The Angican Archdeacon, well known to Goulburn and Taralga parishes, will be consecrated as only the second female Assistant Bishop in the Canberra/Goulburn diocese.

"Who'd have thought?" she quipped this week.

Some 25 years ago, she and husband, Jay, were teaching music to children from mobile classrooms. Blessed with a musical gift, she taught piano, flute, guitar and almost everything in between. By the time they sold the business in the late 1990s, they had 800 students and 23 staff. Parents and children loved it and the cost was half that of other private lessons.

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But the pull towards her faith was proving too strong. She was aged in her 40s with four children when she studied theology.

As Archdeacon Wagner explains, it was a slow burn ignited in her childhood.

Born in South Africa to a South African mother and English father, the family immigrated to Australia in the late 1950s. Even on the ship out she felt a draw to the onboard Sunday School classes.

She grew up at Minnamurra and attended nearby Kiama High School and SCEGGS, Wollongong. A school camp prompted her to become a christian.

"My family background is totally non-religious but somewhere inside me was a 'God thing,'" Archdeacon Wagner said.

She told The Post that if more opportunities had been available to women when she was younger, she would have entered the ministry earlier.

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Despite the circuitous path, Archdeacon Wagner was ordained a deacon at Saint Saviour's Cathedral in 2001 and a priest in 2002. She spent her first three years at Saint Nicholas, North Goulburn, before being appointed to Taralga parish at the end of 2002.

While there, the couple's 21-year-old daughter, Bethany, died of a diabetes-related heart attack. It's an ache she says never goes away. They also have three sons, Joel, now 35, Micah, 29 and Toby, twenty-seven.

At the end of 2005, the family moved to Snowy Mountains/Berridale parish for five years. Over the years, Archdeacon Wagner has served on numerous diocesan committees and boards and has only just resigned as Archdeacon for the South Coast, based at Narooma.

There she worked closely with families affected by the fires, as part of the Disaster Recovery Chaplaincy Network.

"We had 4500 people come through," she said.

"It was intense and the centre couldn't cope in terms of supplying food and water. But the community rallied and supported one another and we got through it. It was like being in a war zone."

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She says ministry, like running a business, can be exhausting but one of the great privileges is being invited into people's lives. In this she finds fulfilment.

Bishop Mark Short appointed her to the Assistant Bishop's role.

As only the second female in the position after Genieve Blackwell, who was appointed in 2012, she described it as "a great privilege and honour."

"It's a good thing," Archdeacon Wagner said.

"I always think a balance of leadership is the best possible outcome because of what each person brings to the table. If women are excluded from leadership, the church misses out."

Since 1991, she said some 50 women have been ordained into the vast diocese.

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The Archdeacon says the church's challenges are a microcosm of broader society. Young people have drifted away from the church, not due to a lack of spirituality but because they're distracted and "eclectic." It was important to make it relevant, she believed.

She also described the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse as a landmark moment.

"It has exposed things and it was long overdue," Archdeacon Wagner said.

"It's been a catharsis and there's a long way to come back but it's been a good thing."

Asked about her approach to the role, she said it was important to be faithful to God, her church leaders and the Commandments.

"The two I hold close are love God with every fibre of your being and love other people. Put people first and if that can inform everyone's ministry, that's a good thing," she said.

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Saturday's service beigins at 11am Saturday at Saint Saviour's Cathedral. Bishop Short will officiate and the Bishop of Newcastle, The Right Reverend Dr Peter Stuart will be chief consecrator. The Assistant Bishop of Adelaide, The Right Reverend Denise Ferguson will be the preacher.

Assistant Bishop Wagner and her husband will live in Canberra, close to two of their sons.

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