DIOCESE OF FALSE BAY, Anglican Church of Southern Africa.
Diocese established in 2005, a division of the Diocese of Cape Town
No cathedral designated.
Bishop based in Somerset West.
The arms may be blazoned:
Per fess dancetty azure and or; in dexter chief a garb, in sinister chief a bunch of grapes and in base an anchor, all counterchanged.
The arms were designed by retired State Herald Fred Brownell, and incorporate symbols which indicate the marine and agricultural nature of the inhabitants of the region.
The symbol with the longest provenance in the region is the anchor, first used together with the female figure of Hope in the 17th-century seal of the Dutch church in Cape Town (now the Groote Kerk) and appropriated in 1804 by Commissioner-General J A Uitenhage de Mist, principal representative in the colony of the Batavian Republic, as the symbol of the colony; it featured as the sole supporter of the shields of arms he granted to the five drostdijen and to Cape Town itself.
It was adopted into the arms of the Diocese of Cape Town as symbolising the colony, and has since been used by several Anglican dioceses in Southern Africa. While the anchor in De Mist’s six grants was black, and remains that colour in the arms of the Diocese of Cape Town, it appears here in blue.
In notes provided by Bishop Merwyn Castle it is explained in these words:
“An anchor is not only an allusion to the Mother Diocese, but also since it is a symbol of hope long associated with the Cape, to me it is an essential component (see Hebrews 6:19).”
He writes further:
“The [dancetty or zig-zag] partition line can be seen as alluding to the mountains dividing the coastal part of the diocese from the Overberg.”
The garb, or sheaf of wheat, and the bunch of grapes symbolise agriculture in the region. Bishop Merwyn explains them thus:
“The wheat and grapes, which are fruits of the diocese, are a clear allusion to the Lord’s Supper. In the Christian context, nothing could be more appropriate.”
The gold and blue colours stand respectively for the land and the sea – the same two colours appear, with the same symbolism, in the arms of the Diocese of Namibia.
These too are explained:
“This simple two-colour design reduces well and would also reproduce well in single-colour printing. Blue and gold, from the diocesan coat of arms of Cape Town, are neutral colours in our multi-cultural society, and can be seen as alluding to sea/sky and sand/land.”
In closing it can be mentioned that the Western Cape Province also incorporates an anchor and a bunch of grapes into its arms.
About the diocese:
Despite a recognition over many years that the Diocese of Cape Town was simply too large to cope with, it had a problem in that its Anglican population was concentrated in the urban areas, and scattered in the rural parts.
The creation of the Diocese of False Bay on the first Sunday in Advent, 2005, represented a compromise in that it incorporated the southernmost parts of the city with the eastern rural area.
It takes its name from the immense bay to the south of Somerset West which separates the southern part of the Cape Peninsula from the mountains that extend from Gordon’s Bay southward to Cape Hangklip.
In the early days of Portuguese trade with the East, following the opening of the trade route by Vasco da Gama in 1524, ships’ captains or watchkeepers more than once mistook Hangklip for the Cape of Good Hope (the southernmost tip of the peninsula) and turned northward on rounding it. On one occasion an entire fleet ran aground on the bay’s northern shores, perhaps in the vicinity of the Strand (Somerset West’s seaside neighbour).
Because of this misapprehension, the oldest European name for Hangklip is Cabo Falso (False Cape – that is, not the Cape of Good Hope); the bay was consequently named Bahia Falso. While the Dutch gave the cape a new name reflecting its craggy appearance, the bay has kept its name.
The diocesan website describes the background to the creation of this diocese:
“The diocese stretches from the Atlantic coast of the southern Cape Peninsula in the west to the Overberg region of the Western Cape in the east, and from Cape Agulhas – the southernmost tip of Africa – in the south to the edge of the Koue Bokkeveld in the north.
“It incorporates communities ranging from the densely populated suburbs of Khayelitsha and Mitchell’s Plain on the Cape Flats to the seaside towns of False Bay and the southern Cape coast. Its people work in every kind of undertaking from the factories of Cape Town to the wheat farms of the Overberg and the fishing industry on the coast. Parishes offer services in three languages – Afrikaans, English and isiXhosa.
“The Diocese of False Bay was carved from the eastern part of the old Diocese of Cape Town, mother diocese of the Anglican Church in Southern Africa. Established in 1847, the Diocese of Cape Town initially encompassed vast tracts of land in the south-eastern corner of Africa.
“However, as early as the 1960s it became clear that the Diocese of Cape Town, which traversed an area up to the Namibian border in the north and halfway to the town of George in the east, was becoming unmanageable. Nearly 40 years and seven commissions of inquiry later, the old diocese resolved to ‘multiply’ and become three.
“The inauguration of the Diocese of False Bay was the first step in this process. The diocese comprises 50 parishes in six archdeaconries, with diocesan headquarters centred on the town of Somerset West. Fifty stipendiary clergy and 35 non-stipendiary (self-supporting) clergy serve the diocese, 10 of them women.”
Bishops: The founding bishop of the diocese is Merwyn Castle, who at the time of writing is still in office.
Vir Afrikaans, kliek
hier
Source of image: Provided by Bishop Merwyn.
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Comments, queries: Mike Oettle