A
US Internal Revenue Service 501(c)(3) public charity, incorporated
in the State of New York in 1997.
THE SOCIETY of ARCHBISHOP JUSTUS was formed in 1996 and incorporated in 1997 as a nonprofit corporation in the State of New York for the purpose of using the Internet to foster and further unity among Christians, especially Anglicans. This page describes the Society itself. A companion page describes the computer services offered by the Society, including web pages and electronic mailing lists.
Our motto—One Bread, One Body—is taken from 1 Corinthians 10:17, and we like to write it in Latin: 'Unus Panis, Unum Corpus'. To be a member of the Society of Archbishop Justus you must be willing to apply your God-given talents towards the benefit of the Body of Christ.
We named our Society after the fourth Archbishop of Canterbury, good Archbishop Justus, because he is not very well known, yet historical records show good work that could only have been accomplished by him. He worked hard, did his job well, avoided publicity, and passed the torch to his successor, Archbishop Honorius. Justus lived in an era in which there really was just one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church, and he was its leader in England.
WORLDWIDE THERE ARE many organisations that have religious
affiliations and that exist to do good works. Some run hospitals
or charities or schools; some do missionary work or education. The
world has many needs, and good works done in the name of the church
are a welcome relief from the secular sterility of the modern era.
The particular good works that we focus on are Internet information
services: web and email servers that help Anglicans be one body.
Our members help install, operate, and maintain the computers and
networks that enable our online communication, and they help educate
the Anglican public about how best to use those computers.
Some societies require that their members take holy orders and make the society be their life. The Society of Jesus, the Jesuits, comes quickly to mind. The Society of Archbishop Justus is at the other end of the spectrum of commitment. We require that our members be baptized Christians, and that they be willing to help our cause as selflessly as they can manage. We do not ask our members to take vows, only to help out. Some people can afford to contribute an hour a year; other can contribute hundreds or thousands of hours a year. We take what we can get.
IN 1994 A SMALL GROUP of Anglican computer scientists realised
that it was important for the Anglican communion to have one domain
name that unambiguously represented the church in communion with
the See of Canterbury. Since there were, and are, many churches calling
themselves Episcopal or Anglican that are not in communion
with Canterbury, and since the Anglican Church was not yet ready
to get and manage its own domain, a group of people formed the International
Anglican Domain Committee, which quickly filed for ANGLICAN.ORG and
set up to use it for the Anglican church. Rob
Pickering, Brian Reid,
and Charles Smith made it happen.
About a year later, Charles Smith realised that it was important to have a computer infrastructure available to do good works in the Anglican church, one that was not part of any national church. He began electronic discussion in the St Sam's Cyberparish that led to a consensus that such organisations should exist, and that the most important criterion was that there should be more than one such organisation to prevent bureaucratic stasis over the long term.
Some members of the International Anglican Domain Committee — Simon Kershaw, Cynthia McFarland, Rob Pickering, Brian Reid, and Simon Sarmiento — formed the Society of Archbishop Justus with the hope and understanding that others would found similar societies with similar goals.
In 2005, Peter Owen, of the UK, and Richard Mammana, in the United States, became directors. Helen Gordon and Alicia Graham, both of the United States became directors in 2014, and Benjamin Hicks in 2015.
AT PRESENT the Society's resources are the time and energy
and money offered by its founders. None
of them can guarantee that they will always be able to continue to
provide such resources, and if the Anglican community is going to
depend on the communication resources provided by the Society, then
it is important that those resources be stable, well-documented,
and conform to all financial and operational guidelines for such
organisations. This takes time and, oddly enough, money.
WE THINK THAT THE PURPOSE of the Society of Archbishop Justus
is important enough that it should be structured to outlive its founders.
We hope never to receive much publicity nor much money; just enough
of both so that we can make solid Internet resources available to
Anglican and affiliated groups to help the church grow and meet the
needs of the modern world. We think also that there should be other
Societies similar to ours but different, too, and we would like to
encourage other like-minded groups of people to consider forming
their own Society as an alternative to joining ours. There is plenty
of room for good works in today's world.
The Society of Archbishop Justus is a nonprofit corporation registered in the State of New York, certified in January 2001 as a 501(C)3 organisation by the United States Internal Revenue Service. Online (in PDF format) is Form 1023, the official document we filed to obtain our tax-exempt status, which the IRS requires be publicly available for review. Click here to view the PDF file of IRS Form 1023. Click here to view a JPEG scan of the letter from the IRS granting us Public Charity status.
ESSENTIALLY a member of SoAJ is someone who supports the society
through a monetary donation. Benevolent supporters and friends in
the United States will be able to receive a tax deduction if they
donate money to SoAJ. As a worldwide Anglican organisation, however,
we hope that we'll find supporters throughout the Communion, even
if there is no particular tax-related advantage to such a donation
outside the States. You
can contribute any amount you like to SoAJ through our secure
server at Anglicans
Online, our primary communications effort, by clicking here.
Not familiar with Anglicans Online? The web site was first established in December 1994 — one of the earliest sites on the Web — and is independent, comprehensive, contemporary, reliable, and fair. Updated every Sunday night, it offers you more than 32,000 links to news and resources related to the Anglican Communion. With about 250,000 readers, more Anglican church leaders read Anglicans Online than all other Anglican sites combined. SoAJ are proud to be the publishers.
CONTACT US You can reach the directors of the Society by sending email to directors@justus.anglican.org or by postal mail to:
The Society of Archbishop Justus
340 Willow Street
Bordentown, New Jersey 08505
USA
If you would like to fax us a document, please send email to directors@ and request our fax number.