Stephen Richard Lowe was, until his retirement in July 2009, the suffraganBishop of Hulme in the Anglican Diocese of Manchester, Link Bishop for Namibia and Chair of the Urban Bishops Panel. From 1988 to 1999 he had served as Archdeacon of Sheffield. In 2006, he was released from all pastoral oversight in the diocese to concentrate on his 2006 appointment as the Church of England's first "Bishop for Urban Life and Faith", charged with the promotion and dissemination of conclusions of the Faithful Cities report.
Political views
In 2004, Lowe in a diocese newsletter commented on the hymn I Vow to Thee, My Country, stating that he would "not sing it", citing as his rationale was his perception of "racist overtones" in the text and his "unease about growing English nationalism". In 2006, Lowe has also defended the Church's review of its shares in Caterpillar Inc. and other companies used in the occupied territories by Israel, and the Church's planned sale of Jacob And His Twelve Sons by Francisco de Zurbarán. In 2008, Lowe voiced support of Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, in the media controversy over Williams' remarks on sharia law, calling the media treatment of Williams "disgraceful" and a "knee-jerk" reaction in interviews on Newsnight and Radio 4 on 8 February and an appearance on Question Time'. In June 2008 a report commissioned by Lowe, Moral, But No Compass – Church, Government and the Future of Welfare, by Francis Davis and Elizabath Paulhus was the lead story in The Times and has subsequently been the subject of two House of Lords debates. In June 2009 his book, What Makes a Good City? Public Theology and the Urban Church, was published by Darton, Longman and Todd.' On 11 February 2017, Lowe was one of fourteen retired bishops to sign an open letter to the then-serving bishops of the Church of England. In an unprecedented move, they expressed their opposition to the House of Bishops' report to General Synod on sexuality, which recommended no change to the Church's canons or practises around sexuality. By 13 February, a serving bishop and nine further retired bishops had added their signatures; on 15 February, the report was rejected by synod.
