The Province of Alexandria has celebrated with great joy the consecration of its new bishops 
For the diocese of Gambella there is Bishop Jeremiah Paul, (pictured right) and for the Horn of Africa Bishop Martin Reakes-Williams (pictured left). Bishop Anthony Ball (second left) was commissioned as bishop for North Africa. The service took place in Chad, on the feast of St Anthony of Egypt on the 17th January 2024. Former Archbishop Mouneer was also present. The service was conducted by the present Archbishop Samy (centre).
The new dioceses are currently working on their constitutions and structures which are due to be complete by 2025. The diocese with the most churches of the four that make up the Province will be Gambella, which now has over 150. Gambella is the westernmost province of Ethiopia, neighbouring Sudan, which is currently at war; and many of the churches operate in the refugee camps that have sprung up as a result. Its new bishop is Jeremiah Paul.
Rev’d Jeremiah Paul was born into a Christian family in Gambella in 1977. He started his church service early, being commissioned as a secular servant in the Anglican Church of St. Luke in Gambella in 2003. St Luke's was the first church established in Gambella in 1996. In the following year he was made deacon and served for four years in that office.
In 2005, Jeremiah began teaching the clergy the Bible and continued until 2011 when he began studying at the Alexandria School of Theology in Cairo, where he obtained a Bachelor of Theological Sciences. During those years he spent in Egypt, he ministered as a priest in the Sudanese service at the All Saints Cathedral in Cairo and worked as a spiritual administrator for the refugee service in the church.
After graduating in 2015, Jeremiah returned to his home country where he began working as a lecturer at a newly established Anglican Theological Seminary, a branch of the Alexandria School, known as St. Frumantius.
The Rev’d Martin Reakes-Williams is based at St Matthew’s Church in Addis Ababa. He arrived at the church following twenty-five years of ministry in the English-speaking Anglican Church in Leipzig, Germany. Reflecting on his time there he has written:
“The Parable of the Sower has always been important to me. Even the Lord Jesus expected a lot of the seed to go to waste but He is also the Lord of the Harvest who sees to it that plenty lands on good soil. The parables of seed and soil also remind us that the Lord tends to work slowly and steadily. In the early years someone gave me the advice that we overestimate what we can do in six months, and underestimate what God can do in five years.”
The Horn of Africa Diocese includes (apart from the highlands of Ethiopia), the countries of Eritrea, Djibouti and Somalia, which are currently affected by war, and consequently, where there is little formal Church presence. That is the challenge the new bishop faces, as he contemplates his new harvest.
Bishop Anthony was also ordained in the Diocese of Europe. A former diplomat, he has been assistant bishop in the Diocese of Egypt with special responsibility for oversight of the process towards a fully functioning Province. His Diocese of North Africa includes Chad, where the consecrations took place, as well as established churches in Algeria, Tunisia and Libya.