“Vast Properties” but Fewer Members: Jamaica’s Anglicans Chose a New Bishop Under Financial Strain

• Jamaica’s Anglicans met to elect a successor to Bishop Howard Gregory
• The Gleaner said the church owns vast properties and numerous schools
• The election came amid declining membership and financial difficulty
• About 200 clergy and lay representatives gathered at St Luke’s Church Hall

When the Anglican Church in Jamaica gathered in March 2025 to choose a new bishop, it did so as one of the island’s largest property-owning institutions facing a shrinking congregation and financial strain, the Sunday Gleaner reported.

About 200 clergy and lay representatives were due to meet at St Luke’s Church Hall in Cross Roads to elect a successor to Dr Howard Gregory, who retired on December 31, 2024, after 12 years as bishop. Bishop Leon Golding and Bishop Garth Minott were seen as front-runners. Under the church’s rules, a vote required a quorum of three-quarters of both the House of Clergy and the House of Laity.

The Gleaner described a denomination under pressure from declining membership, financial difficulty and a wider drift away from traditional churches. It also noted the scale of what the church holds: the Anglican Church owns vast properties and numerous schools across Jamaica, as well as charities and social programmes.

Rev Dr Glenroy Lalor, a former head of the Jamaica Baptist Union, stressed how much communities still depend on churches. “The church is the centre of social and spiritual life,” he said, adding that it is sometimes “the only major organisation that provides anything holistic for families.”

That combination, a large estate of land and buildings alongside falling income and attendance, is one of the biggest practical questions facing older Jamaican denominations. Property can be a burden, with maintenance, insurance and occupation problems, or a resource that can be leased, developed or put to community use to fund mission.

For Anglicans at home and in the diaspora, the choice of leadership matters for more than worship. How a new bishop manages churches, schools, land and idle plots will shape whether that property base supports the church’s work for another generation, or quietly drains it.

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