Talk about a tough job.

Katharine Jefferts Schori has presided over the Episcopal Church during an extremely tumultuous time.

Some conservative Anglicans have broken away from the Church in protest of the 2003 consecration of New Hampshire Bishop V. Gene Robinson, an openly gay man who lives with his longtime partner. But there have also been rifts about ordaining women.

The Church of England’s ruling body in July voted its support for women to become bishops, which caused further division among Anglicans.

Jefferts Schori faced that division firsthand. She’s the first female bishop in the worldwide Anglican Communion (and a third-generation pilot, by the way), making her the chief pastor to the Episcopal Church’s 2.4 million members in 16 countries. But her 2006 election was met with opposition from at least one diocese, which asked the Archbishop of Canterbury to step in. 

The Washington Post’s Sally Quinn sat down with Jefferts Schori, who said homosexuality is a “gift” and discussed the future and stability of her church. Schori voted to consent to the election of Robinson.

"This is something I’ve been thinking about for 30 years," both as a scientist and as a theologian, Schori said. "This is a reality of creation, not just the human species … For some people to say it’s against the order of creation, it’s a very interesting comment – it doesn’t accord with what we can observe in nature."

She explained that it’s the job of the church to help those in need – no matter who, or what, they are.

"We’ve not really explored as a church until fairly recently how two people of the same gender might live a partnered relationship together in a holy way," she said, adding, there’s "lots of evidence of holy living" around us.

Schori said science has proven that homosexuality is not a choice – as many Christians believe – and that the focus should be more on what to do with the hand you’re given.

"The choice is about how we live, the choice is not about how we were created. The religious question is … what we do with what we’ve been given? How we use the gifts with which we’ve been given?" she asked.

"I think we have to understand that homosexual orientation is a gift, in the same way that we understand heterosexual orientation is a gift. It’s a different kind of gift and it’s going to come with different consequences and opportunities, but it is a gift."

Schori also said the "emotional fervor" within the church over homosexuals and women has died down a bit, and that, "I think, five or ten years from now, we will probably come to a place where we can say, ‘we can agree to disagree.’"