murphy moving chess pieces around, however, I don’t think there was any guile in what Shuler was doing. Shuler is genuinely passionate about the Great Commission and he had been sidelined by the AMiA for quite some time. It’s not clear to me what Murphy was hoping to achieve in encouraging Shuler at that time, and the timing is odd, but it may be a coincidence. In 2023 Shuler told a podcast that he suspects that Murphy’s eventual brain cancer was already affecting him and his decision making in the years when he took AMiA out of Rwanda.
Whatever Shuler and Murphy’s intentions, the source from Alexis’ camp saw things as becoming chaotic, writing:
The Rwandan House of Bishops knew that Chuck Murphy had larger plans than evangelizing America. He had pushed the Rev. Jon Shuler to ask ++Rwaje to make him (Shuler) a Missionary Bishop of the AM and Primatial Vicar over a world wide Missionary Society that would send missionaries all over the world to preach the gospel and provide an Anglican presence wherever there might be a need… The Rwandese were incredulous that their missionary jurisdiction in North America was presuming to become a ‘worldwide’ Mission Society without even consulting them. On top of that the AM publicly announced that +Murphy in ‘consultation’ with the Council of AM Bishops” had “in consultation with theAM’s Council of Bishops, has appointed the Rev. Kevin Donlon to serve as Canon for Ecclesiastical Affairs. In this role, Kevin will continue to provide advice and counsel on matters of church order, particularly about the complexities of canon law and ecclesiological principles. In addition, Kevin will assist in promoting a greater understanding of the norms of the Church in general and Anglicanism in particular with a focus on how the Province of Rwanda relates to the wider church.” This is another symptom. Just as the Rwandan Bishops had no what happened to most of the money given to the Province, now they were being represented by and interpreted to the world by a man they had not approved or appointed.
Fundamentally it appears that the Rwandan bishops were beginning to exert some real authority over a group operating in its name on another continent. At the same time, Chuck Murphy was pushing for real changes in the status quo and perhaps was testing this new Archbishop to see if they were in alignment.
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