Dame Sarah Mullally has been named as the new Archbishop of Canterbury designate – the first woman to be chosen for the role.
A former NHS chief nurse, the 63-year-old became a priest in 2006 and was appointed as the first female Bishop of London in 2018 – the third most senior member of clergy in the Church of England.
She used her first public statement on Friday to condemn the “horrific violence” of Thursday’s deadly attack on a synagogue in Manchester, saying “hatred and racism cannot tear us apart”.
The Church has been without someone in the top job for almost a year after Justin Welby resigned over a safeguarding scandal.
He stepped down after a damning report into a prolific child abuser associated with the Church. It found that he “could and should” have reported John Smyth’s abuse of boys and young men to police in 2013.
Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell took on most of Mr Welby’s responsibilities in an interim move, and was one of the voting members of the body charged with choosing his successor. He himself has faced calls to step down over his handling of an abuse case.
Women were first ordained priests in the Church in 1994, while the first female bishop appointments followed 20 years later in 2014
In line with tradition, the process of choosing a new archbishop involves a name being given to Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and then passed to the monarch.(BBC)
