Church of England may ordain women bishops

LONDON — Leaders of the Church of England voted July 11 to begin a process leading to the ordination of women as bishops.

The House of Bishops voted 41–6 in favor of “the process for removing the legal obstacles to the ordination of women in the episcopate,” which is likely to take up to four years to complete, The New York Times reported.

The Church of England has ordained women as priests since 1994, and the exodus of conservative priests following that decision leads many to believe another such exodus is looming. The move to ordain women as bishops almost certainly will widen the gap between the more conservative Anglicans in Africa and the rest of the world and many of those in Europe and the United States, The Times noted. A schism has already developed over the Episcopal Church USA’s acceptance of homosexuals, and in particular, the ordination of an openly homosexual bishop in New Hampshire in 2003.