LONDON (AP) Anglicans in Wales have approved the consecration of female bishops a move that adds more pressure on the Anglican Communion's more conservative branches to open the church's upper ranks to women.
The issue of whether to accept female bishops has long divided the Anglican Communion, a Christian denomination that claims more than 80 million adherents worldwide.
The Church in Wales said in a statement Thursday that its governing body approved the motion by a vote of more than 100 to 24 after a "passionate debate" at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David in the town of Lampeter.
The U.S. branch of the communion, the Episcopal Church, was the first to have a woman bishop in 1989.
