She secured the necessary two-thirds majority vote from members of the Electoral College on the last day of its meeting at Newport Cathedral.

The announcement was made by the Archbishop of Wales, John Davies, President of the Electoral College.

He said, "I am looking forward enormously to working with Cherry. She has a huge amount that she will be able to contribute to the life, not only to the Diocese of Monmouth, but also to the Church in Wales.

"One area I know is very close to her heart is the church's ministry in post-industrial areas where community life, and church life in particular perhaps, has suffered enormously. The diocese, a little while ago, appointed a new archdeacon with responsibility for those areas, but having a bishop with great experience of them will be a huge morale boost for them."

Bishop Elect Vann said the challenges facing churches in south-east Wales were the same as those in the north-west of England. She said, "The towns around Manchester, Oldham, Rochdale and Ashton are significantly challenged, both economically and in terms of church life. We've done some statistics, and a very, very small percentage of the population are going to our churches. This is something that we have been working hard to address in the Manchester area and I look forward to bringing some of the wisdom and knowledge I've gained from there to Newport and the Diocese of Monmouth.

Originally from Leicestershire, Bishop Elect Vann has served as Archdeacon of Rochdale, in the Diocese of Manchester, for the past 11 years. She trained for ministry at Westcott House, Cambridge, and was ordained as a deacon in 1989. Among the first women to be ordained as a priest in the Church of England in 1994, she has spent her entire ministry so far in the Diocese of Manchester, in Flixton, Bolton and Farnworth. She is also an honorary canon of Manchester Cathedral and a former chaplain to deaf people.

A talented pianist, Ms. Vann is both an Associate of the Royal College of Music (ARCM) and a Graduate of the Royal Schools of Music. She conducts the Bolton Chamber Orchestra.

AncientBriton blogger noted that holiness had been lost in this selection of bishop. He observed that an element of holiness based on biblical guidance of the qualities are needed to be a bishop. "Merit and holiness has nothing to do with the election of bishops in the Church in Wales. This is a political process. There are 23 clergy electors in the electoral synod. All but 7 are bishops, archdeacons and deans and you need to have a two-thirds vote so what this means is that the establishment by the way they pack the Electoral College is able to select those people whom they wish to put forward as bishop... Barry Morgan the former archbishop has been pushing for this outcome. Pushing for women clergy, pushing for women bishops, pushing for the normalization of homosexuality.

"Members of the Archbishop's Council tell me that Archdeacon Vann is a complete nonentity, not as a person but in her role in the substantive debates within the Archbishop's Council. In other words, she is not someone who has ideas, is a mover or a shaker, who people when we come to an issue, they look at her and think: What does she have to say? She is just another grey face at a long grey table. She is a committee person; she sits on the dais at General Synod and in 10 years has made no meaningful contribution whatsoever.

"Within the diocese where she is archdeacon she has made life miserable for conservative evangelicals, I'm told, through a passive, aggressive approach to things. In other words, she is not a warrior for this cause, she is just an apparatchik. And so now we have another mediocrity who has a good CV of positions but no actual real holiness or merit or intellect or heft...

"On the face of it the appointment of Cherry Vann is entirely political. Llandaff boasts the first transgender priest. Now the bench can pride themselves on appointing the first female bishop with a same sex partner. She is also an interfaith enthusiast supporting the removal of church pews to allow Muslim events in church."

You can read AncientBriton's blog here: https://ancientbritonpetros.blogspot.com/2019/09/holiness-lost-in-church-in-wales.html

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