The ordination of Dr. Arnold Hollis as Bermuda's first black Anglican minister broke a racial glass ceiling in the 1950s. Now, more than 50 years later his daughter Joanna is uniquely poised to break yet another glass ceiling of the local Anglican Church.

Last month the Synod of the Anglican Church of Bermuda voted in favour of the ordination of women. The landmark decision came just four days after Ms Hollis became Rev. Hollis as she was ordained a Deacon in a US Episcopal church. She is expected to be ordained as a minister in the autumn.

But Rev. Joanna Hollis said she has no plans to seek a position locally in the next few years. She is the youngest of three daughters of the Ven. Dr. Arnold Hollis, Archdeacon Emeritus of Bermuda and Rector of St. James Church in Sandys and his wife Janice Hollis.

Joanna Hollis went to the US for a three-year course of study to the priesthood despite the field being completely closed to women in Bermuda. This May she graduated with a Master of Divinity Degree from the Church Divinity School of the Pacific, Berkeley Campus, California and on June 6 she was ordained as a Deacon at Trinity Cathedral, San Jose California.

A few days later, in its June meeting, the Synod of the Anglican Church of Bermuda voted in favour of allowing the ordination of women.

Rev. Hollis described the decision as "absolutely wonderful!" but added that she has no intention of applying for current vacancies in Bermuda.

Asked why she decided to pursue a career where she had no job prospects at home, Rev. Hollis said: "God calls us in God's own time. My decision to follow in this path was not contingent upon where the Diocese of Bermuda stood on the issue of women's ordination. In fact, I remember telling my parents when I was very young that I wanted to be a priest, and neither of them ever said that I couldn't!

"As a young adult I decided to pursue another path, but God had other plans! I was, however, very saddened that I could not go through the ordination process in Bermuda."

Rev. Hollis explained that although she still has to be ordained into the priesthood, that it would not take place in Bermuda.

"My ordination to the priesthood will be determined by my bishop, the Rt. Rev. Mary Gray-Reeves. It will either be back at Trinity Cathedral or at/near the location of my first call," she said.

Back in 1956 her father, Dr. Hollis, was the first black Bermudian sponsored by the Anglican diocese in Bermuda for Holy Orders.

A fighter for tearing down walls of segregation, Dr. Hollis said he'd always advocated that women be given full rights in the church at all levels.

"It is such a thrill to realise that we have gotten this far in our interaction with each other," he said of the June decision to allow women to be ordained.

"Even before I realised that my daughter had this leaning to serving God and his church, I had always been a proponent of women being more visible in the church and I paid a penalty. I suffered rejection by the Church because of that," he added.

Although the decision has been widely embraced, for many in the local diocese it comes very late – some 30 years after the US and 16 years after Britain. Asked if he was anxious for his daughter to practice at home in Bermuda, Dr. Hollis said: "I am hopeful that one day she will consider coming home but I think the Church here has a great deal of maturing to do in order to project positive ministry.

"She herself has acquired by her own discipline, excellent skills in ministry. I can perceive them and that pleases me well. Her Bishop saw it and it is pleasing her well," he added.

A top student at Divinity School, Rev. Hollis was one of 12 women on the ordination track compared with eight men.

"All of my classmates – both men and women – were surprised that the Anglican Church of Bermuda did not allow the ordination of women," she said. "However, they were not at all surprised that I was in the ordination process."

An outstanding student, Rev. Hollis has secured a full scholarship to attend St. George's College in Jerusalem. She plans to go next year for a two-week program. For the moment, she said she is still discerning her first call. "It is – as always – in God's hands," she said.

Among her duties will be to help choose the new Dean at her College. Dr. Hollis said his daughter became the ombudsman for her classmates. "When she thought her role was over they asked her to sit on the church committee to choose the next Dean of the Seminary," he said.

"She had worked in the Office of the Seminary and apparently she so pulled together that area of the office that the lady in charge was astonished at her ability to be organised," he added.

And he agreed that his daughter is exceptional.

"Looking at her objectively, not so much as her dad but as a priest, I do believe that she has great leadership potential," he said.

And his praise appears to be fully warranted. The Divinity degree is Rev. Hollis' fourth degree. In addition she holds a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology and in Japanese from Connecticut College, as well as a Master of Arts in Teaching a Foreign Language from Monterey Institute of International Studies.

She said pursuing study in aa career she might not have been able to practice in Bermuda was not unsettling to her.

"My first career as a Japanese language teacher was something from which I knew that I could not make a life for myself in Bermuda," she said. "I knew that I would be able to find work in other places. The same goes for my answering the call to the ordained ministry. God always finds a way."

And she noted too that she had no plans to obtain her degree then fight for the rights of women here at home to join the ministry.

"It had not been my intention. However, I had thought that the reality of my ordination would cause some awareness around the issue of women's ordination," she said. "I believe that it has."

And while she's not looking to return to Bermuda in the near future she said she's also never seriously considered the option of taking over from her father when he retires from St. James Church.

Her father wondered if he could have "such a fantasy as a likelihood of that" and said: "I would love to live long enough just to see how she develops and where she goes but I am grateful for what I have already seen."