Sarah Mullally: The former nurse chosen to lead the Church of England

0:00How does a banana trigger a CIA-backed coup? Do AirPods herald the arrival of a new global order? What do LED lights say about the future of humanity? I'm Ed Conway, and in each episode of my new podcast, Stuff Matters, I take an object, crack it open, and reveal the world-shaping forces hidden inside. This is economics told through the things we think we understand. Search Stuff Matters on your podcast app to listen and follow. Coming up on the Sky News Daily, the Church of England has a new Archbishop and for the first time, it's a woman. So, who is Dame Sarah Mullally? How does a banana trigger a CIA-backed coup?

0:43Do AirPods herald the arrival of a new global order? What do LED lights say about the future of humanity? I'm Ed Conway and in each episode of my new podcast Stuff Matters I take an object, crack it open and reveal the world-shaping forces hidden inside. This is economics told through the things we think we understand. Search Stuff Matters on your podcast app to listen and follow.

1:13Hi everyone, Neil Patterson here with another one of our Friday profiles and And it is a huge day for the Church of England. A new Archbishop of Canterbury has just been elected. And it is, for the first time in the role's 1 ,400-year existence, a woman, Dame Sarah Mullally. Admittedly, women have only been permitted to be bishops for a little over 10 years. Archbishop Justin Welby shepherded that decision through the Church's governing body, the General Synod, back in 2014. And it was Archbishop Welby's resignation late last year that created the vacancy in the first place. An internal review found that he failed to formally report a prolific child abuser to the police.

1:53As such, well, the church exists under something of a cloud. For the moment, Sarah Mullally remains Archbishop-designate. Her installation as Archbishop Proper takes place next year. But foremost in her mind must be the attack on the synagogue in Manchester and the tension that exists between the faiths. In a moment, I'll be speaking to Ruth Gledhill, Religious Affairs Commentator and Assistant Editor of The Tablet. First though, here is Archbishop-designate Sarah Mullally. She was speaking shortly after the announcement was made.

2:23Dame Sarah Mullally:Mindful of the horrific violence of yesterday's attack on a synagogue in Manchester, we are witnessing hatred that rises up through fractures across our communities. I know that the God who is with us draws near to those who suffer. Let's speak then to Ruth Gledhill, Religious Affairs Commentator, Assistant Editor of the Tablet. Good to see you, Ruth. Look, a female archbishop. This is a big moment for the Church of England, isn't it? It's absolutely huge. And it's not something I really ever thought I would see. And if you told me 30, 40 years ago that this would happen, I simply wouldn't have believed it was possible.

3:06Justin Welby, her predecessor, left under a cloud because of safeguarding issues. and safeguarding is going to be high up her agenda as well. She's going to have to deal with some difficult things moving forwards. But I have to give him credit, and I think he deserves the credit, for managing to get the women bishops legislation through the General Synod and for that to become possible. So the first person to succeed him after it became possible for a woman to do it is a woman. And I think that is a credit to the process that the Church of England has gone through. So we'd better find out just a little bit more about her.

3:41I mean, who is Dame Sarah Mullally, or should I say Archbishop Sarah Mullally? Well, she started out as a nurse. And again, you know, if you were thinking 40 years ago, if I want to be Archbishop of Canterbury, what's the first career step I need to take? I don't think you'd become a nurse. And so it is a really extraordinary career path. And it just shows that careers in the Church of England or in churches generally are not like normal careers out there. You know, the spirit moves in mysterious ways. But I think the Church of England does need nursing back to health. And she is a nurse and so she can be that nurse, I think.

4:15And in her opening remarks, she made it clear that pastoral skills are really among the most important things she brings to this role. The Church of England, like the wider world, is beset by divisions and tribalism. Tell me then just a little more about her career within the church itself. So she was ordained priest in 2002. Then she worked in the Southwark Diocese of the Church of England in various parish positions. She then became a canon at Salisbury Cathedral. And she then became a suffraging bishop in Crediton. And then after that, she went on to become Bishop of London, which was she was the first woman in that role as well.

5:01Again, you know, it's all happened so quickly and so recently. And so that just wasn't possible until relatively recently. And so then from Bishop of London, which it is a kind of natural path from London to Canterbury. Bishop of London is the third most senior after Canterbury in York. It's a top job. Just in terms of the election itself, why her? Because presumably there were other names in the frame for this. It was pretty thin, actually. I think they did struggle. There was apparently about four people on the shortlist, of which two were women. They had various options. They could have gone for a man, obviously.

5:35They could have gone for someone who was very much a conservative, evangelical. The controversial aspect about choosing her is that some parts of the Anglican Communion, which is a very key part of her role, still don't ordain women at all. This is the thing. I think people often forget that the Church of England has global reach, of course. It does have global reach, but it is also its own entity. You know, the king is the supreme governor of the Church of England. And the Anglican Communion, it's not a church like the Catholic Church. The Archbishop of Canterbury is not like a Pope, but it is like the mother church of the wider Anglican Communion.

6:10And as Archbishop of Canterbury, you're first among equals, but you're not a Pope. So in a sense, the Church of England can kind of do its own thing. But because it is the mother church, it does have a global impact in the wider communion. So where do you put her then on the kind of the progressive traditionalist spectrum within the Church of England? really pretty much in the middle. On assisted dying, for example, she surprised me recently with quite how strong her statement was opposing it. So there is someone there who's very much gospel-oriented and very much focused on life issues. She's very strong and she will speak out in strong terms when necessary.

6:51On the lesbian and gay blessings issue and on the whole progressive issue. I think the church is really grappling with that at the moment. My guess is she will see her role as being someone to try and calm it all down a little bit. And then I think she will try and lead the church to making up its own mind. But isn't there, just by the nature of her election, does the election of a female archbishop not in and of itself risk a split from the more evangelical wing? Not within the Church of England, no. No, that won't happen now, but there will be objections from the wider Anglican communion and you might find what they call impaired communion.

7:34What does that mean? Well, it means that you might find some bishops or archbishops from other parts of the Anglican communion refusing to attend the Lambeth Conference, maybe, if it's a woman archbishop. Those are the kind of difficulties that might confront her. But that would not be for the Church of England. That would not be a schismatic thing. How political is she? I mean, have we got another activist, troublesome priest on our hands? Well, this is the thing about her, and she's very like Pope Leo in this sense. She's a strong person, she knows her own mind, but she's not a culture warrior.

8:08And it's funny because with archbishops, they often do seem to be quite similar to the popes that they're having to deal with. So Rowan Williams and Benedict had a lot in common. Justin Welby had a lot in common with Pope Francis. They got on very well. They're both evangelicals. And now I think they've got someone who obviously is different sex, but I think she's got quite a lot in common with Pope Leo in terms of the emphasis on the pastoral, on the considered approach, and being a healer and a peacemaker rather than someone who's stirring the pot. She also enters the job at a time where we have seen, in terms of religion generally, but in terms of Christianity and the Anglican faith, a rise in numbers and amongst younger people.

8:51Yes, the Church of England, like the Catholic Church and other Christian bodies, is seeing a Gen Z take up. There's suggestions from well-informed sources that this could be due to the influence of TikTok and social media and influences out there. But what they are all suffering from is a shortage of vocations. So one of her jobs will be, you know, how do we find people, more people to become priests? So that will be one of her challenges. she has many challenges ahead and I'm sure she will have thought really hard and carefully before accepting this but if you're a clergy person like that already had many jobs and done well at many jobs when a call like that comes it would be like the call of God so you wouldn't really I think seriously turn it down but I think she will have prayed hard for strength and help and the wisdom to do it because it's what it's one must be one of the hardest jobs in the world.

9:46If God's been calling, however, God's been calling for quite some time. It's about a year, isn't it, that we've been without an archbishop. What is the process then? And why has it taken so long? Well, it does, again, compare, you know, quite unfavourably, actually, with the Catholic Church, which kind of got a couple of weeks. They managed to get it done in, didn't they? They did. And it's taken nearly a year, as you say. It's partly because it's such a complex animal in terms of its place within the establishment, the established church. the King as Supreme Governor and they brought on board people from the whole Anglican Communion to take part in the election process and then there were problems with appointing electors on the Crown Nominations Commission to help make the choice at the local level.

10:29Then the Crown Nominations Commission had to meet three times and that was over the summer. So whilst all this is going on, are the candidates out there hacking? Are they politicking, getting their soapboxes out or, I don't know, as is traditional in the Church of England inviting people round for a cup of tea and a slice of cake? Well, you see, you can't be seen to want the job. And actually, to be fair to the candidates on the shortlist anyway, none of them will have wanted the job because it is not a particularly desirable job. To us secular people, you might think, oh, well, the status looks great and live in palaces and get to dress up in all these lovely clothes.

11:05But it is really the case that these people, these Christian ministers, that's not what draws them to these roles. And she, especially being a nurse, We know, we absolutely know about her, that she's not a power person. She's not a person looking for status and power. She's looking to make the gospel make a difference in our world. She's looking to be a pastor and to bring healing. She's a healer. I mean, perfect, perfect person for the role at this particular time. So, no, they wouldn't have been doing that, but people might have been doing it on their behalf. As you've kind of intimated there, she enters the role at a time in which, from my perspective at least, the church remains in something of a state of crisis.

11:49Well, I think Justin Wilby himself personally, you know, left under a cloud. It was very unfortunate what happened, the things that led up to his having to go. And he definitely did have to go. And it was very damaging. But I think for the wider church, for the Archbishop of Canterbury, never mind Justin himself, but for the Archbishop of Canterbury to have to step down like that, it's really bad. I mean, I've interviewed Justin Welby on a couple of occasions. I have to admit, given my impression of the man when I encountered him on those occasions, I was surprised with the way he handled those allegations of abuse within the church and latterly the complaints about his own personal conduct.

12:30Were you surprised? I was surprised that it had come to that, yes. And I don't know why, but I do think that it might have been partly a result of the job being so demanding and so complex. And that it's something, for whatever reason, there was a failure to completely get on top of these and to deal with them in the appropriate way. I think for the established church as a whole, it's not good if the Archbishop of Canterbury has to resign in such circumstances. And so healing is what is needed now. Can she do that, though? Yes, she can. I believe she can. And I think she is actually possibly the perfect person for the job.

13:10In a way, I think that people will forget very soon that she's a woman or a man, or, you know, that she's just a person and she's a priest. And a priest who his very difficult role is to try and bring the gospel to bear on not just the church, but the wider world. You speak very warmly of the woman and it is clear that you have confidence in her abilities to lead the Anglican Church as Archbishop. But she has been named Archbishop at a time when, you know, there is a real unease among and between the separate faiths. And it's a world that, you mentioned the tension between faiths, but it's also a world where so much of it has lost any faith.

13:55and so it's a big tension as well between the worlds of faith and the secular world. In some faiths, abuse is taking place of power and doctrine in order to perpetrate not good things. There are no easy answers to any of this and she'll be all too aware of that. She will have to have a response to those shocking, those tragic events that took place in Manchester. What is the approach that you think she is likely to take? So the Church of England and consequently the Archbishop of Canterbury has traditionally had very strong relations with the Jewish community and with the chief rabbinate as well.

14:32There's also been very good relations with the Muslim community and leaders of the Muslim community around the country. I mean, this will be a very important part of her job. So she's already been dealing with these issues in London at a local level. so she has a lot of experience already in this and understands the complexities involved but yes I think that to have someone like her speaking out against anti-Semitism she could help to make a difference and we could help to maybe militate against this kind of monster of hatred in our midst Given your experience as a religious affairs commentator have you known a time before now at which it has been quite so sensitive that it has been quite so angry.

15:17There's always been security at synagogue. There's always been the threat of anti-Semitism. And ever since I've been in this field writing about it, every year the Community Security Trust, the Jewish Security Trust, will release figures on anti-Semitic attacks. And I can't really remember a year when there's been a big drop. Nearly always it's going up. There's been conflicts in the Middle East in the past when there's been big surges in anti-Semitism. things that have nothing to do with Britain's Jewish community when they happen in other parts of the world outside Britain can prompt these massive rises in anti-Semitism.

15:53Why is this? It is the world's oldest hatred and I think that it would be so great if somehow she could help and I'm sure she'll do her best to do something about it. The person who manages to deal with it there's a person who would deserve the Nobel Peace Prize. Indeed. What then do you think Sarah Mullally sees as the role of the Church of England in the 21st century? I think just the fact that they have had the courage to choose a woman. She's still awaiting election, of course, in Canterbury, but that's a kind of formality, really. But just the fact that the Crown Nominations Commission had the courage to do that, there'll be payback for that, and the payback will be the Church will be seen as being more relevant, because discrimination against women has been a long-standing aspect of not just the Church of England but all the Christian churches.

16:47She's off to a good start just by being who she is. She's not someone who's going to major on theological battles or political grandstanding. She's going to major on helping the people who need help and that's a large part of the world at the moment, not just in this country but all over the world through the Anglican Communion. So I think if she's manifestly able to be seen to be doing that, I think that the church does have a chance of recovering its relevance in a way that could really help our country and our world as we move forward. My thanks to Ruth and to you for listening. If you like what you've heard, do give us a follow.

17:27The Daily is back Monday. Till then, take care.

17:37How does a banana trigger a CIA-backed coup? Do AirPods herald the arrival of a new global order? What do LED lights say about the future of humanity? I'm Ed Conway, and in each episode of my new podcast, Stuff Matters, I take an object, crack it open, and reveal the world-shaping forces hidden inside. This is economics told through the things we think we understand. Search Stuff Matters on your podcast app to listen and follow.