32. Humility and Collegiality: Archbishop of Canterbury, Sarah Mullally
by Graham Kings
Date added: 15/06/2026
Humility and Collegiality: Archbishop of Canterbury, Sarah Mullally
by Graham Kings
God bless our merry England,
God bless our Church and Queen,
God bless our great Archbishop,
The best there’s ever been.
(Edward Plumptre, 1864).
This verse was in the manuscript version of Edward Plumptre’s hymn, ‘Thy hand, O God, has guided’, which was the opening processional hymn of the Installation of the new Archbishop of Canterbury on 25 March 2026.Footnote1 Thankfully, the editors of Hymns Ancient and Modern, in 1889, refused to include that verse. It is not recorded whether the cause of this omission was their view of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Archibald Tait, or their reticence to imply that each new archbishop would have to improve on the last (Dudley-Smith, Citation2017, p. 136).
The Most Revd and Rt. Hon. Dame Sarah Mullally, the new Archbishop of Canterbury, in post since her Confirmation of Election on 28 January 2026, would, no doubt, have been grateful to those editors. Previously, she served as Bishop of London, Bishop of Crediton in the Diocese of Exeter, Canon Treasurer of Salisbury Cathedral (when I came to know her, while Bishop of Sherborne) and Team Rector of Sutton. Richard Chartres, her eminent predecessor as Bishop of London, employed a chauffeur: she used a folding Brompton bike (Atherstone, Citation2026, p. 120).
Archbishop Sarah was born in Woking in 1962, and was educated at Winston Churchill Comprehensive School, Woking Sixth Form College, and South Bank Polytechnic College (BSc, 1982, and MSc, 1994). She has pointed out that she has not had a private education, nor an Oxbridge background, and has had to learn to cope with dyslexia. She gained a Diploma in Theology in 2001 (University of Kent) and Masters in Pastoral Theology in 2006 (University of London). She was made a Dame Commander of the British Empire in 2005, for services to nursing and midwifery. She is the 106th Archbishop of Canterbury since 597 AD, and the first woman to be installed on the Chair of St. Augustine,Footnote2 the seat of authority, from the Latin sedes. One wit has suggested that bishops be ‘sedated’ rather than ‘installed’. Prior the ‘Inauguration of Ministry’ of her predecessor, Justin Welby, in 2013, Bishops and Archbishops were ‘enthroned’.
Sarah Mullally’s installation was a service of great joy and celebration. It included questions from young people at her entrance, vibrant African Gospel Acclamations in song and movement, and radiant smiles from the Archbishop.
Their Royal Highnesses, The Prince and Princess of Wales, together with the Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, attended. Earlier in March, Prince William revealed through a spokesperson his ‘quiet faith’ and ‘commitment to the Church of England’ (Nikkhah, Citation2026). Amongst the congregation of 2,000 were people from charities, community groups and schools. Thirty-two provinces of the Anglican Communion were represented (out of a total of 42) and 26 Primates (Archbishops and Presiding Bishops) were present. The sheer range of ecumenical attendance was exceptional, including representatives from the Holy See, the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the Coptic Orthodox Church, and all major Christian denominations. Interfaith leaders were also present. That evening, I heard her vividly address the Nikaean Club dinner for ecumenical relations at the University of Kent. The other main speaker, significantly, was His Eminence Archbishop Nikitas, the Greek Orthodox Archbishop of Thyateira and Great Britain.
At the installation service two items of jewellery were noticeable. Archbishop’s Sarah’s cope was fastened with a memorable clasp. It signified her service as a nurse. Her father had commissioned her nurse’s belt-buckle in the 1980s and it was refashioned as the morse (the traditional name for the clasp of the cope). The episcopal ring she wore she inherited as Archbishop: it is kept at Lambeth Palace. Sixty years previously, on 24 March 1966, it had been given to Archbishop Michael Ramsey, in a surprise gesture of theological symbolism, by Pope Paul VI, after an historic service at St Paul’s-outside-the-Walls, Rome. It had been the Pope’s ring when he was Cardinal Archbishop of Milan.
Archbishop Sarah’s sermon at the installation service expounded the Gospel passage about the Annunciation to Mary, celebrated annually on 25 March. It began with her recounting her own pilgrimage with her husband, Eamonn, and a small group of friends:
Over the last week I have walked the ancient pilgrim path from St Paul’s Cathedral in London to Canterbury Cathedral. Each day my heart and spirits were lifted immeasurably by the people young and old we encountered, even though my aching feet and limbs tell a different story!
She concluded with a sensitive, evangelistic and vocational call:
Maybe as you are listening to me, you are thinking about your own journey. Perhaps it’s smooth, perhaps it’s hard. Knowing God is with you on the journey makes all the difference. I encourage you to visit a church — for a quiet prayer or for a conversation. If you want to talk, you will be heard. And you can respond to God’s invitation with words as simple as the words of Mary: ‘Here I am’.
On the day after the installation, I sat for an hour by the Chair of St Augustine, praying for Archbishop Sarah, and giving thanks for all her predecessors.Footnote3 The Dean of Canterbury, The Most Revd David Monteith, came and sat next to me and commented how easily she related to people whom she met on the walk. The BBC engineers were clearing up around us. David was delighted that the BBC, with significant encouragement from the Church of England, broadcast the whole service throughout the world.
During an in-depth interview with the editor of The Church Times, Sarah Meyrick (Citation2026), on 9 April 2026, Archbishop Sarah mentioned:
What I want to offer is a consistency: a calm, non-anxious leadership. I see myself as a shepherd, as somebody who supports and provides pastoral care.Footnote4
She is not afraid of being vulnerable in public. I remember, in particular, the moving moment in the February 2025 General Synod when she was Bishop of London. Premier Christian News reported her words and added a comment:
‘I would love to encourage women, which I do all the time, but there continues to be institutional barriers, we continue to experience micro-aggressions’.Footnote5 The bishop who had tried to fight back the tears, was then overcome with emotion and turned away from the podium. She was met with applause from Synod members, with some giving her a standing ovation (Birrell, Citation2025).
She then gestured to the members to sit down, with humour and realism:
‘You’re using up my time! And people will say that I have manipulated you, I have not …’
The Archbishop took her pilgrimage from London to Canterbury on to Rome over four days in April. She had attended the funeral of Pope Francis II, because she and Eamonn had been walking the last 100kms of the Via Francigena, from Montefiascone to Rome.Footnote6 She met Pope Leo XIV on 27 April 2026 and prayed with him in the chapel of Urban VIII.Footnote7 After her private audience, she presented him with an antique edition (1910) of The Dream of Gerontius by Saint John Henry Newman, a Peruvian devotional work of art, and a pot of Lambeth Palace honey: she and Eamonn are beekeepers. I wonder if they also discussed music? She plays the French horn and he plays the piano … Archbishop Sarah addressed the Pope:
Your Holiness, you have spoken powerfully about the many injustices in our world today, but you have spoken even more powerfully about hope. Your pilgrimage to Africa was full of life and joy.
The Pope recalled Pope Paul VI and Archbishop Michael Ramsey seeking ‘the restoration of complete communion in faith and sacramental life’ and added:
While much progress has been made on some historically divisive issues, new problems have arisen in recent decades, rendering the pathway to full communion more difficult to discern. I know that the Anglican Communion is also facing many of these same questions at this time. Nevertheless, we must not allow these continuing challenges to prevent us from using every possible opportunity to proclaim Christ to the world together.Footnote8
In my article for Churches Together in England about Archbishop Sarah, I concluded:
If we look back at the last three Popes and Archbishops of Canterbury, perhaps we may trace a pattern of personalities: Benedict and Rowan were renowned theologians; Francis and Justin were mission activists; and now Leo and Sarah are quiet servant-leaders (Kings, Citation2026).
There will be many challenges (Wyatt, Citation2026). The unity of the Anglican Communion is important throughout the world, including in the Commonwealth of Nations, where between 85% − 90% of its members reside. Currently it is fragile, but resilient. A key moment will be in June 2026 in Belfast, when the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) meet to discuss the ‘Nairobi-Cairo Proposals’.Footnote9 Amongst other matters, these propose that Provinces in the Anglican Communion would no longer be defined supremely as ‘in communion with the see of Canterbury’ but rather one of their many characteristics would be simply having an ‘historic connection’ with the see.Footnote10 There has been some recent trenchant questioning of these proposals and also responses to these criticisms (Avis, Citation2026; Goddard, Citation2025, Citation2026).
May this trailblazer of an Archbishop preside at the ACC, and throughout her six years in office (before she retires at the age of 70), with her customary aplomb, humility, collegiality, transparency and kindness.
Notes
1. https://www.anglicancommunion.org/installation-of-the-archbishop-of-canterbury/
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chair_of_St_Augustine
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_archbishops_of_Canterbury
5. Atherstone mentions ‘misogyny’, ‘regular abuse’ on social media, ‘hate mail and even death threats’ against her. Archbishop Sarah Mullally, pp. 125–6 and 131.
6. Atherstone notes her delight in regular long-distance walks including: part of the Camino Trail in northern Spain (2011), 188kms in nine days; part of the Via Francigena, from Switzerland to Italy over the Alps (2017); and part of that same walk from Canterbury to Tournehem-sur-la Hem, northern France (2023). Archbishop Sarah Mullally, pp.151–2.
7. https://www.archbishopofcanterbury.org/news/archbishop-canterbury-meets-and-prays-pope-leo-xiv
8. https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2026-04/pope-leo-xiv-audience-archbishop-sarah-mullally.html
9. The Nairobi-Cairo Proposals, Anglican Communion Office, paras 76–81 and Appendix. https://www.anglicancommunion.org/the-nairobi-cairo-proposals/ The paper makes recommendations for updating how the Anglican Communion describes itself and encourages a ‘maximal sharing in leadership’.
10. See Andrew Goddard’s helpful article, ‘The Nairobi-Cairo Proposals in Context’, Covenant 13 February 2025.
References
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