First Filipina bishop to be consecrated

The Philippines’ first woman bishop will come from the Aglipayan Church or Iglesia Filipina Independiente (IFI).

The Episcopal News Service said Philippine’s first Christian woman bishop, Emelyn Dacuycuy, was elected to be the bishop of Batac, Ilocos Norte.

Bishop Dacuycuy will be consecrated this Sunday at the Aglipay National Shrine in Batac. together with three other IFI bishops-elect.

Aglipayan Church has 10 million members, the second largest Christian denomination in the Philippines after Catholics. It was founded in 1902 as an offshoot of the revolution from the oppressive Spanish colonization for 300 years.

Unlike the Catholic Church, the Aglipayan Church ordains women.

But it was the first time in 117 years of Aglipayan history that a woman was elected as bishop. The journey is quite challenging for Dacuycuy who had to allay fears that electing a woman bishop might lead to a woman Obispo Maximo, the highest leader.

“Any woman priest aspiring for the position of bishop in a male-dominated council of bishops needs extra strength for the hard struggle. I am very fortunate I have very strong support from my family, and by the grace of God, I am endowed with a very firm principle to stand against stiff opposition and even amidst my own brokenness,” Dacuycuy told the Episcopal News Service.

Aglipayan Church invited foreign dignitaries to watch this historic occasion including two women bishops from Episcopal churches in Kansas and Ohio, two female Filipino-American priests, and the first Filipino woman archdeacon of Micronesia, and the first woman rector of in San Jose, California.