Her Eminence

For the first time in history, a woman has been elected Archbishop of Canterbury, Primate of the Church of England - Sarah Mullally

In the episcopate of the good old Protestant churches of Europe - Lutheran, Anglican, Reformed - there are more and more women. Very soon the problem of the “female priesthood” will arise in full force before the Catholic and even Orthodox churches. Why is the “gender factor” a challenge for church conservatives?

The Royal Commission on Appointments, one of the key bodies of the established Church of England, announced on October 3 the election of a new, 106th Archbishop of Canterbury, primate of the church. There were 17 candidates vying for this high post, but preference was given to the 63-year-old Bishop of London, member of the House of Lords, Dame Sarah Elizabeth Mullally.

For the first time in the 1,800-year history of Christianity in the British Isles, a woman will be their supreme shepherd. In addition to the approximately 25 million members of the church in England itself, she will lead the 85 million-strong global community of Anglican churches, uniting communities around the world, primarily in the United States and African countries, where, by the way, women’s priesthood is still viewed with skepticism. And this has already become a reason for gloomy forecasts about the schism of Anglicanism...

Commenting on her election, Sarah Mullally shared her joy at making history as the first woman to occupy the ancient see of the Archbishop of Canterbury, while acknowledging that it would pose some challenges for the church. As does the “legacy of deep harm and mistrust” left behind by Archbishop Justin Welby, who resigned earlier this year amid a child sex abuse scandal. It is not a fact that the archbishop knew about this violence, but still considered it best to leave.

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The history of the Church of England begins in the era of the province of Britain within the Roman Empire - the first mentions of Christian communities on the island date back to the 3rd century. In the 4th–16th centuries, British bishops participated in the councils of the Catholic Church, and the supreme archbishop of the island was appointed by the Pope. However, the pope's refusal to annul the marriage of King Henry VIII in 1534, when the Reformation had already begun in continental Europe, led to the separation of the Church of England from Rome and the proclamation of the monarch as head of the church. After some hesitation, the Church of England's affiliation with Protestantism was finally established in 1558. The process of including women in the clergy of this church began in the 19th century with the revival of the rank of deaconesses; they began to be ordained as priests in 1994, and as bishops in 2015.

In churches close to the Church of England in terms of religion and liturgical tradition, women began to be ordained even earlier: in the Church of Denmark - since 1948, in the Church of Sweden - since 1960, in the Church of Norway - since 1962, in the Church of Iceland - since 1974, in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland - since 1988. The first precedent for a woman to lead an entire local church in this tradition was the election of Antje Jäkelen as Archbishop of Sweden in 2014. Among the traditional Christian churches operating in the Russian Federation, the female priesthood was represented only in the United Methodist Church: Lidia Istomina, who later moved to the United States, served as the pastor of its Yekaterinburg community.

Sarah Elizabeth Mullally is a very interesting person, otherwise she would not have been elected archbishop. Born in Surrey in 1962, she received a medical degree and rose to the position of chief nurse (director of the nursing department) of the Kingdom's Ministry of Health. For outstanding services in the development of obstetric services and raising the prestige of the nursing profession, in 2005 she was awarded the Knighthood of the Order of the British Empire, the holders of which receive the title of Sir or Dame.

After being ordained as a deacon (2001) and a priest (2002), she continued for some time to combine ministry with work in the National Health Service and at King's College London. Having received his theological education at the College of St. Augustine, in 2015 Mullally became Bishop of Crediton (Diocese of Exeter), and in 2017 - Bishop of London. In connection with the appointment to the capital's see, Elizabeth II included Lady Sarah in the House of Lords of the British Parliament, and soon Mullally became the dean of the royal chapel. The elected archbishop is married and has two children. It is interesting that over the long 70 years of her reign, Elizabeth II confirmed male archbishops in the cathedra, and now the man Charles III will approve a female archbishop.

Formally, the election ceremony for Mullally will be completed by January, and the ceremonial enthronement at Canterbury Cathedral will take place in March 2026. According to a long-standing tradition, representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church will probably be invited to it. But whether they will respond is a big question:

So far, there is no congratulations on the website of the Moscow Patriarchate to the new primate of the Church of England, despite the fact that it was with this denomination that the Russian Church had the most active theological dialogue since the 19th century.

So far, little is known about the church-political program of the archbishop. The task that lies on the surface is to keep African congregations in the Anglican Communion that do not understand the female priesthood and deny same-sex marriage. Mullally herself justifies such marriages, but at the same time advocates “preserving the traditional understanding of marriage.” According to doctoral student at the University of Bonn theologian Natallie Vasilevich, “Mullally is considered liberal by conservatives, conservative by liberals, but in fact she is a balanced centrist. Which for a polarized community is also a very important ministry of leadership.”

Viewed from Moscow, the most important intrigue associated with the election of such a primate is how the Russian Orthodox Church will now build relations with the Church of England, one of its few remaining partners in ecumenical dialogue. In the Orthodox tradition, the female priesthood is not categorically recognized.

As the Thomas magazine, created by Patriarch Kirill’s press secretary Vladimir Legoyda, wrote , “starting with the apostles, the performers of the sacraments were invariably men - after all, the priest personifies Jesus Christ during the service.” Modern Protestant theology responds to this with a quote from the Apostle Paul (Gal. 3:28): “In Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female.” To which, in turn, the Orthodox respond with other quotes from the Apostle Paul, where he prohibits women from preaching in the church (1 Cor. 14:34) and leading men (1 Tim. 2:12). They also remind that there were no women among the apostles of Christ, and bishops and elders in the New Testament are mentioned exclusively in the masculine gender.

This debate can be carried on for a long time - the main thing, Orthodox theologians emphasize, is not the problem of the dignity of women (supposedly everything is in order with this in Orthodoxy), but liberal “gender ideology,” especially feminism, which is unacceptable for Orthodox Christians. Because he “justifies abortions,” which undermine the demographic program.

The Russian (and not only) type of Orthodox religiosity and church subculture has developed in recent decades (if not centuries) in such a way that the Russian Orthodox Church has turned into a “church of white handkerchiefs”: its parishioners are overwhelmingly women. In the Soviet years, there remained a relatively narrow niche for men in the church - clergy, singers or workers at churches, but now the male ranks of the church subculture are replenished mainly by radicals such as the organizers of military-patriotic clubs, the “Forty Forties” movement or the “Russian Community”.

But in a church environment independent of the Russian Orthodox Church, there has long been talk about the revival of the order of deaconesses, which existed in the ancient church. If you like, the feminization of the Christian community is a global trend, and churches are included in it one way or another: some earlier and more radically, and others later and more cautious.