Currently Bishop of Penrith, Bishop Emma will take up the position from 1st June 2021.
press release from the Archbishop of Canterbury, and from the Archbishop of York
Bishop Emma Ineson to be Bishop to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York
Currently Bishop of Penrith, Bishop Emma will take up the position from 1st June 2021.
Archbishops Justin Welby and Stephen Cottrell have announced the Rt Revd Dr Emma Ineson as the new Bishop to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York. Currently Bishop of Penrith, Dr Ineson will take up the position from 1st June 2021.
The role reimagines and replaces the existing position of Bishop at Lambeth – the post currently held by Bishop Tim Thornton, who announced his retirement earlier this year – in order to facilitate closer working between Lambeth Palace and Bishopthorpe.
Bishop Emma will work directly for both Archbishops and closely with the whole College of Bishops. As a senior member of the Archbishops’ teams, she will play a key role in work being done on the future of the Church of England, appointments and liaising with the House of Bishops.
She will also have specific oversight of the programme for the 2022 Lambeth Conference, having been chair of the conference’s working group since last year. She will not be Bishop to the Forces or Episcopal Commissary to the Falkland Islands, roles currently performed by the Bishop at Lambeth.
Bishop Emma has been the Bishop of Penrith in the Diocese of Carlisle since 2019. Prior to that she was Principal of Trinity College. She has also been a Bishop’s chaplain, and chaplain to the Lee Abbey community in Devon. In 2016 she was appointed as an Honorary Chaplain to the Queen.
She is author of two books – Busy Living: Blessing not burden (Continuum) and Ambition: What Jesus said about power, success and counting stuff (SPCK). She is married to Mat. They have two adult children and two black dogs.
Bishop Emma said: “I am absolutely delighted to be taking up this new role at such a time of great opportunity and challenge for the Church of England, as we emerge from the Covid pandemic. I am very much looking forward to working with the Archbishops and their teams at Lambeth and Bishopthorpe to enable the work of healing, renewal and hope that will be needed in the Church, and in wider society, in the coming years. We have good news to share in Jesus, and it will be a privilege to play whatever part I can in ensuring that good news is heard and received by all.”
The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Revd Justin Welby, said: “I am truly delighted to welcome Bishop Emma to Lambeth Palace. I know she will bring her considerable wisdom, humour and humility to the role, as well as her wealth of experience as a chaplain, teacher and outstanding preacher. Archbishop Stephen and I are looking forward to working with Bishop Emma on issues relating to the Emerging Church, the role and nature of bishops meetings and the priorities we face.
“As we look forward to the Lambeth Conference, in which Bishop Emma will continue to play a crucial role, her authentic and practical ministry will be invaluable to the global Anglican Communion. I will be praying for her and her husband, Mat, as they prepare to join this community of communities at Lambeth Palace.”
The Archbishop of York, the Most Revd Stephen Cottrell said: “I’m delighted that Emma has been appointed as Bishop to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York. Her theological depth and pastoral heart will be a huge blessing in this important ministry, not just to the Archbishops, but to the Church of England as we strive to be a simpler, humbler and bolder church.”
Presumably, this role is in addition to the special friend on 90K that the Archbishop of York needs to help him lead a simpler, humbler church…
Do explain.
Here’s the story…
https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/news/local-news/anger-archbishop-york-advertises-chief-20319954
Yikes! Thank you.
Congratulations to Dr Emma. Her many evident talents will be a great contribution to the life of the Church nationally. I did not note full-time stipendiary parochial experience though. Perhaps that is of far less significance for the role than I believe.
Parish experience is important, as is some kind of sector ministry experience. But I don’t see why either has to be stipendiary to count.
My prayers for Bishop Emma as she makes this move which is hopefully good news for her and her family, as well as for the Archbishops of Canterbury and York who will gain an able new colleague. Not such good news, perhaps, for the see of Penrith. Like most dioceses Carlisle is currently looking at significant reductions to clergy posts and has taken the line that the next ‘senior’ post to fall vacant will not be filled. So the wider effect of this appointment will be that the church loses a frontline pastoral person in order to replace a backroom… Read more »
Fret not, the box-ticking exercise of a review of episcopal ministry that takes place whenever a see becomes vacant will conclude that a new bishop of Penrith must be appointed forthwith, so those all-important managerial responsibilities will not be neglected. It’s only parish posts that lie vacant for months and years at a time leaving the quite unnecessary business of pastoral ministry neglected.
Good Evening Filigree! Looking a few minutes ago at the website of the Diocese of Carlisle, it is very clear that the Diocese intends to move forward with the appointment of a New Suffragan Bishop of Penrith, If for the sake of argument the Bishop of Carlisle decided to retire soon or in the next year or two, it would make no practical sense to dispense with this Episcopal role at this juncture, as they will need a Bishop to administer the Diocese of Carlisle during a future interregnum, as the acting Bishop of Carlisle, so a New Bishop of… Read more »
Bishops’ stipends and expenses are paid for by the Church Commissioners and not by the Dioceses. The would be no saving to the Diocese in not appointing a new Bishop.
Many thanks. That has led me to wonder whether the ‘solution’ to all diocesan woes and parish share stress is to make all incumbents bishops so that the liabilities for the wage bill and pensions accruals finally pass back to the Commissioners, who can well afford it!
*MORE* bishops, please!
Froghole, I do believe you’re on to something! Now, I must go mitre shopping…
The diocese could sell the suffragan bishop’s house though. That belongs to the diocese and is worth a groat or two.
I think it is possible to be happy for Emma while simultaneously questioning whether there is a need for such a post.
Northern rearrangements in the offing? According to Peter Owen’s site, Hardman of Newcastle is 70 this August and Newcome of Carlisle in July 2023. Looking further ahead, Henderson of Blackburn is 70 in July 2024 and Butler of Durham in September 2025. The geography and communications network of Cumberland, Westmorland and Furness Lancashire that make up Carlisle diocese mean that Keswick, though centrally sited, is not an ideal location for the diocesan’s residence, so one can understand the desirability of a suffragan. Carlisle and Blackburn already work together and from Barrow and the southern parts of Carlisle diocese it’s as… Read more »
Thinking about communication in the mountainous diocese of Carlisle – I remember when I served there in the 1980s I once heard a saying that proclaimed that “If you bought a new pair of curtains in Carlisle they knew about it 10 minutes later in Barrow!”
Aye, reet eenuff ower David. Weer all related in sum way, tha kenst. Incest flourishes where t’roads are bad.
“Incest flourishes where t’roads are bad.” Shameless cultural appropriation, Stanley. Laurie Lee is spinning in his West Country grave.
I suppose I should apologize for that, Allan. But I shan’t. I couldn’t bear the Lake poets, inevitably shoved down our necks at school in Penrith – all that flummery nature nonsense – though as I get older I am drawn to Wordsworthian pantheism. There were rumours about Dorothy and him, but they’ve been demolished. Norman Nicholson AFAIK led a life of unparalleled virtue as befits a Millom Wesleyan (I’m a Langwathby Wesleyan who defected, quite wicked) so he’s no use in this context. Mr Lee it had to be.
What’s all this about Laurie Lee then? We now live a mere two miles away from where the great author and poet is buried in the Slad Valley. This last Sunday I attended worship at Slad parish church where there is a beautiful stained glass window in his memory. One if the first things we did when moving here last October was to have a pint of cider at the Woolpack Inn.
In Cider with Rosie, Laurie Lee is unsparing with, “Quiet incest flourished where the roads were bad; some found their comfort in beasts; and there were the usual friendships between men and boys…” . But then he also gives us, “Never to be forgotten, that first long secret drink of golden fire, juice of those valleys and of that time, wine of wild orchards, of russet summer, of plump red apples, and Rosie’s burning cheeks.”
Thank you for that information. I have now ordered Cider with Rosie and I very much look forward to reading the same. I can only add that the roads have greatly improved in the Stroud District since Laurie Lee’s Day.
It sounds like what the Carlisle diocese needs is lots of Associate Archdeacon Transition Enablers.
Dean, I think that in Cumbria (ugh! horrid 1970s neologism), “the first ecumenical county to be formed in England”, that’s what they call Methodists.
As Bishop to the Forces, Bishop Tim Thornton is a member of the House of Bishops (Canon H3.1 (bb)), a position he does not hold as Bishop at Lambeth. Emma Ineson is not to be Bishop to the Forces, so the Canon will need to be amended to provide for the Bishop to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York to be an ex officio member of the House of Bishops if, as I suggest, her new role merits this.
‘Simpler and humbler’ !?! We have more bishops and archdeacons, including associate archdeacons we heard today for the diocese of Sheffield, than at any point in the CofE’s history and yet the number of clergy working at the coalface is being reimagined downwards. The Church’s fundraising units (parishes) won’t keep coughing up for this. My non churchgoing friends have all been giggling about applying to become the Archbishop of York’s friend at £90,000 a year. The latest in a long series of PR blunders from the CofE.
I find the job title a huge distraction. ‘Bishop at Lambeth’ was at least detached in name from the Archbishops. Now we see yet more resources aimed specifically at the ministries of our two Archbishops. And who will pick up the Forces and Falklands ministry? Another appointment? Coupled with the growth in support/central/administrative/senior roles which have appeared over the last two years it seems we are growing a centralised hub which only in barely discernible ways energises or sustains the wheel where it touches the ground. I think the point about incumbency is important, not because incumbent ministry is the… Read more »
When was a bishop not delighted at any new appointment? “I am absolutely delighted” (Penrith) – “I am truly delighted” (Canterbury) “I’m delighted” (York). Ebor is here being simpler and humbler in his comment.
I recall that great bishop + Richard Chartres wishing ordinands a “terrifying” ordination. As the Church of England continues on its long slow pilgrimage of decline shouldn’t our Archbishops perhaps be a little more terrified than delighted as they boldly go into a future which sees yet more cuts in clergy numbers and more parish amalgamations?
Cuthbert, Hildebrand etc etc etc were not delighted, but all the better for it, but in the modern CofE it is different. Canterbury’s use of the word “truly” is curious. When he does not include “truly” in a remark are we to assume he doesn’t really mean it? Or does he protest too much? Canterbury also says he knows she will bring humility to the role. If I were he, I wouldn’t count on it. With the grand pomposity of the title of bishop to the archbishops, and the notion that her role brings together the north and south, like… Read more »
I think the phrase ‘cock a hoop’ is most apt.
But isn’t one of the original meanings of “cock a hoop” “to drink without restraint, to celebrate drunkenly” and doesn’t that contradict the meaning of the stone in the bishop’s ring?
I think this post is something of a misunderstanding. It would be beyond bizarre if, having invited someone to take up a new job, one publicly said that one was terrified at the prospect of them doing so. Richard Chartres (the ‘great’ bishop who refused to ordain women) may well be right in telling ordinands to be terrified of the calling and responsibility of ordained ministry. That is a completely separate point from announcing that someone has accepted a job offer. While there is a repetitious and perhaps rather trite feel to all the ‘delighted’ remarks it is not helpful… Read more »
Father David asked when was a bishop not delighted at any new appointment, quoting Penrith’s “absolute” delight at her own. When Cuthbert, Hildebrand and many others, were made bishops they tried to escape. That is the difference. I said nothing about how they attempted to live out their vocations. Pope Gregory warned that anyone calling himself a universal bishop would be precursor to the AntiChrist. Accepting a grand title, never before conferred on anybody, is not a sign of humility. It simply isn’t. “Bishop to the Archbishops” may seem merely “clumsy and misguided” to Mr Barrington. If so, it is… Read more »
I missed something yesterday. In announcing that a Church of England bishop will have “specific oversight of the programme for the 2022 Lambeth Conference” the Church of England becomes directly responsible for the decision to exclude same sex spouses from the programme. It is no longer possible to say that the event is organised by a third party, nor that the decision was made by Justin Welby in his capacity as an instrument of communion rather than as Archbishop of Canterbury. It is now officially a Church of England event with a bishop having oversight of the programme as part… Read more »
Thank you for mentioning this, Kate. The issue has not gone away and it is both rude and discriminatory. The exclusion of partners because they are gay, but inclusion if they are straight, is plain discrimination – and no university hosting this gathering, nor its students, nor the Church of England itself (whether formally involved or not) should in any way accept this. People who attend the Lambeth Conference should at the very least make a noise in calling this out. It’s a betrayal, not only of the partners concerned, but of the dignity and respect due to all LGBT… Read more »
As the chair of the Lambeth conference group is it fair to assume she has already agreed exclusion of same sex spouses? She previously signed a letter in 2016 opposing radical inclusion of LGBTI people within the church. As someone who will become a key player between Canterbury and York and the House of Bishops, especially as LLF is part of their decision making, can we assume Bishop Ineson will support the radical inclusion which the Archbishops said they wanted to see but never fleshed out? We shall see but history suggests this appointment might not be such good news… Read more »
Marise, would it be possible to cite that letter, please? I’d like to read it.
Dr Ineson’s appointment puts into context her resignation from the trusteeship (I think) of the Church Society at about the time “A beautiful story” was released.
There are a some clues in this announcement to the ‘method in the madness’ of this appointment – and why it is in response and reaction to what has gone before. The emphasis on the need for a firmer hand on the organisational (and diplomatic) tiller of the Lambeth Conference bears out the disaffection I’ve picked up, not least because of the dysfunction at the Lambeth (Palace) end of things. Ditto the need for a greater degree of cooperation between Lambeth and Bishopthorpe. If anyone is still in doubt about what led to the ‘stay out of your churches’ edict… Read more »
Tim Thornton stays on as a Trustee of the Lambeth Conference Company and will be involved in the planning. So that will be two bishops, one representing the old covenant and one representing the new, actively involved in the Lambeth Conference. Perhaps they will need a bishop to moderate their episcopal ministry.
It’s purely ‘face-saving’ Stephen. As time goes on, I think you can safely assume he’ll just evaporate into the background – just as key people from his office are already doing. Big plans. Little result.
Two black dogs? One for each archbishop! Very Churchillian
There is another aspect to all this that is worthy of note. Bishop Emma has been Bishop of Penrith for little more than two years, barely time enough to begin to recognise the clergy and lay leaders of the diocese. Presumably, news of her departure will be as likely to elicit a shrug of the shoulders and the question “Who?” as it is a deep lament at the loss of a much-loved pastor. Does the Church of England no longer care for the stability of pastoral appointments, or is climbing the greasy pole the new path to virtue?
Once upon a time a young cleric came to the attention the King and his courtiers. They were impressed by the cleric’s many outstanding gifts and qualities. “We need this cleric to be close to us” they said, “so that we can benefit from the cleric’s wisdom and diligence, and our mediocrity will be covered”. And so it came to pass that after a spell as a college principal it was judged timely for the young cleric to be empurpled. The see of Penrith was available and into that see the cleric was placed. “After a few months in the… Read more »
Don’t forget that one of Dr. Ineson’s new bosses spent a similarly short amount of time at Durham as she has spent at Penrith.
“Dr Ineson’s move after less than two years says something about the value the politburo places on pastoral episcopal ministry on the ground.” Or perhaps, as happens in other organisations too, there are times when a need arises and a person’s particular gifts fits a role even when the timing is otherwise awkward and admittedly tough on others. “Those who noticed Dr Ineson’s arrival – and most did not … ” Ouch. I have worked with Bishop Ineson in a number of contexts over the years. In an impressive and unassuming ability to make an impact quickly and effectively wherever… Read more »
Will Carlisle, like Hereford, take this opportunity to become a one Bishop diocese?
I’d suggest two bishops and two archdeacons, rather than one and three. It’s going to be a pretty exhausting schedule if the diocesan Bishop is going to visit parish churches for confirmations, licensings, etc. It is a vast and complex area to navigate. Although more centralised services might solve that in an unpopular way. I suppose Hereford have thought all this through, although over a slightly smaller and less mountainous area.
Will her “impressive and unassuming ability” help to ensure that marriage equality for LGBTQ people is halted or delayed?
Two years in most organisations is considered sufficient before promotion.
Is the Church supposed to be like most organisations? In my experience, it takes that long to start developing pastoral relationships and to build trust, things I would have hoped were thought essential in a bishop’s ministry. Conversely, pastors leaving too soon can erode trust, and there are plenty of parishes around which can bear testimony to that.
Can we really equate the church with a bank or manufacturer of goods?
Well done to Emma but seems to demonstrate, whatever the experience is in the parishes, that the corporate CofE has plenty of funding for a salary, removal and housing costs. These efforts to ‘be a simpler, humbler and bolder church’ come at some considerable cost
______________________________________________________________ This small paragraph in Colin Coward’s article about the new appointment in the Church of England says everything about its moral and spiritual implications: “As a signatory of the letter, she (the Rt Revd Dr Emma Ineson, currently Bishop of Penrith) foresees any changes towards the full and equal inclusion of LGBTIQ+ people as leading to the breakdown of the Anglican Communion and trigger a process of division and fragmentation in the Church of England.” As Principal of Trinity College, Bristol (before her consecration as a bishop) Dr. Emma Ineson was a signatory to a letter by ‘a group of conservative… Read more »
Good to know. In the real world that is prejudice but apparently it is acceptable to promote it in the Church of England. It fascinates me that the denomination thinks that it is the custodian of the concept of marriage when equivalent unions were in place way before Christianity emerged. But if you believe in the creation story of Genesis then I suppose that the belief has foundation.