Dorothy Sanders Wells is the eleventh and current bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Mississippi, elected in February 2024 to succeed Brian R. Seage. She was consecrated on July 20, 2024. She is both the first woman and the first African-American to head the diocese. [1]
Wells is originally from Mobile, Alabama. She was a student of vocal performance at Rhodes College, graduating in 1982. [2] She earned a juris doctor from the University of Memphis, [3] and worked as a lawyer for 18 years prior to her ordination to the priesthood. [1]
She has a master of divinity from the Memphis Theological Seminary, and a doctorate in ministry from the Candler School of Theology at Emory University. [3] She was rector of St. George's Episcopal Church in Germantown, Tennessee since 2013 until becoming bishop. [2] [3]
Church Divinity School of the Pacific (CDSP) is an Episcopal seminary in Berkeley, California. It is one of the nine seminaries in the Episcopal Church and a member of the Graduate Theological Union. The only Episcopal seminary located in the Far West, CDSP has, since 1911, been designated the official seminary of the Episcopal Church's Eighth Province, the Province west of the Rocky Mountains.
Barbara Clementine Harris was an American bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States. She was the first woman consecrated a bishop in the Anglican Communion. She was elected suffragan bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, on September 24, 1988, and was consecrated on February 11, 1989. Eight thousand people attended the service, which was held at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston, Massachusetts. She served in the role of suffragan bishop for 13 years, retiring in 2003.
The Episcopal Diocese of Tennessee is the diocese of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America that covers roughly Middle Tennessee. A single diocese spanned the entire state until 1982, when the Episcopal Diocese of West Tennessee was created; the Diocese of Tennessee was again split in 1985 when the Episcopal Diocese of East Tennessee was formed. It is headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee.
Katharine Jefferts Schori is the former Presiding Bishop and Primate of the Episcopal Church of the United States. Previously elected as the 9th Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Nevada, she was the first woman elected as a primate in the Anglican Communion. Jefferts Schori was elected at the 75th General Convention on June 18, 2006, and invested at Washington National Cathedral on November 4, 2006, and continued until November 1, 2015, when Michael Bruce Curry was invested in the position. She took part in her first General Convention of the Episcopal Church as Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church in July 2009.
Carolyn Tanner Irish was an American bishop. She was the 10th Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Utah. At the time of her election and consecration in 1996 she became the fourth woman in the Episcopal Church to hold the office of bishop.
Carolyn Tyler Guidry, a bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, was the first woman appointed to be a presiding elder in the Fifth Episcopal District of the AME Church and the second woman to become a bishop in the denomination.
The Anglican Diocese of Melbourne is the metropolitan diocese of the Province of Victoria in the Anglican Church of Australia. The diocese was founded from the Diocese of Australia by letters patent of 25 June 1847 and includes the cities of Melbourne and Geelong and also some more rural areas. The cathedral church is St Paul's Cathedral, Melbourne. The current Archbishop of Melbourne since 2006 is Philip Freier, who was translated from the Anglican Diocese of The Northern Territory, and who was the Anglican Primate of Australia from 2014 to 2020.
James Peter Sartain, better known as Peter Sartain, is an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as the fifth archbishop of the Archdiocese of Seattle in Washington State from 2010 to 2019.
The Episcopal Diocese of Mississippi, created in 1826, is the diocese of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America with jurisdiction over the entire state of Mississippi. It is located in Province 4 and its cathedral, St. Andrew's Cathedral, is located in Jackson, as are the diocesan offices.
John McKee "Kee" Sloan is an American prelate who served most recently as the eleventh Bishop of Alabama.
The Philadelphia Eleven are eleven women who were the first women ordained as priests in the Episcopal Church on July 29, 1974, two years before General Convention affirmed and explicitly authorized the ordination of women to the priesthood.
Helen-Ann Macleod Hartley is a British Anglican bishop, Lord Spiritual, and academic. Since 2023, she has served as Bishop of Newcastle in the Church of England. She previously served as Bishop of Waikato in New Zealand from 2014 to 2017, and area Bishop of Ripon in the Diocese of Leeds from 2018 to 2023. She was the first woman to have trained as a priest in the Church of England to join the episcopate, and the third woman to become a bishop of the Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia.
Charles Brinkley Morton was second bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of San Diego.
Diane M. Jardine Bruce is the Bishop Provisional of the Episcopal Diocese of West Missouri. She previously served as the seventh bishop suffragan of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles.
Joanne Caladine Bailey Wells is a British Anglican bishop, theologian, and academic. Since January 2023, she has served at the Anglican Communion Office in London as "Bishop for Episcopal Ministry". Previously, she was a lecturer in the Old Testament and biblical theology at Ridley Hall, Cambridge, and then associate professor of Bible and Ministry at Duke Divinity School, Duke University, North Carolina; From 2013 until 2016, she had served as Chaplain to the Archbishop of Canterbury; she was then Bishop of Dorking, a suffragan bishop in the Diocese of Guildford, 2016–2023.
Alex Dockery Dickson Jr. was an American Anglican bishop. He was first bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of West Tennessee, serving from 1983 to 1994. He was Bishop in Residence in the Anglican Diocese of South Carolina at the Anglican Church in North America in his last years.
William Evan Sanders was an American Episcopalian bishop. He was the eighth bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Tennessee from 1977 to 1985, and first bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of East Tennessee from 1985 to 1992. He was consecrated to the episcopate on April 4, 1962.
Anne Catherine Dyer is a British Anglican bishop, previously an academic administrator.
Phoebe Alison Roaf is an American prelate who is the fourth and current Bishop of West Tennessee.
Cathleen Chittenden Bascom is the tenth and current bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Kansas.