From Seattle-The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, shattering a glass ceiling, has elected the Rt. Rev. Elizabeth Eaton as the first woman to serve as presiding bishop of the 4-million-member denomination.
Eaton defeated incumbent Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson at the ECLA Churchwide Assembly in Pittsburgh. Hanson had been in office for 12 years, presiding over such difficult decisions as allowing partnered gays to serve as clergy in the church.
Eaton has been ECLA bishop of Cleveland. She is a graduate of the Harvard Divinity School and is married to an Episcopal priest. The ECLA and the Episcopal Church are in full communion and at times share ministries.
“We are a church that is overwhelmingly European in a culture increasingly pluralistic. We need to welcome the gifts of those who come from different places; that is a conversation we need to have as a church,” Eaton told the Churchwide Assembly, according to the Religion News Service.
The ECPA has 9,638 congregations but has lost substantial membership in recent years. The decision to allow partnered gay clergy caused a split by conservatives, who have formed the North American Lutheran Church.
The Episcopal Church has experienced similar difficulties since election of the Rt. Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori in 2006 as its first female presiding bishop.
More here-
http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattlepolitics/2013/08/14/lutherans-shatter-glass-ceiling-first-woman-presiding-bishop/
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