On Monday, The Church of England made the decision at the general synod in York where the House of Bishops voted 41 to 6 in favor of "the process for removing the legal obstacles to the ordination of women in the episcopate." The move has threatened to further divide the global Anglican Church.

The Church of England has permitted the ordination of woman as priests since 1994, yet the decision also prompted hundreds of conservative priests to leave. The opposing bishops to the new decision claimed that the ordination of woman would bring greater migration among bishops in protest.

Bishop Tome Bulter of Southward, who proposed the motion, said "good ecclesiological and theological reasons why women should now be able to be ordained bishop."

"There are many hurdles ahead, and we will gradually discover whether there is sufficient consensus in our church," Bishop Butler said.

Since the ordination of openly gay bishop Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, the split within the Anglican Communion was widened, and especially as Anglicans in Africa and other parts of the developing world spoke in protest against the morality United States and Europe.

"There continues to be serious disagreement within the Church of England," said Bishop John Hind of Chichester, the leader of the opposition toward woman ordination. "It reveals deeper disagreements about how we do theology and agree doctrine."

The decision will likely take up to four years to enact. This will also bring the Church of England into the same stature with the Episcopal Church in United States and 13 of the 38 member churches of the Anglican Communion.