Former Australian primate dies, aged 89: CEN 1.09.09 p 8

The former Primate of the Anglican Church of Australia, Archbishop John Grindrod KBE died on Jan 3 following a long illness. He was 89.

“Sir John led the Anglican community during an important period in which some difficult issues were addressed the Archbishop of Brisbane Dr. Phillip Aspinall said on Jan 5.

Educated at Repton and Queen’s College, Oxford, Archbishop Grindrod served his curacy at St. Michael’s Hulme in the Diocese of Manchester, before emigrating to Australia. He served as the incumbent of parishes in Manchester and in Queensland and Victoria before being appointed Archdeacon of Rockhampton.

Elected Bishop of Riverina in 1966, he was translated to the Diocese of Rockhampton in 1971, and elected Archbishop of Brisbane in 1980. In 1982 he was elected Primate of the Anglican Church of Australia, and was made a Knight Commander of the British Empire in the 1983 New Year’s honours list.

During his seven years as Primate of the newly renamed Anglican Church of Australia—until 1981 it was known as the Church of England in Australia—Archbishop Grindrod fostered closer relations with the Roman Catholic Church and championed the cause of Australia’s aborigines. Within the Anglican Church he oversaw the passage of canons permitting the remarriage of divorced persons in the church, the admission of children to Holy Communion, and the ordination of women to the diaconate.

As Bishop of Rockhampton, Archbishop Grindrod was chairman of the Australian church’s Liturgical Commission which in 1978 published An Australian Prayer Book—the first new prayer book authorized for use in Australia after the 1662 Book of Common Prayer.

The late archbishop was a “much loved and admired member of the Anglican Community. He was a great man of the people and he displayed empathy, care and compassion to all. He will be sadly missed,” Dr. Aspinall said.