The Bishop of London

The Rt Revd and Rt Hon Dame Sarah Mullally DBE was installed as the 133rd Bishop of London at St Paul’s Cathedral on 12th May.

Bishop Sarah studied first at South Bank University for her BSc followed by a MSc and then at Heythrop College, University of London where she got her MA. She was awarded Honorary Doctorates of Science from Bournemouth University, (2004), University of Wolverhampton (2004) and University of Hertfordshire (2005) and was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2005 for her contribution to nursing and midwifery.

She is a late ordinand who before ordination was Chief Nursing Officer in the Department of Health. She trained for the ministry at the South East Institute for Theologian Education and served her first curacy at Battersea Fields in Southwark Diocese from 2001 to 2006. From 2006 to 2012 she was Team Rector at Sutton in Southwark Diocese. From 2012 to 2015 she was Canon Residentiary and Canon Treasurer at Salisbury Cathedral before taking up her current role in 2015 as Suffragan Bishop of Crediton in the Diocese of Exeter.

Bishop Sarah is married to Eamonn and they have two children. She has continued her interest in the health service having been a non executive director at The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust then at Salisbury NHS Foundation Hospital. She is a member of Council at King’s College London University. She is a novice potter.

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The Diocese of London is presided over by the Bishop of London who is assisted by the Suffragan Bishop of Fulham and four Area Bishops who exercise responsibility on behalf of the Bishop of London in their Areas.

The Bishop of Islington has responsibilities in London and nationally for helping churches establish new worshipping communities. The bishops are assisted in their Areas by Archdeacons.

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St Paul's is the seat of the Bishops of London. The name 'cathedral' comes from the Greek and Latin word cathedra meaning 'chair', as bishops like other authorities in the ancient world sat down to teach. The Bishop's chair in St Paul's is at the south-east end of the quire.

Although the Dean is responsible for the running of the Cathedral, the Bishop is the principal minister there, and he presides and preaches at major Christian festivals and on some other national and civic occasions. The Bishop is the Cathedral's Visitor and appoints many members of the Cathedral Council, as well as licensing its clergy, exercising in these and other ways a care for the well-being of the Cathedral and its work on behalf of the Diocese.

As well as being the Bishop's seat, the Cathedral is a centre for the Bishop to use for his work and mission across the Diocese of London, which covers much of London from Bow in the east to Heathrow in the west, and north to Enfield and Northwood. In the presence or under the authority of the Bishop, clergy for the diocese are ordained at St Paul's, lay ministers are commissioned, and significant mission initiatives are celebrated; and on a smaller scale, parishes come on pilgrimage and are prayed for as part of the Cathedral's daily round of intercessions.

There is more information about the Bishop of London at bishop.london.