In October, GAFCON rejected the Instruments of the Anglican Communion, namely the archbishop of Canterbury, the Lambeth Conference, the Anglican Consultative Council and the Primates Meeting, for failing to uphold the doctrine and discipline of the Anglican Communion. Archbishop Laurent Mbanda of Rwanda declared that the Anglican Communion will be “re-ordered, with only one foundation of communion, namely the Holy Bible,” as the Global Anglican Communion.

NAIROBI, Kenya (RNS)—Conservative Anglican leaders gathering in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, are planning to unveil a new leader of the worldwide Anglican Communion, even as Archbishop Sarah Mullally is set to be installed as the first female leader of the body later this month.

The Global Anglican Future Conference, a conservative Anglican movement better known as GAFCON that has encouraged its provinces to cut ties with Canterbury and that rejects Mullally’s election, called the meeting to reorder the communion. During the four-day gathering, which began Tuesday (March 3), the global network of 10 provinces—representing at least half of the world’s Anglicans—plans to formalize the Global Anglican Communion, which it announced in October, and to elect a new leader.

Mullally’s election in October further widened a rift within the 85 million-member worldwide Anglican Communion, which since the 1990s has battled over female leadership and same-sex marriage in the church. Conservative bishops and clerics with GAFCON accuse Mullally and other leaders of the communion of abandoning the inerrant Word of God to support the blessing of same-sex unions, ordain women bishops and elect Mullally archbishop of Canterbury.

Archbishop Henry Chukwudum Ndukuba, the primate of the Church of Nigeria, told those at the opening service of the meeting this week that GAFCON had been calling and praying for a turnaround among the leaders of the Anglican Communion, but having failed, the network was declaring that the future had arrived.

“You cannot serve God and mammon. Choose this day whom to serve. This is the cry and call of God,” he told the more than 400 archbishops, bishops, clergy and lay leaders attending the meeting, dubbed G26.

The clerics at G26 view the meeting, whose main focus is in reforming the Anglican Communion as a whole, to be a pivotal moment. GAFCON says it represents 85% of the world’s practicing confessing Anglicans, though independent studies have placed the number at closer to 50%-60%. Regardless, GAFCON represents a significant portion of Anglicans throughout the world, with large populations in Asia and African countries, including Nigeria, Uganda and Kenya.

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