Philadelphia Eleven

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.

In the Episcopal Church in the United States, a member church of the worldwide Anglican Communion, no canon law existed prohibiting the ordination of women as deacons, priests and bishops. However, the custom of ordaining only men was the norm. Women ordained as deacons were subject to a canon law which referred to them as "deaconesses". Although they were understood by themselves and their bishops as being in holy orders, they were treated differently from their male counterparts who were simply called deacons. By custom they were celibate and wore a blue habit-like garb which gave them the appearance of nuns, though they were not nuns. By custom women were denied ordination to the priesthood.

During the first half of the twentieth century women in the Episcopal Church had begun exploring ways to increase their participation in the life of the church. Many women became church workers or directors of religious education. The movement gained explicit momentum in 1970 when laywomen were seated with voice and vote for the first time in General Convention, the bicameral legislative body of the Episcopal Church, and called for a vote to eliminate the canon law on "Deaconesses" so that male and female deacons would be treated equally. In 1965, James Pike, Bishop of California, recognized Phyllis Edwards as a deacon in his diocese. She had been ordained a year earlier under the old canon law using the term "deaconess".

This increased awareness led to the General Convention of 1970 eliminating canonical distinctions between male deacons and female deaconesses, allowing women already ordained to marry for the first time and to discard the old habits. It made clear that women seeking ordination would be recognized as full and equal deacons. The Episcopal Church was then presented with the issue of whether to ordain women as priests and bishops too.

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