Swiftly adding that the Church of England was his "spiritual home", he said that he was not intending a veiled threat to leave, but wanted to work from within the Church to resolve the problems between the different factions.

"I see it as my vocation to pray and work hard for it to continue to be a spiritual home for England," he said.

Dr Sentamu spoke to The Times just hours after he and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, suffered a humiliating defeatat the General Synod, when a proposal to create a "Church within a Church" for opponents of women bishops was thrown out. The meeting in York voted narrowly against a proposal by the two archbishops to create a new type of bishop to care for opponents of women's ordination when women are consecrated bishops.

Critics said that the archbishops' plans would have created a parallel jurisdiction and fatally undermined the oversight of women bishops. Some women would have refused to become bishops had their ministry been so compromised, the synod heard.

For the rest of the article click here: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/faith/article2639545.ece