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The Most Rev Peter Jensen MA (Hons) (Syd); BD (London); ThL (ACT); D. Phil (Oxford) is Archbishop of the Anglican Church, Diocese of Sydney, and Metropolitan of the Province of New South Wales.

Dr Peter Jensen was elected the 11th Archbishop of Sydney on June 5, 2001 and consecrated on St Peter’s Day, June 29, 2001. However, Archbishop Jensen avoids much of the pomp that often attaches to the office of Bishop. He sees himself “as a man of the people not a prince of the church” and his role as that of a preacher, teacher and evangelist for the Diocese.

“We must be a missionary Diocese” Archbishop Jensen said. “Our church is narrowly English in name, but it must be comprehensive in fact. Our fundamental aim should be to address the secular challenge by providing flourishing Bible-based, gospel-centred, people-nurturing churches in as many places as possible. We need to be both prayerful and intentional; trusting and planning”.

One of the Anglican Church of Australia’s leading theologians and academics, Archbishop Peter Jensen, was born in Sydney in 1943 and educated at Bellevue Hill Public School and The Scots College. After completing his Leaving Certificate, he studied law for two years and worked as an articled clerk before he moved into primary school teaching. He entered Moore Theological College in 1966. He was awarded the Hey Sharpe Prize for coming equal first in Australia in the Th. L., and he completed a Bachelor of Divinity degree from London University. In 1976 he commenced doctoral studies at Oxford University and earned a Doctor of Philosophy for his research in Elizabethan Anglicanism.

Peter Jensen was ordained in 1969 and appointed Curate at St Barnabas’ Broadway. In that time he worked among underprivileged youth as well as Sydney University students. While engaged in research at Oxford, Dr Jensen was Curate at St Andrew’s, North Oxford and for a time he was that church’s Acting Rector. Dr Jensen was appointed Principal of Moore Theological College in 1985, following the retirement of Canon Broughton Knox.

In the sixteen years of his principalship the College grew conspicuously. The numbers of full-time students climbed from 142 in 1985 to 241 in 2001, a record enrolment for the College. The student body of men and women sees them preparing for independent ministries or as ordination candidates for the Diocese of Sydney. Women graduates are ordained to the ministry of deacon.

Since 1985, the Moore College Faculty has also grown in number and, with Dr Jensen’s encouragement, in academic qualifications. A constant output of articles and books embracing solid evangelical scholarship from faculty members has widened the reputation of the College, not only nationally but internationally. Moore College is arguably the best known and most popular theological college in Australia, with its extensive library the envy of other academic colleagues.

He was consecrated as bishop and installed as the eleventh Archbishop of Sydney and Metropolitan of New South Wales on June 29, 2001 at St Andrew’s Cathedral.

Recognised as a gifted teacher and preacher, Archbishop Jensen receives many invitations to teach and preach, within the Diocese of Sydney, as well as throughout Australia and overseas. He has addressed as many as 800 clergy at the Evangelical Ministers’ Assembly in London, as well as the Clergy School in the Diocese of Chile, and other gatherings in New Zealand, South America and the USA. He has published a number of books and articles and his “At the heart of the Universe” is used as an introductory text on Christian Doctrine.

He has offered a significant contribution to the counsels of the Diocese of Sydney and also to the national Anglican Church. He has been a member of the Sydney Diocesan Doctrine Commission since 1980, and also a member of the Standing Committee of the Diocese since 1984. He was appointed a Canon of St Andrew’s Cathedral by the former Archbishop Donald Robinson in 1989. In the Anglican Church of Australia he has been a member of the General Synod Doctrine Commission (now Doctrine Panel) since 1982. He has contributed to a number of publications of that body, including the recently published Faithfulness in Fellowship: Reflections on Homosexuality and the Church. In that volume he authored the chapter ‘Ordination and the Practise of Homosexuality’.

Archbishop Jensen has often shown himself to be a persuasive speaker in the Synod of the Diocese of Sydney.

In 1998 he lead a debate, with fellow Synod representative Tom Mayne, on concern for victims of child abuse, after he participated in the production of the video resource Behind Closed Doors.

In the Synod in October 2000 he moved the motion that saw the unanimous vote to oppose the reforms proposed to the NSW Anti-Discrimination Act.

In 1992 Dr Jensen led the debate on the General Synod Canon concerning the ordination of women to the priesthood, and was successful in persuading the synod to vote against the canon being adopted in Synod.

In 1996 he lead the debate in Sydney Synod on the new General Synod A Prayer Book for Australia, which resulted in the synod declining to adopt the canon allowing wholesale usage of that book in parishes in the Diocese of Sydney.

Archbishop Jensen has also argued strongly against the possibility of women bishops for the Anglican Church of Australia.

Peter Jensen is married to Christine. They have five adult children and fifteen grandchildren.

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