The new archbishop of Wales, the Most Rev Cherry Vann, has said that gay marriage in church is inevitable.
Vann, 66, stated this while speaking to the Guardian of how she kept her s3xuality secret for decades as part of her struggle to be accepted as a female minister in the Anglican communion.
Vann became one of the first female priests to be ordained in England in 1994. Now, she is UK’s first female and first openly gay archbishop, and the first openly lesbian and partnered bishop to serve as a primate within the Anglican communion.
She said that without the strong belief that God had called her to the priesthood she “would not have survived” her journey through the ranks of the church.
“It happens that I’ve lived in a time that’s meant that I’m a trailblazer, but I’m not a campaigner,” the Leicestershire-born archbishop said during an interview at the Church in Wales’s offices in central Cardiff,” she said.
“I’m not somebody to be out there all the time but I do seek to be true to what I think God’s asking of me.”
Working in the Church in Wales since 2020 has been very different from the many years Vann spent at the Church of England, she said, as clergy are permitted to be in same-sex civil partnerships. In the Anglican church in England, same-sex relationships are technically allowed, but gay clergy are expected to remain celibate
Upon becoming bishop of Monmouth five years ago, Vann publicly disclosed her civil partnership with Wendy Diamond, her partner of 30 years, for the first time.
“Other people in England were braver than I was and made their sexuality clear. A lot of them suffered the consequences of that, certainly when going forward for ordination,” Vann said.
“For years we kept our relationship secret because I worried about waking up and finding myself outed on the front page of a newspaper. Now, Wendy joins me everywhere, and when I take services, it’s just normal. But in England she had to stay upstairs if I had a meeting in the house.
Being a woman in the church had been difficult enough, she added. “You can hide your sexuality, up to a point, but you can’t hide being a woman. There was a lot of nastiness; the men were angry, they felt they had been betrayed
Vann said in the 1990s, she and a handful of other female priests began meeting for prayer and conversation with male colleagues opposed to their ordination.
“It was awful, it was really difficult for all of us, but we stuck at it,” she said.
Over time, the hostility dissipated. “This is what I’m hoping around the sexuality issue too – modelling that we can vehemently disagree about something, but we can still love one another in Christ and recognise one another as children of God.”
Andy John, the former archbishop, announced in June he was standing down with immediate effect after an alcohol-fuelled financial, bullying and sexual misconduct at Bangor Cathedral.
John was not accused of wrongdoing, but calls for his resignation gathered pace after summaries of two reports were published and six “serious incident reports” were sent to the Charity Commission earlier this year.
The new archbishop said her top priority is “healing and reconciliation”.
“There’s a lot of work already going on in the background, we haven’t been standing still … We must work to build trust with those who have been hurt and angered by what has gone on.”
Gender and sexuality are still highly divisive issues in the Anglican communion. Even in her new role as the first female and first openly gay archbishop in the UK, Vann was cautious on the topic of gay marriage.
“I don’t personally feel the need to get married in church; Wendy and I have been together for 30 years, we’ve made our vows, and we are committed to each other.
“Gay marriage in church is inevitable, I think: the question is when. There are people who are very opposed, and as leader, I have to honour their position, which is theologically grounded. It isn’t my job to push something through that would alienate a good proportion of clergy,” she added.
