Our new Presiding Bishopess

While much of the focus on the Episcopal Church’s triennial General Convention has been on, y’know, the Gay thing, a new curve ball got tossed in by the election, on the fifth ballot of a new Presiding Bishop, Rt. Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, Bishop of Nevada.

The Presiding Bishop in the Episcopal Church is sort of a First Among Equals, the spokesperson for ECUSA to the greater Anglican Communion, the focus of discussion within the greater church, etc.

The really interesting thing about this, is that, while the Episcopal Church has had female priests and bishops for a number of years, a number of our fellow provinces in the Anglican Communion either don’t have any female clergy (and consider the whole thing Highly Improper), or have female priests but not bishops (the Church of England being particularly dithering over the subject the past few years, along with over half of the AC’s provinces). Indeed, some dioceses within ECUSA still aren’t all that hep on women being ordained in the first place, and there’s been an extraordinary (some might say overextended) amount of sensitivity to that feeling.

Still, in comparison to the whole Gay Thing, this seems like a slam dunk. Still, will our brethren in the AC (and those more conservative Episcopalians) see this as another slap in the face from us uppity Libruhl Episcopalians? I have to say, I almost hope so. I know nearly nothing about Bp. Schori (aside from that her first name is spelled differently from our daughter’s), but, granting that it is a tad presumptuious of me, I like her already.

And, on a different but parallel note, yes, that’s my parish that Jean Torkelson is nattering about — this time something positive, about a couple of very cool folks in our congregation and a pretty spiffy story about some people we know.