Dorian Baxter - Education and Ministry

Education and Ministry

He obtained his B.A. from York University in Humanities and his Master's Degree in Divinity from the University of Toronto. He has been an educator for 33 years commencing his career as a classroom teacher with the York County Board of Education in 1970. In 1972, he was invited by the Headmaster of St. George's College, Jack Wright, to join the staff. Baxter taught grades 4 through to 10, coached the school swim teams, and ran the Independent Schools Athletic Association (Swimming) in Ontario.

In 1980 Mr. Baxter resigned after a quarrel with the headmaster, Mr. Allen. Allen attempted to fire Baxter before the end of the school year. Over 400 parents protested and Baxter was immediately reinstated and an apology letter was written to him by Mr. Allen.

At the end of the school year, he resigned and entered Wycliffe College of the Toronto School of Theology at the University of Toronto. He was ordained in St. James Cathedral on 15 May 1983 after serving as Head of Divinity, elected by the student body at the College. He served as a priest with the Anglican Church of Canada at St. Paul's Anglican Church in Thunder Bay, Ontario and as Priest-in-charge of the Anglican Church of the Holy Spirit in Manitouwadge, Ontario. He then was an associate professor at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa.

In 1996 Baxter began incorporating the music and look of Elvis Presley into his services. That year, he won the Canadian Showstopper at the Collingwood Elvis Festival. In 1997 he won the Grand Champion of Showstoppers at that same festival. After that year, festival founder Billy Cann was ousted and control given to the town's business groups, a decision which Baxter objected to before Collingwood Town Council. Baxter joined Cann to establish a competing Elvis festival in Orillia and has since refused to return to the Collingwood festival.

In 1998, Bishop Ronald Ferris of the Diocese of Algoma removed Baxter from his parish and revoked his license to perform Anglican weddings because of his use of Elvis in Anglican services, saying it was "in poor taste." In 2002, the church revoked his invitation to be the keynote preacher at the Masonic divine service in a Toronto Anglican church. Baxter has said he found this particularly difficult, as he has been a Freemason for more than 25 years and was Worshipful Master of his lodge in 1980. Baxter attended the service anyway, in full Elvis regalia.

Baxter says that the controversy originated when the media reported that he performed weddings and funerals dressed as Elvis, which he denies doing. Instead, he says, he performs the services in traditional clerical garb and changes into the Elvis clothes for the reception. He now performs weddings with a United or Baptist minister proclaiming the couple married. He is still officially a priest on leave from the Diocese of Algoma.

In 2003, he set up an independent church, Christ the King Graceland Independent Anglican Church of Canada in Newmarket, Ontario, where he continues to conduct services using Elvis' music, with his signature Elvis pompadour and sideburns. Baxter was consecrated on 9 March 2003 in Newmarket by the Rt. Rev'd Christopher Andrew Jukes of Calgary, Alberta, who at that time was a bishop in the Communion of Evangelical Episcopal Churches using the traditional ordinal of the Book of Common Prayer (1962 Canada). He also established the Federation of Independent Anglican Churches of North America with himself as Archbishop; this organisation was incorporated by Federal Canadian Letters Patent on 1 October 2003.