With her appointment as the new Archbishop of Canterbury, Sarah Mullally became the first female head of the Church of England, which has roots in both the Roman Empire and the worldwide Anglican community.
According to the UK government, King Charles III has approved her nomination by a commission charged with choosing a replacement for Justin Welby, who resigned due to an abuse scandal. The mother church of Anglicanism worldwide is the Church of England. Mullally, who is sixty-three, is the 106th Archbishop of Canterbury in the church’s history; the first was appointed in the latter part of the sixth century. The former nurse stated in a statement that she felt “peace and trust in God to carry me” despite the “huge responsibility” of her new post.
“This nation places great value on the Church of England. He added in a statement that the next archbishop would “play a key role in our national life,” saying, “Its churches, cathedrals, schools, and charities are part of the fabric of our communities.”
After a review revealed that the Church of England had concealed a case of serial abuse in the 1970s and that Welby had neglected to notify authorities of the assaults when they were brought to his attention in 2013, he resigned.
The independent investigation found that up to 130 adolescents and young men were abused by John Smyth, a lawyer who ran evangelical summer camps in the 1970s and 1980s.
While British authorities were investigating him, Smyth passed away in South Africa in 2018 at the age of 75. He was never charged with a crime.
The British monarchy is the Church of England’s highest administrator, and the scandal stunned the country and led to widespread calls for reform. According to data for 2022, the Church of England has almost 20 million baptized members, yet there are only slightly less than one million regular churchgoers. After a protracted screening process overseen by a former chief of the MI5 internal security department, Mullally was selected by King Charles III.
After King Henry VIII broke with the Roman Catholic Church in the 1530s, the Anglican Church was formally recognized as the state church.
Mullally became the first female Bishop of London in 2018 after being ordained as a priest in 2002.
After years of fierce factional squabbling, the church finally allowed women to serve as bishops in 2014. Several Anglican denominations, with a combined membership of almost 85 million people across more than 165 nations, have long allowed women to serve as bishops; the first was appointed in the US in 1989.
Since women were initially allowed to serve as clergy in the early 1990s, almost 40 of England’s 108 bishops are now female, and the percentage is comparable for priests.
