Bishop Burnett was ordained and consecrated Bishop of Nebraska on September 13, 2003. A native Mississippian, he attended public schools, and graduated from Millsaps College in Jackson, Mississippi, with a B.A. in 1970. He later earned an M.Div. and D.Min. Degree from Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University, in Dallas. Drawn to the Episcopal Church during his seminary years, he was confirmed in 1972, and became a postulant and then candidate for holy orders from the diocese of Mississippi. He was ordained deacon in 1974, and priest in 1975. In Mississippi, he served a succession of parishes for twenty-five years before becoming Professor of Pastoral Theology at the School of Theology of the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, in 1999.