Bishop Grant Bradley Walters has officially taken the helm as the new bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Port Elizabeth, vowing to keep the church engaged in issues affecting communities ranging from poverty and corruption to poor service delivery.
Walters, 51, was elected Bishop of Port Elizabeth in November 2025 and consecrated earlier this year after moving to Gqeberha from Cape Town, where he was born and raised.
With the support of his wife, Abigail, and his daughter, Zia, 26, he said he was not entering the diocese with plans to immediately change everything, but wanted to first understand its people, communities and challenges.
“For now, I’m just coming in to receive, to discover,” he said.
“There are some things that I must probably change if I feel, for example, there are no proper internal controls with finances, that I want to change immediately.”
Walters holds a master’s degree in theology and a PhD.
Before becoming bishop, Walters served as the provincial executive officer of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa (ACSA), an administrative role covering the church’s work across SA, Namibia, Eswatini, Lesotho and St Helena.
He previously served as a priest at St Mark’s in District Six in Cape Town.
As one of 25 bishops in ACSA, Walters is now responsible for the Diocese of Port Elizabeth, which stretches from Gqeberha into various areas including Colesberg, Nxuba (formerly Cradock), Robert Sobukwe Town (formerly Graaff-Reinet) and George.
He succeeds Bishop Edward Daniels.
Walters said his approach would be collaborative rather than imposing.
“I’m not coming here with a Messiah complex, and I’m going to fix things.
“I’m going to do it together, I’m going to grow from these people here, and they can hopefully grow from me.”
For Walters, the church’s role extends beyond Sunday services.
He believes it has a responsibility to speak out on poverty, injustice, gender-based violence, corruption and poor service delivery because these issues directly affect its congregants.
With local government elections looming in November, Walters also urged people to take their responsibility as voters seriously.
He said his approach to politics was not about supporting a particular political party, but about holding leaders accountable for how they served their communities.
Walters said the church could not separate itself from the daily struggles of its congregants.
“While our people are still being affected by non-service delivery or by corruption or by whatever it is, we need to speak up, we need to say, we need to hold our feet to the fire,” he said.
He also believes the church has a responsibility to stand alongside vulnerable people, regardless of their background or beliefs.
“We must just acknowledge each other’s humanity, no matter where we are born, no matter how much money we have, what title we have.
“This collar, this ring that they put on you, that’s all symbols of something, but once we are stripped of all that, we are all the same.”
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