The Most Revd Dr Renta Nishihara has written to the churches of the Nippon Sei Ko Kai (NSKK), the Anglican Church in Japan, setting out his priorities for ministry following his installation as the province’s 21st Primate.
His election took place at the 71st General Synod of the NSKK, held from August 31 to September 2, 2026, at the Cathedral Church of St Andrew in Tokyo. His installation took place on September 2.
The Archbishop's message was shared through a newsletter to the Japanese churches on 25 October 2026. A copy of the message in Japanese is available here, and an English translation sent to Anglican News features below.
Message on Assuming the Office of the 21st Primate of the Nippon Sei Ko Kai: A Church that Bears the Ministry Together and Walks Together in Communion
The Most Revd Dr Renta Nishihara, Primate of the Nippon Sei Ko Kai, the Anglican Church in Japan
1. Introduction — A Shared Ministry of Bishops
I have now been called to take up the ministry of the 21st Primate of the Nippon Sei Ko Kai (NSKK, the Anglican Church in Japan). I feel the weight of this great responsibility, and above all I am reminded anew that the life and journey of our Church are sustained by God’s guidance and by prayer.
What is the ministry of a bishop? A bishop is not someone who stands above the Church and directs it unilaterally. The ministry of a bishop is to bear witness to the faith and the mission of proclaiming the Gospel handed down from the apostles, to safeguard them within the communion of the whole Church, and to pass them on to the next generation. A bishop is the pastor of a diocese and, at the same time, a visible sign of the unity of the Church.
The ministry of a bishop involves preserving the faith received from the apostles, continually re-examining it in the context of each time and place, and continuing to teach it. It also has a prophetic dimension: asking questions of the realities of society and the challenges of the age, and raising a voice from the perspective of the Gospel. And it has a pastoral dimension: accompanying each person in their joys and sorrows, wounds and vulnerabilities, as a shepherd. These three dimensions must not be separated; they are to be exercised together, each sustaining the others.
In this regard, I wish to recall that the episcopal ministry has three dimensions: personal, collegial, and communal. Each bishop bears personal responsibility in response to God’s call. Yet that responsibility never belongs to an isolated individual; it is exercised collegially through collaboration and mutual discernment among the bishops and clergy. And the episcopal ministry itself is sustained communally by the prayer and participation of the whole Church, including both lay people and clergy.
The Primate is not a bishop who stands above the other bishops. The primacy is a ministry of service that supports the collegial communion of the House of Bishops and enables the NSKK as a whole to pray, reflect, and make decisions together. I do not wish to carry everything myself. Rather, I hope to cherish a way of walking together in which each of us makes use of the gifts entrusted to us, and in which you share in and support the ministry of bishops together.
2. Reaffirming Anglicanism — The Richness of the via media
Whenever we in the NSKK seek to clarify where we stand, we must return to the tradition of Anglicanism. One of its key concepts is the “via media.” In Latin, via means “way” and media means “middle,” so the expression is often translated as “the middle way.” Yet in Anglicanism, the via media means more than simply occupying a position between the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant churches. We cherish the understanding that we are pilgrims who continually journey in search of truth, using Scripture, tradition, and reason as our guides. It also means refusing to become fixed at either extreme and rejecting all forms of absolutism.
Since the sixteenth-century theologian Richard Hooker and the seventeenth-century theologian Jeremy Taylor, who helped shape the foundations of Anglicanism, Anglicans have deepened their understanding of what it means to be both liberal and catholic. Properly understood, “liberal” means resisting rigid traditionalism and fundamentalism. At its roots, Anglicanism can therefore be understood as liberal whether it takes a more catholic or a more Protestant tendency.
The via media, however, does not mean simply choosing a point midway between opposing opinions, nor does it mean postponing decisions on difficult issues. It is a rich theological disposition that honours Scripture, tradition, and reason; preserves the apostolic and historical continuity of the Church; and enables people with differing convictions to explore the faith and continue discerning together.
Since the English Reformation, Anglicanism has forged its distinctive path not by setting catholic tradition against the spirit of reform, but by embracing the tension between them. John Henry Newman, a leading figure in the nineteenth-century Oxford Movement, reconsidered the importance of the Church’s apostolic tradition and liturgical richness. Meanwhile, the Christian Socialist movement, represented by figures such as F. D. Maurice, made clear that the Gospel is concerned not only with the inner life of individuals but also with social injustice, poverty, and human dignity.
Through these diverse currents, Anglicanism developed a tradition that holds together two convictions: that the Church receives God’s grace through worship and the sacraments, especially Baptism and the Eucharist; and that the Church bears witness in the midst of society to the importance of justice, peace, and the dignity of life. This is not a matter of freezing tradition in place, but of seeking to bring its richness to life anew in the present day.
The existence of diverse opinions need not be a cause of disunity in the Church. On the contrary, by listening to different voices, resisting the easy exclusion of those who disagree, and continuing to seek the truth through prayer and dialogue, we mature as a Church. I wish to reaffirm the richness of the via media not as a mere historical slogan, but as a way of being Church that the NSKK is called to practise today.
3. The NSKK as a branch of the Anglican Communion
The NSKK is one of the 42 provinces that make up the worldwide Anglican Communion. Although we are rooted in Japan, we share our faith and the mission of proclaiming the Gospel with churches throughout the world. This communion is more than an institutional connection; it is a living communion in which we share prayer, worship, Scripture, the sacraments, and history.
The 42 Primates around the world, including the Archbishop of Canterbury, give visible expression to this communion. The Anglican Communion, however, is not a centralised organisation in which directions are issued from the centre to each province. It is a communion in which provinces respect one another’s autonomy, listen to one another, and discern together. The Archbishop of Canterbury is a focal point for the worldwide Anglican Communion, yet, as Primate of the Church of England, is a fellow Primate on an equal footing with the Primate of the NSKK; and, as Bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury, is likewise a fellow diocesan bishop with bishops throughout the world. In keeping with a tradition reaching back to the early Church, the Archbishop serves as primus inter pares—“first among equals.”
Soon after of my appointment as Primate of the NSKK, I received a very warm message of congratulations, full of prayer and encouragement, from the Most Revd Sarah Mullally, the 106th Archbishop of Canterbury. I was also invited to the Primates’ Meeting, scheduled to take place in Johannesburg, South Africa, from 27 February to 5 March 2027. Having known Archbishop Sarah Mullally and many other Primates and archbishops for some time, I personally look forward to seeing them again in person.
A Primate is not someone who claims greater authority than other bishops, but someone who accepts a particular responsibility to serve the fellowship of those who share the same episcopal ministry. One part of this responsibility, as Primate of the NSKK, is to listen to the voices of churches around the world and to communicate to the wider Communion the challenges and hopes experienced by the Church in Japan.
The Primate’s role is not simply to connect dioceses within the province. Standing at a meeting point of a communion that transcends time and space, the Primate passes on to the Church today the faith received from past generations and carries hope forward to future generations. The role also involves connecting the realities of the Church in Japan with the experience of churches around the world, so that we may learn from one another. I hope to cherish this vocation of ministry within the communion.
4. The Present Situation, Challenges, and Possibilities of the NSKK
Today the NSKK faces a range of serious challenges, including changes in the life and strength of our churches, the ageing of clergy and lay members, the finances and upkeep of church buildings, and our relationship with local communities. We must, of course, look these challenges squarely in the face. Yet if we view them only in terms of numbers or organisational contraction, we may lose sight of the possibilities entrusted to our Church. What is required of us is not simply to preserve the structures we have inherited, but to ask together where, through whom, and by what means God is at work today.
For this reason, we must not understand recent initiatives such as the mission-district system and mission partnership areas merely as organisational restructuring or the more efficient use of resources. I wish to see them as missional endeavours through which churches share their gifts across diocesan and parish boundaries, and churches that have been isolated discover new possibilities for working together. Naturally, it is essential to respect the histories and traditions built up by each diocese and church, as well as the feelings and commitments of the people who live them. Change must not simply be imposed from above; through sustained prayer and dialogue, we need to discover its meaning together.
Here I would like us to reconsider the concept of the “parish.” The parish system developed within the established Church of England, but other Anglican churches have also broadly adopted it. In recent years, it is noteworthy that new efforts have emerged to reinterpret the parish and articulate its significance in terms of mission. Until a few centuries ago, the established Church of England operated on the assumption that being a member of the Church of England and being an English citizen largely went together. The Church’s “pastoral care” therefore meant caring for its members who lived in a parish, while also extending care to all the people living within that parish. Taking responsibility for issues affecting the local community was necessarily part of the Church’s pastoral care.
We should ask whether this traditional understanding of pastoral care might be especially valuable for Anglican churches that do not exist within an established-church system. The “pastoral care” exercised by our churches certainly includes care for our members, but it also means actively engaging, as a Church, with the challenges facing the communities in which we are placed. We must attend to loneliness, suffering, poverty, and anxiety in our neighbourhoods, and remain open to people who have not yet encountered the Church. Our churches are faith communities rooted in their local areas, praying alongside the people who live there and sharing responsibility for the life of the community.
“Mission” and “pastoral care” are not separate activities. Sharing the Gospel with people and cherishing the life and dignity of each person, accompanying them on their journey, are part of the same mission entrusted to us as disciples of the same Lord. As we are nourished by the Gospel, listen to one another, and bear concrete witness to God’s love in our local communities, these everyday acts gradually shape the character of our Church.
The future of the Church will not be opened up only by restoring the scale we once had. Even a small community can bear faithful witness to the Gospel if it is a place of prayer and communion, and if it acts to cherish the lives of others. I hope that we will seek together new forms of mission and pastoral care—forms that discover possibility amid our challenges and enable us to support one another.
5. Conclusion — The Church as a “Bird’s Nest”
I have previously introduced the image of a “bird’s-nest ecclesiology” as one way of thinking about what the Anglican Church is called to be. Traditionally, Anglican ecclesiology is not a “balloon ecclesiology” that seeks to expand by making everything uniform. A balloon may grow large, but a small pin can make it burst at once. A bird’s nest, by contrast, is made from branches of many different lengths, thicknesses, and shapes. It may look irregular and be full of gaps; nevertheless, it does not simply fall apart when pricked or dropped from a height. Within it, precious eggs and chicks—in other words, life itself—are protected.
Is our Church not like this as well? People of different ages, genders, experiences, ways of thinking, and journeys of faith are joined together by God’s love. A single communion takes shape among them, and within that communion, life is nurtured.
Unity in the Church does not mean that everyone thinks alike, nor does it mean erasing our differences. It means that people who are different acknowledge one another, are bound together in Christ, pray together, and walk together. Just as a bird’s nest gives new life a place to emerge and be protected, so the Church should be a place that welcomes those who are wounded, those who are lonely, those who are beginning to lose hope, and those who have yet to encounter the faith—and nurtures new life among them.
The challenges facing the NSKK are immense. At times we will disagree, our progress may be slow, and answers may not be easy to find. Even so, we must continue to listen to one another, to pray, and to seek the guidance of the Holy Spirit. At the centre of our Church is not ourselves, but our Lord Jesus Christ, crucified and risen. Following him, I hope to walk together with all the dioceses, churches, clergy, and lay people of the NSKK.
May the journey of the NSKK from this day forward be one in which we support one another, receive our differences as a source of richness, and pursue mission and pastoral care that are open to our local communities and to the world. And may God’s justice and peace, and the boundless dignity of all life, be borne witness to everywhere through this journey. Amen.
Read a copy of the message in Japanese.
Find out more about the Anglican Church in Japan.