A liberal nurse to lead a dying church?

The Church of England announced Friday that the Right Reverend and Right Honorable Dame Sarah Mullally has been named the 106th Archbishop of Canterbury. She will be the first female to serve as priestly leader of the church, which claims a 1,400-year history. Formerly Britain’s chief nursing officer, Sarah Mullally entered the priesthood in 2002, and was installed as bishop of London in 2018, progressing in a mere 16 years from the field of nursing to assume the third most senior position in the Church of England. Now, she has been promoted to the top, to serve as primate of all England.

Her predecessor as Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, resigned in the wake of a sex abuse scandal in which he was accused of taking inadequate action. The selection of Bishop Sarah to be the next Archbishop of Canterbury is seen as response to that controversy, though, given the theological trajectory of the Church of England, the appointment of a woman to the highest clerical leadership position in the church was inevitable. It was just a matter of time, and, at the end of last week, the time came.

Two of the last three primates had been advertised as some kind of evangelical. In both cases, with George Carey and Justin Welby, they turned out to be the kind of evangelicals who are not evangelical. Both withered in conviction while in office. If they had any strong convictions in the past, those convictions seemed to disappear as soon as they put on Canterbury’s miter. Conservatives in the Church of England—and there are brave ones left—are now put in a devil’s bind. Evangelical priests in the Diocese of London, where Sarah Mullally has been bishop, were allowed to appeal for external episcopal oversight. Now that she is to be Archbishop of Canterbury, that would seem to be impossible.

Understandably, conservatives in the Anglican Communion are up in arms. Many expressed outrage at the appointment of Sarah Mullally to Canterbury, both for the fact that they do not recognize a woman as priest or bishop, and because this particular woman bishop is quite liberal. Interestingly, she cited her experience as a nurse in coming out against assisted suicide, now debated in Britain’s House of Lords. You can imagine the puns. It certainly does appear that the Church of England is being self-euthanized. On LGBTQ issues the new archbishop is all in on welcoming practicing homosexuals in the church and blessing their unions. It is hard to see how the church will not move swiftly under her leadership to embrace legalized same-sex marriage and all the rest—meaning, all the letters of GLBTQ, and that pesky + sign as well.

The Most Reverend Dr. Laurent Mbanda, Archbishop of Rwanda and leader of GAFCON, the group of conservative global Anglicans set up in opposition to liberalism in the Episcopal Church in the United States and out of disappointment with the pathetically anemic leadership of the Church of England, spoke the truth when he said that “the majority of the Anglican Communion still believes that the Bible requires a male-only episcopacy.” Worldwide, Anglicanism has been most vigorous where the doctrine has been most conservative—and that has generally meant in places far from London or Canterbury. GAFCON also expressed gave disappointment in the lack of biblical fidelity seen in Dame Sarah, and the group expressed disagreement with her “unbiblical and revisionist teachings regarding marriage and sexual morality.”

Dr. Gerald Bray, historian and theologian and one of the most respected voices among conservative Anglicans, held nothing back in an article for Evangelicals Now: “Undertrained and inexperienced, with a proper job somewhere else, the only reason she became a bishop is that she was a woman when women were wanted and in short supply. A man in her position would never have been considered. General awareness of that will make her task exceptionally difficult. Everybody in the Church of England will be polite to her, but few will listen to whatever she has to say.” In the British tradition of pushing on anyway, Bray concluded: “The best we can hope for is that evangelicals (in particular) will be left alone to get on with the mission of Christ, and that when the See of Canterbury becomes vacant again, a more promising candidate may be found.”

My own life has been so enriched by the Anglican tradition, and my soul has been fed by towering figures such as John Owen and Bishop Charles Ryle. I hold dear the memory and examples set by towering Reformation martyrs such as Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, Bishop Nicholas Ridley, and Bishop Hugh Latimer. I learned much from J. I. Packer and John Stott and a host of others, living and dead. I am thankful for such good work done by so many for so long. I pray for them. I cherish Anglican music, though I hear it far more commonly in my library than in my church. I grieve for my Anglican friends.

Year ago, on a visit to our campus, historian John Shelton Reed remarked that you can only expect so much orthodoxy from a church founded by King Henry VIII. I see the point. But I can only wonder what King Henry would say of this development in the Church of England, and what he would think of the approval granted by King Charles III, the church’s current Supreme Governor. Then again, I am fairly certain King Henry’s response would not be printable at WORLD Opinions. I’ll leave it at that.