Sarah Mullally Becomes First Female Archbishop of Canterbury

• Sarah Mullally becomes first woman enthroned as Archbishop of Canterbury
• Ceremony held at Canterbury Cathedral
• Now spiritual head of 85 million Anglicans worldwide

In the first ever ceremony to see a new Archbishop of Canterbury enthroned, a new female leader to guide the Church of England, Sarah Mullally, was enthroned at the Cathedral in Canterbury, England and takes on the role of spiritual head of 85 million Anglicans around the globe.

The enthronement of Mullally, a former nurse, occurred while she sat in the Chair of St. Augustine before an audience of 2000 guests, including the UK's future king, Prince William, and his bride, Kate, Prime Minister Keir Starmer, and many religious leaders.

During her first sermon as the Archbishop of Canterbury, and wearing a golden mitre, with an African choir of women singing and dancing in front of her, Mullally prayed for “the peace to come to those parts of the world that are currently experiencing war, especially in the Middle East, Ukraine, Sudan, and Myanmar.”

Directing her comments to the congregation Mullally said, "As I begin my ministry as Archbishop of Canterbury, today I say again to God: 'Here I am!'"

As a generation of church leaders come together to mourn the loss of their predecessors’ shy abilities to practice faith based on the truth, compassion and John 1:11 and to use Justice, and to take action thereafter Mullally spoke about the Church’s past mistakes concerning its failure in safeguarding which ultimately led to the resignation of her predecessor, Justin Welby.

Bishop Philip Mounstephen, who was to bestow a blessing on her for her installation into the diocesan chair during the ceremony, called it a historical event after the service when he spoke to Reuters about the significance of a woman being in an "ancient office...older than the Crown".

“It does signal a huge change that has taken place in the life of the Church,” Mounstephen said.

Mullally was previously subjected to criticism from Gafcon for her appointment; however, Gafcon members this month determined that they would not have a Gafcon appointee put in place as a so-called ‘parallel’ position and instead, establish a new Anglican Council rather than naming a parallel head without their Gafcon representative as was recently proposed by Gafcon.

One representative body within the Anglican Communion has also decided to scrap their proposal for a rotating presidency after some expressed concern that doing so could create some rivalry between themselves and the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Mullally arrived at Westminster Cathedral in the usual manner by knocking on the Cathedral’s west door wearing a cope secured by a Cresset. The clasp on the cope she wore, was modeled after the belt she wore as a nurse for the National Health Service. Following her arrival at the Cathedral, she was greeted by children in the Cathedral foyer.

Mullally wore the ring presented by the Pope in 1966 to one of her predecessors, Michael Ramsey, as a way of showing progression between Anglicans and the Catholic Church hundreds of years after King Henry VIII broke with Rome.