THE GUARDIAN: New archbishop of Wales says faith kept her going through decades-long struggle for acceptance as a woman and lesbian in the Anglican church
The new archbishop of Wales, the Most Rev Cherry Vann, has told of how she kept her sexuality secret for decades as part of her struggle to be accepted as a female minister in the Anglican communion.
Speaking to the Guardian on Thursday, the day after her appointment, Vann, 66, 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.
Vann became one of the first female priests to be ordained in England in 1994. Now, as the 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 has well and truly broken the stained glass ceiling.
“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.
“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.” » | Bethan McKernan | Wales correspondent | Sunday, August 3, 2025
