US-based Katharine Jefferts Schori has become the first woman in the history of the worldwide Anglican Communion to be inaugurated as a senior bishop. Schori heads the Episcopal Church in the U.S. The solemn induction service was Saturday at the National Cathedral in Washington.
US-based Katharine Jefferts Schori has become the first woman in the history of the worldwide Anglican Communion to be inaugurated as a senior bishop. Schori is at the helm of the Episcopal Church in the USA. The formal induction service was Saturday at the National Cathedral in Washington. Conservative Anglicans had strongly criticized the 52-year-old's election in June, saying they were not ready to recognize Jefferts Schori as a senior bishop.The worldwide Anglican Church has about 77 million members. Thirteen of its 38 member churches have no women in the pastorate. Before her election as senior bishop, Jefferts Schori was bishop of the Diocese of Nebraska.In 2003, she had supported the election of Bishop Gene Robinson, who is in a homosexual partnership, in the Diocese of New Hampshire. She also took more liberal positions on other theological ies, unacceptable to traditionalists in the divided Episcopal Church. Seven of the 111 Episcopal dioceses in the U.S. have said they will not recognize Jefferts Schori, according to a report in The Washington Post. Bishops from abroad, especially bishops from Africa, also reject cooperation with their colleague. In the first place not because she was a woman, but because of her attitude toward homosexuality.Responding to intense criticism of her choice, Schori said in her sermon Saturday that all church members must work to "heal the wounded church". The former oceanographer is married and has a daughter. Her term lasts nine years.