Ecclesiastical Province of the Northern Lights

The ecclesiastical province was established in 1875 as the Ecclesiastical Province of Rupert's Land, at a time when the Anglican Church was reorganizing its work in the Canadian North-West after the transfer of Rupert's Land to Canada.^[1][2] Its early territorial extent reflected the missionary geography of the former Diocese of Rupert's Land, which had been created in 1849 and once covered much of what is now western and northern Canada.^[3]

In the late 19th century, the development of the province was closely tied to the subdivision of that large missionary jurisdiction. The Diocese of Saskatchewan was created in 1874 to oversee Anglican missionary work among Indigenous peoples and to minister to settlers in the Saskatchewan River valley, while the Diocese of Qu'Appelle followed in 1883 as settlement expanded across the southern prairies.^[4] These changes formed part of a broader process by which Rupert's Land evolved from a single frontier jurisdiction into a provincial structure composed of dioceses with more clearly defined regional responsibilities.^[5]

During the early 20th century, the province assumed a more northerly and prairie-centered shape as the Anglican Church of Canada reorganized its provincial boundaries. The Diocese of Moosonee was transferred to the Ecclesiastical Province of Ontario in 1912, and the dioceses in British Columbia formed a separate ecclesiastical province in 1914.^[6] The province now includes dioceses in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, together with jurisdictions extending into northwestern Ontario, Nunavik in northern Quebec, Nunavut and the Northwest Territories.^[7][8] It remains the largest ecclesiastical province in the Anglican Church of Canada by area.^[9]

In 2024 the provincial synod voted to rename the province the Ecclesiastical Province of the Northern Lights, the change followed consultations begun during the COVID-19 pandemic and was intended to adopt a name more reflective of the peoples and geography of the province.^[10]

There are presently 10 dioceses in the province^[11]:

• Athabasca (Northern Alberta)
• Arctic (Northwest Territories, Nunavut, and Nunavik (northern Quebec))
• Brandon (Western Manitoba)
• Calgary (Southern Alberta)
• Edmonton (Central Alberta)
• Mishamikoweesh (northern Manitoba and northwestern Ontario)
• Qu'Appelle (Southern Saskatchewan)
• Rupert's Land (Southeastern Manitoba and Northwestern Ontario)
• Saskatchewan (Northern Saskatchewan)
• Saskatoon (Central Saskatchewan)

The provinces of the Anglican Church of Canada are headed by metropolitan bishops, elected from among the provinces' diocesan bishops, who then become archbishops of their own diocese and the metropolitan of their province.

The current metropolitan of the Province of the Northern Lights is Greg Kerr-Wilson who is the Archbishop of Calgary.

• Ecclesiastical provinces of the Anglican Church of Canada
• List of dioceses of the Anglican Church of Canada