Phenomenal Sydney

The Diocese of Sydney is admired, hated, loved, and feared. While often criticized as no longer Anglican, it has at its heart an adherence to classic Anglicanism. While to some it is a beacon in the darkness, to others it is like a threatening bushfire. It is very large, very wealthy, and very influential in other places. Its opposition to ordaining women priests, and, in many parishes, to women preaching, mystifies and angers many Anglicans within and outside its boundaries.

What makes this diocese such a phenomenon? The answer lies in its history: in the men and women who shaped it, in a particular view of the authority of the Bible, and in the influence wielded by some powerful institutions that have prospered.

Its energy comes from the Scriptural mandate for mission: to bring the outsider into the community of Christian people, but not to leave it there. To educate them in the knowledge of Christ in a variety of creative and imaginative ways.

This book also looks at what Sydney has done badly. It may help readers to learn from its past achievements and its mistakes.


""Dr. Cameron provides a fascinating and detailed account of what she calls the 'phenomenon' of the Anglican Diocese of Sydney. Her judgments are both critical and sympathetic: the Sydney Diocese has, as readers will see, had a remarkable impact on Australian life over two centuries.""
--Michael P. Jensen, author, Sydney Anglicanism: An Apology

""Sydney Anglicans are a family who love the Bible and who love to argue. Here are the arguments, from all sides; they are robust, surprising, refreshing. They make this account at once absorbingly entertaining, unrelentingly serious, and critically important to any concerned about the future of the church. . . . I disagreed time and again, and for that reason, I suspect it must be right.""
--Stuart Piggin, Associate Professor, Director, Centre for the History of Christian Thought and Experience, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia

""In this astonishingly wide-ranging book, Dr. Cameron reviews the Diocese of Sydney's history with skill, an eye for detail, clarity, and integrity. She points to its strengths, but does not shirk from disclosing its flaws. This is a must-read for those interested in the impact of Anglican Christianity in Sydney on the modern world.""
--Paul Barnett, formerly Bishop of North Sydney

""Dr. Cameron's history poses the question: Why is the Sydney Diocese growing when the rest of the Anglican Church in Australia is in decline? She explores the criticisms leveled at Sydney, including its relationship to the wider Anglican communion, attitude to homosexuality, women's ordination, ecclesiology, Gafcon, wealth, and loss of funds. This is not only a page-turner but an accomplished, insightful work of the highest order.""
--Evonne Paddison, Former New Testament Lecturer, Ridley Theological College


Marcia Cameron lives in Sydney. She has published a number of books including SCEGGS: A Centenary History (1995), Living Stones: St Swithun's Pymble 1901-2001, and An Enigmatic Life: David Broughton Knox, Father of Contemporary Sydney Anglicanism (2006).