Female Priests in the Episcopal Church

What appears to be a decline in both orders after 1994 more likely reflects a lag in the time that ordinations actually get reported and recorded in The Clerical Directory. The Directory used for making these tallies appeared in electronic form in January of 1998, and it is highly unlikely that it had recorded the many ordinations that often take place in December. Nor does the graph include priests ordained during that period who have since died, because their records are no longer in the Clerical Directory. Click here to see the graph just of women.

See graphs of 2002 data below

In 1973, there were no women priests.  The 1998 Episcopal Clerical Directory contains ordination dates for all but one of 1,955 women priests.  Women now constitute 13.8% of those listed in the 1998 Episcopal Clerical Directory. See the dramatic increase reported in the 2001 edition.

Women Priests in ECUSA's 100 Domestic Dioceses
(left to right in descending order of percent)

NMich	15	41.7%	U	15	26.8%	Roch	29	26.1%	Vt	22	25.9%
EO	8	24.2%	Ida	14	23.7%	Mo	23	22.5%	Ind	24	22.4%
Mass	103	22.1%	Cal	71	21.1%	NC	45	20.7%	ECR	29	20.4%
WK	1	20.4%	WDC	51	20.4%	Nwk	51	20.3%	At	41	20.0%
SD	11	20.0%	Nev	11	19.6%	Ia	17	19.3%	Ak	12	19.0%
Minn	39	18.8%	Mont	9	18.4%	EMich	11	18.3%	Be	19	18.3%
SO	32	17.9%	Ct	66	17.6%	RI	25	17.5%	Del	14	17.3%
WVa	17	17.2%	NwPa	9	17.0%	Va	63	16.5%	NH	17	16.5%
Me	21	16.4%	Mich	37	15.9%	Los	64	15.7%	CPa	16	15.5%
NY	83	15.4%	Md	39	15.4%	CNY	24	15.4%	SwVa	12	15.0%
Wyo	8	14.5%	Spok	9	14.5%	WMich	19	14.5%	Colo	29	14.0%
O	32	14.0%	WMo	13	13.7%	WNY	16	13.7%	ND	3	13.6%
RG	16	13.4%	Oly	31	13.1%	Haw	11	13.1%	Pa	47	12.9%
NCal	17	12.9%	Ky	9	12.9%	NJ	39	12.7%	Mil	13	12.5%
WTenn	8	12.5%	NwT	7	12.3%	USC	16	12.0%	Lex	8	11.9%
Chi	40	11.9%	Ore	18	11.7%	SVa	19	11.6%	Miss	13	11.4%
WNC	13	11.3%	EC	13	11.1%	Tenn	10	11.1%	Kan	10	10.8%
Okla	13	10.7%	Fla	15	10.6%	Ark	8	10.3%	SeFla	15	10.1%
ETenn	10	10.0%	SanD	12	10.0%	NI	6	9.5%	Pgh	12	9.4%
Az	13	9.1%	Tex	27	8.7%	WTex	12	8.3%	Ala	11	7.3%
CGC	7	6.9%	Dal	10	6.6%	Neb	5	6.2%	SwFla	9	5.4%
Spr	3	5.2%	LI	13	4.8%	Ga	5	4.7%	Eas	2	3.7%
WMass	19	3.7%	CFla	6	3.6%	Alb	5	3.0%	WLa	3	3.0%
La	3	2.8%	SC	3	2.5%	FdL	1	1.8%	Eau	0	zero%
FtW	0	zero%	NAM	0	zero%	Q	0	zero%	SJ	0	zero%

See also the the deployment of black women priests by diocese and the deployment of all black priests.

• The entries of 2 women priests did not name their diocese.
• The Dioceses of Quincy and San Joaquin do not recognize the priesthood of women. The Diocese of Eau Claire has held such a view in the past, but a letter which I received on May 22 reviews its current policy:

  While I cannot speak for the other Dioceses involved, as President of the Standing Committee of the Diocese of Eau Claire, I can speak to the current policy in this diocese.

  The Executive Council and the Commission on Ministry of the Diocese have repealed all previous statements on the ordination of women and recognized the authority of the canons of the National Church in this mater. No other policies or canons in the Diocese of Eau Claire exist which would prohibit a women from pursuing ordination to the priesthood in this diocese any more then they would a man. As we are about to elect a new bishop this October, our ordination process for the priesthood has been closed to new aspirants for over a year and will remain closed until our next bishop takes action to open it.

  Thank you for your efforts to report information to the church accurately and fairly. If you have any questions, please contact me.

  Faithfully,

  The Very Rev. Ward H. Simpson, President
  Standing Committee
  Diocese of Eau Claire
  

Women are distributed differently in the three orders of ordained ministry:

These same patterns are reflected in the portion of women in each of the three orders of ordained ministry:

In the 41 episcopal elections of bishops consecrated since 1/1/95, 22 (13.6%) of the 162 runners up were women, so the 2.5% will likely continue to increase.

Only 378 women priests are employed as rectors (9.7% of 3,902 rectors). Women priests are 17.7% of 1,062 vicars.

Women rectors have only one-fourth the share of male rectors in overseeing parishes of 1,000+ members. Only 1.4% of all female rectors now occupy such positions, compared with 5.2% of all male rectors and 4.4% of all black priests. Only five women are rectors of parishes with 1,000 or more members:

1. The Rev. Carol Linda Anderson, R All SS 89-. Beverly Hills, CA Parish Size:1400-1499
2. The Rev. Heather Elizabeth Cook, R S Andr 94-. York, PA Parish Size:1200-1299
3. The Rev. Margaret B Gunness, R Chr 91-. Ridgewood, NJ Parish Size:1500-1599
4. The Rev. Brenda Gail Husson, R S Jas 96-. New York, NY Parish Size:1800-1899
5. The Rev. Rosemary Pickering Thomas, Abilene, TX Parish Size:1100-1199

Click on any image to see it in its original size

Jane Dixon Retired Bishop Suffragan of Washington.	Carol Gallagher Assistant Bishop of Newark.	Barbara Harris Bishop Retired Suffragan of Massachusetts.
Gayle E. Harris Bishop Suffragan of Massachusetts.	Carolyn Irish Bishop of Utah.	Katharine Jefferts Schori Bishop of Nevada.
Chilton Knudsen Bishop of Maine.	Mary Adelia McLeod Retired Bishop of Vermont.	Bavi 'Nedi' Rivera Bishop Suffragan-Elect of Olympia.
Catherine S. Roskam Bishop Suffragan of New York.	Catherine (Cate) Waynick Bishop of Indianapolis.	Geralyn Wolf Bishop of Rhode Island.

Three more women are bishops in the Anglican Commmunion outside the USA

1. Rt. Rev. Penelope Jamieson, Bishop of Dunedin, New Zealand
2. Rt. Rev. Victoria Matthews, Bishop of Edmonton, Canada
3. Rt. Rev. Ann Tottenham, Bishop Suffragan of Toronto (Credit Valley), Canada

Eleven Women Bishops at the Lambeth 1998 Conference
Photo by ENS

Women deployed as rectors have the smallest average congregation of any subgroup that I have monitored:

I have not computed averages of congregations overseen by vicars, priest-in-charge....., but those congregations are included in "All Congregations." To compute "All congregations" I divided the total number of confirmed communicants (1,592,653) by the total number of parishes (7,395) -- a reported in the 1998 Episcopal Church Annual. and I will continue to add new information to this report.

It seems like the same ole patriarchy to me.

Women priests are on average ten years younger than male priests, (51.74 vs. 60.73). That is in large measure the result of the larger pool of retired clergy males. Women have not been ordained long enough to comprise a proportionate share of the elderly clergy.

Although the average woman priest is younger than the average male, women priests were older upon ordination, 41.82 vs. 32.63 for the males. Also, women priests took an average of 1.22 years to move from the diaconate to priesthood, compared with only .89 of a year for male priests.

The data suggest that women have to jump higher to get less far.

I would appreciate notice if you wish to be added to my lists as well, lcrew@newark.rutgers.edu

Added on September 9, 2002

Thanks very much to Dr. Matthew Price of Church Publishing for providing the data on which these three graphs are based. Ordinations often are not reported promptly; hence, the numbers for 1999 and 2000 are likely to increase in later reports. All data reported is for priests, but the dates are for their diaconal ordination. That is why you will see some female ordinations before 1974, the year the first 11 women were ordained as priests in Philadelphia.

Note: The 2001 Electronic Clerical Directory includes 3,481 women (20.34%) of the 17,118 listed. That includes deacons, and I know no way to exclude them in searching the database.

Visit
• Female Priests in the Anglican Communion
• Marge Christie's Tallies of Women's Ordination in the Anglican Communion
• Current bishop elections/retirements. Started on 7/2/98.
• Quean Lutibelle's 1998 Report on ECUSA Clergy http://newark.rutgers.edu/~lcrew/priests98.html
• Louie Crew's Anglican Pages, http://newark.rutgers.edu/~lcrew/rel.html.

• Write to lcrew@newark.rutgers.edu

  

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