Church of England First Female Bishop named as the Reverend Libby Lane

Church of England first female bishop has been revealed as the Reverend Libby Lane few months after historic change to canon law that allows only male leadership in church. That trend is gradually fading out as women emacipation is on the increase.

 

She is to become the new Bishop of Stockport, a post that has been vacant since May according to BBC news. Mrs Lane has been the vicar at St Peter's Hale and St Elizabeth's Ashley in Cheshire since April 2007. Although Mrs Lane will not be able to enter the House of Lords as the post is a junior or suffragan appointment within the Diocese of Chester, the BBC's religious correspondent Caroline Wyatt said.

Mrs Lane was ordained a deacon in 1993 and a priest in 1994, serving her curacy in Blackburn, Lancashire. Since 2010 she has also held the role of Dean of Women in Ministry for the Diocese of Cheshire.

After being schooled in Manchester and then the University at Oxford, she trained for ministry at Cranmer Hall in Durham, according to her church's website.
 
Her husband George - a chaplain at Manchester Airport - is also a priest, and they were one of the first married couples in the Church of England to be ordained together.