Correspondents write:
SHEILA CAMERON was a true influencer of her time, one of a remarkable generation of women in the law, who helped to change attitudes towards women by just “getting on with it” and building a successful legal practice. This was also to be the theme to her ecclesiastical-law career.
Born in Wallington, Surrey, to Scottish parents, Sheila Morgan Clark Cameron graduated in jurisprudence from St Hugh’s College, Oxford, and was called to the Bar in 1957 (one of only 20 women). Her charismatic, intelligent, and persuasive character certainly helped.
In 1958, she won a prestigious Harmsworth Scholarship from Middle Temple to help to fund her pupillage and early practice as a barrister, having been quizzed in the interview, as was conventional at the time, about her love life and intentions.
Sheila built a successful career in ecclesiastical law, commencing with the case Re. St Mary’s, Luton: the issue was whether an extension of the church to provide for vestries, marshalling areas for processions, office, lavatory, and a church hall and kitchen fell within the exception in section 3 of the Disused Burial Grounds Act 1884, which permitted building for the purpose of “enlarging the church”. She succeeded in the case, which has helped to shape so many churches since.
Sheila’s ecclesiastical career was launched, and it was only a matter of three years before she was asked to become Chancellor of the diocese of Chelmsford. When the decision was announced in 1969, the Daily Express front-page headline, above a photograph of Sheila, ran: “Church appoints woman to position of authority!”
Amid all the professional commitments, Sheila married Gerard (Gerry) Ryan, later KC, in 1960, and gave birth to two sons in 1965 and 1967. She returned swiftly to work, juggling the demands of practice and motherhood. Having summoned up the courage to tell her clerk that she was expecting, she was amazed when he replied that he wanted her to come back to work as soon as possible.
In 1983, Sheila became the first woman Vicar-General of the Province of Canterbury, and, thus, a member of the General Synod when the close vote on women’s ordination to the priesthood was taken. Breaking with convention, under which the Vicar-General does not generally vote, she voted in favour of the motion. She remained in post until 2005.
In 1986, Sheila also became chair of the Archbishops’ Group on Women and the Episcopate. Their report was published in 1990. She described this post as one of the most difficult of her entire career, since it proved impossible for the members of the group — who had been selected to represent the divergence of views within the Church on the subject, which they found “painfully divisive” — to reach consensus.
She was the first woman to hold three further posts: Chancellor of the diocese of London (1992), Dean of the Arches Court of Canterbury (2001), and Auditor of the Chancery Court of York (2001). She was, therefore, the senior ecclesiastical judge of the Church of England during that period.
Sheila retired from practice at the Bar in 2001, after 44 years, and as Dean of the Arches in 2009. She was instrumental in securing the progress of the Church towards women’s ordination and consecration, thereby helping to achieve their full participation in the legislatures of Church and State. Her service to the Church and her learning were recognised by Archbishop Carey when he awarded her a Lambeth Doctorate of Civil Laws in 2002. She was appointed CBE in 2004.
Sheila was one of the first group of women who, in 2004, were elected to membership of a hitherto all-male ecclesiastical dining club (founded in 1800), the Club of Nobody’s Friends. This was a membership that Sheila thought important.
In retirement, Sheila continued to influence. She was deeply committed to her local community, and, in 2010, became churchwarden of the tiny Downland church St Mary the Virgin, Bepton. She supported the church and its parishioners over many years, always encouraging regular attendance with her trademark gentle persuasion. She continued to use her legal skills to obtain planning permission for restoration of the ancient tower. She was delighted when granted the Order of St Richard by the Bishop of Chichester in recognition of her service.
Sheila died a few days after her husband, Gerry; a joint funeral will be held in Chichester Cathedral tomorrow. She leaves two sons, Andrew and Nick, and their families, which include five granddaughters and one grandson. She will be greatly missed by many friends, colleagues, and those women who followed her into law, on whom her influence was considerable.
Sheila Cameron died on 2 July, aged 91.
