Sarah Mullally becomes first woman Archbishop of Canterbury

Sarah Mullally has been named the new Archbishop of Canterbury, becoming the first woman to lead the Church of England in its nearly 1,500-year history.

Her appointment, confirmed on Friday by King Charles III after a formal selection process, marks a watershed moment for the Anglican Communion, which counts around 85 million members worldwide. Mullally, 63, will serve as the 106th Archbishop of Canterbury, succeeding Justin Welby, who stepped down earlier this year following a damning abuse scandal.

“The responsibility is huge, but I feel peace and trust in God to carry me,” Mullally, a former nurse and later Bishop of London, said in her first public statement after the announcement.

Prime minister Keir Starmer welcomed her appointment, describing the Church of England as “part of the fabric of our communities” and expressing confidence that Mullally would play “a key role in our national life.”

Mullally’s elevation comes at a turbulent time for the Church. Her predecessor, Welby, resigned after an independent inquiry found that senior church figures had covered up decades-old abuse by John Smyth, a barrister who ran evangelical summer camps in the 1970s and 1980s. At least 130 boys and young men were said to have suffered at Smyth’s hands. He died in South Africa in 2018 while under investigation, never facing criminal charges.

The scandal has fuelled calls for deep reform within the Church of England, whose supreme governor is the British monarch. Once the spiritual backbone of national life, the Church now counts around 20 million baptised members but fewer than one million regular worshippers.

Mullally’s appointment also signals the Church’s evolving stance on women in leadership. The Church of England began consecrating women bishops in 2014, following decades of debate, although other Anglican provinces, such as the United States, had taken this step decades earlier. Mullally herself became the first female Bishop of London in 2018, the third-highest post in the English hierarchy.

Mullally is a former cancer nurse who worked as England’s Chief Nursing Officer in the early 2000s, while also being ordained as a priest in 2002. She became one of the first women to be consecrated as a bishop in the Church of England in 2015.

“There are great commonalities between nursing and being a priest. It’s all about people, and sitting with people during the most difficult times in their lives,” she once told a magazine.

She has advocated for creating an open and transparent culture in churches which allows for difference and disagreement, and has spoken on issues including the cost-of-living crisis, healthcare, and social justice.

Today, more than 40 of England’s 108 bishops are women, with women making up a similar proportion among priests.

The office of the Archbishop of Canterbury is one of Britain’s most historic. The first incumbent, Augustine of Canterbury, was appointed in the late sixth century. The role became central to national life after King Henry VIII established the Church of England in the 1530s, thereby breaking with the Roman Catholic Church.

Mullally’s selection was the outcome of a lengthy process led by a committee under a former head of MI5, reflecting the position’s political as well as spiritual weight. Her leadership will stretch far beyond England, with the Archbishop of Canterbury regarded as the symbolic head of global Anglicanism.

The challenge before her is twofold: to restore trust in an institution shaken by scandal and to offer direction in a society where faith holds a diminished but still powerful role.