The new Tikanga Toru Youth Commissioner, Rev Chaans Tumataroa Clarke has made his first public appearance in the role when Br Zhane Tahau Whelan interviewed him for a Kāhui Rangatahi Livestream on Facebook last Monday. Anglican Taonga joined the watch party to meet our new leader for three-Tikanga youth ministry across the Church.

During their talk Rev Chaans told the Kāhui Rangatahi that youth ministry in the church means enabling young people to contribute, as well as to receive.

“I want to develop resources for rangatahi that meet their needs where they are."

Things like this evening karakia (Pīhopatanga prayers on Facebook livestream) that takes the church into people’s homes. They’re there online, so this way it comes into their lives.” 

Chaans wants to help young Anglicans to develop liturgy that’s relevant to them, to develop their own skills for ministry, and to aid the church in developing ministry for their peers.

To do that he wants the T3 Youth Commission to refine its work with a well-defined strategic direction,

“There’s probably a million kaupapa out there that we could push for rangatahi, but I want us to be very deliberate about doing a few things well.”

“We want to get the fundamentals right, about the resources that are available to us, and about reinforcing the relationships that we have with the Amorangi and the Dioceses.”

Archbishop Don Tamihere, who is also Chaans’ Bishop of Tairāwhiti and has known him for a long time, was pleasantly surprised to hear Chaans had applied for the T3 Youth Commissioner role, 

“Chaans is still a young man but he has amassed significant ministry experience in the church and in his community – as a leader of iwi and marae initiatives, and more recently as a district councillor.”

Archbishop Don is pleased that Chaans has responded to God’s call into provincial ministry, 

“Chaans is the right person at this time and place to take on the Tikanga Toru Youth Commissioner role.

My fellow Archbishops and I are looking forward to serving with him in the provincial space.”

Rev Chaans Tumataroa Clarke began life in Wairoa where he was brought up by his grandfather Guy Tumataroa in the heart of Kahungungu country in the Hawke’s Bay. He has connections to Ngāti Kahungunu, Ngāti Pahauwera, Ngāti Porou, Te Arawa, Ngā Puhi and Ngāi Tahu alongside his Scottish, English and Irish whakapapa.

Rev Chaans, who was ordained deacon in 2018, first became involved in church life when kuia at Huramua marae got him onto mowing the marae lawns. It wasn’t long before Chaans started coming along to the monthly Anglican karakia at the marae, which led him to his baptism in St Abraham’s Church Ruataniwha, followed on by his confirmation by Archbishop Brown Turei in 2004. 

Joining the body of Christ catapulted Chaans into a fast-paced education on community organisation and governance, as he quickly stepped into ministry and by 16 years of age was licensed as a kaikarakia (lay reader). Soon he was on committees dedicated to building up and running the church at pariha, Amorangi and Pīhopatanga levels – all the while growing in his love of God and relishing the chance to express his faith through worship.

Chaans served as secretary and chair of his home vestry, then as a member of Te Hui Amorangi o te Tairāwhiti, and from there he went on to represent the Pīhopatanga o Te Tairāwhiti on General Synod Te Hīnota Whānui from 2008-2012.

At 28, Chaans is the youngest ever Tikanga Toru Youth Commissioner, but it’s already ten years since he first served on General Synod Standing Committee between 2010-2012.

Kāiarahi of the Kāhui Rangatahi (Māori Anglican Youth Network leader) Br Zhane Tahau Whelan remembers being taken aback by Chaans,

“I remember the first time I heard Chaans stand up and speak at a Hui Amorangi, I thought; ‘Who is this? Is this a parliamentarian?’”

“Chaans will be such a blessing representing our youth voice in our church forums.”

Rev Chaans says taking part in those governance roles was formative for him and he found that the kaupapa he grappled with through church bodies fed into his thinking and working for the wider community.

Not surprisingly, Chaans was quickly in the sights of other organisations wanting leadership. Since 2008 he has served as a minita-a-iwi, as both Chairperson and a Trustee of Huramua marae, Trustee and Deputy-Chair of the Ngāti Pahauwera Development Trust, an RSA chaplain, and in 2019 he was elected as a Wairoa District Councillor. During the Covid-19 lockdown he served in the Civil Defence Welfare team as a Spiritual Support Welfare Officer, which saw him coordinating an interfaith network of clerics and organising essential tangihanga services.

Throughout this time, Chaans has worked for the church as a self-supporting minister, bringing money in from fulltime jobs in local agriculture and industry.

Chaans’ own journey in the church shapes his sense of real-life skills the church can bring to young people – especially the experience of living in a loving community – but also the practical skills of leading, empowering and organising. 

But he’s quick to point out that those “skills” come a long way behind the real reason church makes a life-changing difference.

“At the end of the day, it’s all about getting to know Jesus, and getting to know how he’s working in your life. It’s about developing that life of faith, of whakapono – and sharing that with other people, and bringing them into the kahui as well.”

“That’s the most important thing.”

As soon as he can, Chaans will be heading out around the country to meet youth across the Tikanga and beyond, to hear the aspirations they have for their own lives and how the Church can help them realise those hopes with God’s help.

Rev Chaans will do that with the full backing of his wife and number one ministry supporter Michelle, and the whole whānau who are right behind him in his work as T3 Youth Commissioner.

To contact Tikanga Toru Youth Commissioner Rev Chaans Tumataroa Clarke email him at: commissioner@t3yc.org