The Church of England (CofE) has upheld its ruling that calling a transgender priest a ‘bloke’ and a ‘fella’ is not offensive.
The decision came after months of investigation into the Revd Brett Murphy, who was put under a Clergy Discipline Measure (CDM) for allegedly ‘misgendering’ Rachel Mann, the first transgender archdeacon.
Murphy, 38, made the comments in June 2023 on his Anglican video blog after Mann was announced as the Archdeacon for Bolton and Salford.
He told his 14,000+ subscribers that ‘The Rev. Rachel Mann is in fact, biologically, a bloke, who identifies and lives as a woman’, and questioned whether the new appointment was ‘positioning’ Revd Mann to become the CofE’s first transsexual bishop.
