Up Front
Lawyer Refutes Bishop
Mr. Douglas Calder
"Deliberately to publish a statementimplying that an Archbishop is not an Archbishop is a seriouslibel", said local Attorney Douglas Calder in a recent PressRelease issued on behalf of the Rector, Churchwardens and Councilof the Church of England in the Cayman Islands.
Mr. Calder was respond-ing to another PressRelease issued by the Bishop of Jamaica in which the Bishop hadannounced that: "at the (recent) Annual Synod of the (AnglicanChurch in Jamaica) a resolution was passed changing the name ofthe (Jamaica) Diocese to 'The Church in Jamaica and the CaymanIslands (being the added words) in the Province of the West Indies'".
Mr. Calder went on to say that the Bishopof Jamaica had stated that he wished: "to share the followingcommunication from the Reverend Dr Herman Browne, the Archbishopof Canterbury's Assistant Secretary for Anglican Communion andEcumenical Affairs" in which Dr Browne wrote, in his ownname, and in that of the Archbishop of Canterbury, inter aliadescribing Archbishop Donald Davies as:
" 'Archbishop' Davies", and declaringthat the Church of England "has no presence nor organisationin the Cayman Islands".
Mr. Calder explained that for more thanseven years Archbishop Davies: "whose status as a Bishopis equally as valid as that of the Archbishop of Canterbury orthe Bishop of Jamaica, has graciously, and for no financial reward,provided Episcopal Oversight to the Church of England in the CaymanIslands" and that he has done this "at all times inthe full knowledge of the Bishop of London and of the Archbishopof Canterbury."
When contacted by Cayman Net News, Mr. Calderexplained that Archbishop Davies was doing so "out of pastoralcharity, and only in the absence of the Bishop of London beingprepared to undertake his legal duty, as the Bishop charged underlaw with ecclesiastical jurisdiction over the Cayman Islands."He added that for the Bishop of Jamaica and the Archbishop ofCanterbury to assert that the Church of England: "has nopresence nor organisation in the Cayman Islands is to fly in theface of actual and legal reality..." and that he was speakingout because it was important "to proclaim the truth".
According to Mr. Calder: "the law inthe Cayman Islands, which is an Overseas Territory of the UK,is that the Church of England is the Established Church in theCayman Islands with the Queen of the United Kingdom as its SupremeGovernor." "Why else", queried Mr. Calder, is theQueen: "described on the Public Seal of the Cayman Islands,and in all Writs of Summons issued in Her name out of the GrandCourt, as 'Fidei Defensor' (Defender of the Faith)? The Faithhere referred to is that of the Church of England", he emphasised.
He explained that Royal Order in Councilin 1634 placed the Church of England overseas under the ecclesiasticaljurisdiction of the Bishop of London. This Order remains in fulleffect in Cayman; and no subsequent legal authority exists tochange the position.
Mr. Calder states that 17 years ago he gavevery detailed legal advice to this effect to the Governor (asrepresentative in Cayman of the Queen as Supreme Governor of HerChurch of England), the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop ofLondon, the Archbishop of the West Indies, and the Bishop of Jamaica."No acknowledgement, let alone any reasoned argument to thecontrary, was ever received from the Bishop of Jamaica or theArchbishop of the West Indies; and that in spite of repeated reminders,"says Mr. Calder, who adds that if the Diocese of Jamaica "isgoing to have any future chance of proclaiming eternal truthssuccessfully, then it had better start by acknowledging some temporaltruths."
Mr. Calder also says that he was presentat a meeting at Lambeth Palace, London, in 1986, convened by theArchbishop of Canterbury to discuss the Cayman Church. At themeeting Queen's Counsel for the Church of England in the CaymanIslands said that resolutions of the Jamaica Diocese Synod attemptingto annex the Cayman Islands to the Diocese of Jamaica had no moreeffect than if instead they "purported to suppress the Archbishopricand the Diocese of Canterbury, and ... attempted to annex thegeographical area of the Diocese of Canterbury to the Dioceseof Jamaica. Nothing like that can be done without the authorityof the Sovereign". The Archbishop of Canterbury's legal adviseralso agreed with this opinion; and the view that all such resolutionsof the Diocese of Jamaica were "totally illegal".
Mr. Calder concluded: "How the Bishopof Jamaica thinks that he can enlarge his jurisdiction like somecolonial emperor and then describe himself without any lawfulauthority whatever as 'Bishop of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands'simply beggars belief. The truth is that he is 'Bishop of Jamaica'in the 'Church in the Province of the West Indies'; he has noecclesiastical authority whatever in the Church of England, andleast of all in the Cayman Islands."