Two churches have announced that their representatives are not to attend the ordination of Irja Askola, Finland's first female bishop, as the bishop of Helsinki, Finnish Christian newspaper Kotimaa reported on Friday.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Latvia and the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Ingria in Russia have decided not to attend the ceremony.

The Latvian church has stopped ordaining new female priests, while women do not work as priest within the Church of Ingria.

Guntars Dimants, the bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Latvia, denies that the church is boycotting the ordination due to the gender of the bishop in question. According to Dimants, the church's representatives simply do not have time to attend the event.

The Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Ingria in Russia did not want to comment on the matter.

STT