John Aitchison was born in Durban and studied at the University of Natal (where he obtained postgraduate degrees with distinction). He was an ordinand of the Diocese of Natal but in 1965 at the age of 20 he was banned and restricted because of his activities in exposing forced removals by the apartheid government in rural areas of Natal. Released in 1976, he was ordained as a deacon. After periods working as a lecturer in Theology and Biblical Studies at the Federal Theological Seminary and Theological Education by Extension College (of which he was one of the founders) and Education Officer of the Diocese, in 1981 he took up a post at the Centre for Adult Education at the University of Natal. He was Director of the Centre for Adult Education until 2001 and also Head of the School of Education, Training and Development from 1999 to 2002. He became the first Head of the new School of Adult and Higher Education in December 2004 until his retirement at the end of 2007. He was appointed an Emeritus Professor in 2009. He has been active in a number of human rights and rural development non-governmental organisations such as the Association for Rural Advancement. In 2022 he was appointed by the Archbishop to be Convenor of the Commission into the ministry of the permanent (distinctive) diaconate.

Joan Jones was educated in Zimbabwe and after leaving school did a secretarial course. She then obtained a Bachelor of Education from the then Salisbury University. She then moved top South Africa in 1981 working as a mathematics teacher. She obtained a Bachelor of Theology from the University of South Africa in 2007. She served as a lay minister at St Francis, Waterkloof from 1989 to 2009, when she was ordained deacon. She moved to Hermanus in 2018 and served at the parish of St Peter the Fisherman.

Gwynne Lawlor Born in Durban and baptised into Presbyterian Church, her parents relocated to Zurich in Switzerland when she was 8 and she was educated in Swiss German and German and attended the Reformed Church. In 1967 she returned to South Africa and to the Presbyterian Church and she served as a Sunday School teacher and Bible Study leader. After her marriage (to an Anglican) and birth of her first child she was confirmed in the Anglican Church in 1974. She was involved in leading and organizing a Youth Group at St Chad's, Edenvale. In 1988 was licensed as a lay minister at St Margaret's Church in Bedfordview and organized Marriage Preparation and Baptism Preparation Courses. After a three-year probation in 1991 she was accepted as a full sister into the Tertiary Order of the Holy Paraclete. She studied to become a social worker and completed a Bachelor of Social Sciences (Honours) in 1991 and a Masters in 2008. The St Margaret's clergy had discerned a vocation in her, as did the Bishop and in 1992 she joined the Fellowship of Vocation but after three meetings she realized that the priesthood was not her vocation.

After relocating to Wakkerstroom, Mpumlanga in 2010 she was licensed as a lay minister, looked after a chapelry and trained lay-counsellors in the two archdeaconries. In 2012 she experienced a call to the diaconate, attended a conference of Diakonia World Federation in Germany, and on return was sent to the Fellowship of Vocation, and ordained Deacon in December of that year at age 63. She actively promoted the distinctive diaconate in the Diocese of the Highveld, setting up a Fellowship of Deacons in that Diocese in 2013 which affiliated to the Diakonia Region Africa and Europe (DRAE) and representatives subsequently attended biennial meetings. Obtained permission from the Archbishop Thabo Makgoba, to start a fellowship of deacons for the whole Anglican Church of Southern Africa. Together with other deacons in various dioceses, she organized three provincial meetings of deacons (2015 Grahamstown, 2016 Benoni and 2018 Stellenbosch) over the years to build a better understanding of what a deacon is and what deacon does, and has done various presentations and retreats on the diaconate around the country.

She has served on the Church Unity Commission (CuC) representing the Diocese of the Highveld and has preached and continues to preach once a month at the Methodist.
She completed a bachelor's degree ,in Theology (2017) and has served on the executive committee of Diakonia Region Africa Europe (DRAE), representing all DRAE members of the diaconal associations of various denominations resident in the continent from Tanzania to South Africa, including Madagascar.

In 2022 she resigned as an active deacon in the Diocese of the Highveld. And also stepped down from the Executive committee DRAE. However she still has permission to officiate as a Deacon renewed on an annual basis and gives service as school counsellor and chaplain at a small private school in Volksrust, as a trainer of volunteer school counsellors, conducts a bible study group weekly for local hotel staff, and visits the sick and frail on a weekly basis in the local retirement home.

Pieter Wesseloo

Stanton Robinson