Updated 17 June 2021 – This Synod meeting will now be held online. Details and a revised timetable are in my post here.
The timetable for July’s meeting of the Church of England General Synod in London was published today, and is copied below.
Synod members have been sent a copy of the timetable with the following attached note.
Please see attached an outline Synod timetable for July 2021, which has been agreed by the Business Committee for a physical meeting of the General Synod in Church House, Westminster in the expectation that no legal restrictions would in place at the time (in line with the anticipated Government Covid-19 plans as per COVID-19 Response – Spring 2021 (Summary) – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)). The Committee has further decided that a hybrid session of Synod will not be practically possible in July though is open to the possibility in the future (should resources be in place to enable it).
GENERAL SYNOD: JULY 2021 OUTLINE TIMETABLE
Friday 9 July
12.30 pm – 7.15 pm
12.30 pm Opening worship
Introduction and welcomes
Presidential Address
Business Committee Report
Racial Justice Commission – presentation
Implementing the Recommendations of “Responsible Representation” (GS 2202)
Climate Change presentation
Appointment of Body to oversee next stage of Anglican-Methodist Covenant
*6.00 pm Question Time
7.15 pm Close of Business
Saturday 10 July
9.00 am – 12.45 pm
9.00 am Opening worship and Bible Study
Joint Presentation by the Archbishops’ Council and the Church Commissioners on their Annual Reports
2022 Archbishops’ Council Budget and Apportionment
Leeds DSM: Wealth Gap
2.00 pm – 5.20 pm
2.00 pm 57th Standing Orders Committee Report (synodical processes for legislative business etc.)
Bereavement and Funerals during the Pandemic – Presentation
4.00 pm (approx.) Adjournment
*5.00 pm Living in Love and Faith: Passing the baton presentation
Informal items not forming part of the Agenda
4.00 pm – 5.00 pm Discussion panel – Clergy Discipline and the Nature of Ordained Public Ministry
5.30 pm – 7.00 pm Living in Love and Faith Group work, including closing worship
Sunday 11 July
2.00 pm – 7.15 pm
2.00 pm Opening worship
Special Agenda I: Draft Legislative Reform (Church Commissioners) Order
Safeguarding report
Appointments:
• Chair of AC Finance Committee
• AC’s Auditors
Mutuality in Finance
Responding to the Housing Crisis: What is the role of the Church?
7.15 pm Close of Business
Monday 12 July
9.00 am – 1.00 pm
9.00 am Opening worship
Special Agenda I: Draft Ecclesiastical Offices (Terms of Service) (Amendment) Regulations 2021
Special Agenda I: Church Representation Rules (Amendment) Resolution 2021
Vision and Strategy
Transforming Effectiveness
2.00 pm – 7.15 pm
2.00 pm Report from the Implementation and Dialogue Group
PMM: The Five Guiding Principles
The Nature of Ordained Public Ministry – presentation
Proposals for legislation to replace the Clergy Discipline Measure 2003
Special Agenda I: Approval of form of electronic service register under Canon F 12
Special Agenda I: Diocesan Boards of Education Measure 2021 (consequential amendment to regulations under Canon B12) Regulations
7.15 pm Close of Business
Tuesday 13 July
9.00 am – 12.30 pm
9.00 am Opening Worship
Report of the Review of Clergy Remuneration
A review of the Mission and Pastoral Measure 2011
Amendments to Standing Orders for elections to CNC
1.45 pm – 4.15 pm
1.45 pm Special Agenda I: Vacancy in See Committees (Amendment) Regulation 2021
Farewells
*3.15pm Service of Holy Communion
*4.15pm Prorogation and Dissolution
Deemed Business:
Church of England Funded Pension Scheme Rules 2021,
Legal Officers (Annual Fees) Order 2021,
Ecclesiastical Judges, Legal Officers and Others (Fees) Order 2021,
and some amendments to the Standing Orders
* not later than
Deadline for receipt of questions: 1200 hrs Tuesday 29 June
Something that stands out for me here as an American Episcopalian, and probably highlights a bit of the difference of how we see ourselves compared to the CofE, is in the terms for worship at a formal leadership gathering like this. In the Episcopal Church in the US you would see terms like “Morning Prayer,” “Evening Prayer,” “Compline” and “Holy Eucharist,” at a formal leadership convention. (Though there is always a bit of experimental worship at GC and in some diocesan conventions, the norm at formal gatherings remains what is in our BCP.) With periods called “opening worship,” “bible study,”… Read more »
That’s interesting. I attended the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada in 1998 and 2001 and my memory is that we had Bible study after Morning Prayer every morning.
I get your point Dennis. Only in the final segment are the words ‘Holy Communion’ mentioned. The traditional concept of a Daily Eucharist seems to have gone out of the window under the present regime. Sad -especially when this is the special worship where Christ has guaranteed He will be Present in Person.
(“Do This to Remember Me!”)
There is always a Eucharist while Synod meets. It is not mentioned in the actual agenda as it is separate but is always in the info provided.
Graeme Buttery
Hi Ron. Christ has actually promised us his presence in quite a few places. Three come to mind: ‘Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them’ (which in context isn’t just about worship services but church meetings too). ‘I am with you always, to the end of the age’ (i.e. when you go out to make new disciples, I will be with you). ‘Whenever you do it for one of the least of these who are members of my family, you do it for me’ (Christs presence in the poor and… Read more »
During lockdown I’ve enjoyed on-line services from parishes such as St Agnes, Bahamas, enjoying the superb liturgy, dignified worship and stirring preaching. It reminds me of the CofE before the protestant, happy clappy take-over and its embracing of mediocrity. I’m sure our Anglican brethren in the Bahamas would find today’s CofE unrecognisable. Sevices in TEC also make the English Church look embarrassingly cringe – worthy.
I’m with the psalmist – clap your hands and shout unto God. I guess all those years of reciting the daily office have turned me into a rabid Pentecostal.
There are many CofE parishes today, Tim, where the main service consists of “shouting and clapping”, with no Anglican content. It’s fine if people wish to be evangelical protestants. Why don’t they join a non-Anglican denomination with no Anglican content?
So it’s okay to recite the psalms, but not to copy the kind of worship described in the psalms?
What is specifically Anglican about that? Westboro Baptist Church claps and shouts. Presumably that makes it “biblical”.
Nice of you to group me in with Westboro Baptist.
I’m not. I’m asking why so many CofE parishes “shout and clap” at their main Sunday services without any Anglican content. Why do they remain ‘Anglican’ when clearly they’re not?
Perhaps they think that what constitutes ‘Anglican content’ is evolving – as it always has. After all, much of what passes for bog-standard Anglicanism these days would have been labelled categorically as ‘papist’ two hundred years ago.
It’s a pity, then, Anglicanism has evolved into non-denominational, conservative evangelicalism and has nothing distinctive to offer.
Indeed! It was not only a matter of vestments or candles which could land the clergy in hot water. Any deviation from the prescribed liturgy – such as extempore prayers – could cause trouble for an incumbent, and might even result in deprivation in certain circumstances. That meant the sermon was the only place in the liturgy where the clergy could show any individuality, but anything not rigidly in accordance with the Articles could also result in trouble. Clergy exercised by the need to preserve their freehold tenures and incomes naturally stuck closely to the BCP script and rubric. Then,… Read more »
The church where I was, until last Sunday, an occasional assistant organist has it right, in my view, partly from choice and partly due to availability of clergy. Holy Communion with sung hymns (but not a service setting) on the first Sunday of the month, all others a full unabridged service of BCP Matins in which the congregation happily and successfully joins in singing the psalms and canticles, and an occasional Evensong. (A hobby-horse of mine, I realise, but people miss so much by abandoning the traditional liturgy with psalms and the beautiful morning and evening canticles: Magnificat and Benedictus… Read more »
I wonder if Roman Catholics who attend mass weekly (or daily) see themselves as devaluing the Sacrament.
Many thanks, and my words were ill chosen. You are entirely right about the RCC. My own personal preference is for BCP matins and evensong (and I have sympathy for Mr Wateridge’s remarks), but it is only a mild preference of mine. I was brought up with ASB communions, save on one Sunday of the month, and I am afraid that I found them heavy going; that’s probably unfair, since the eucharistic prayer in the BCP seems almost perfunctory, and the ASB and its precursors aimed at something fuller and richer. In my teenage years and into my early twenties… Read more »
After many years of ploughing through tedious liturgical revision, beginning with Series 1, 2, 3 etc., with Common Worship being its eventual result, it’s very sad that many CofE clergy have abandoned liturgical worship altogether. Their “common worship” consists of drum kits, guitars, large screens and singing embarrassingly trite ditties. They have successfully abandoned Anglicanism. I note on another thread you said most outsiders find evangelicalism “repulsive”. It’s a sad – perhaps true – adjective to describe today’s Church of England.
Interesting. Since Covid started and our church buildings were shut down, I’ve only received Holy Communion a few times, from July to October last year. In the first months of the shutdown I missed it somewhat, but this gradually faded. Rather as (so I’m told) a person who loses their eyesight compensates over time with an improved sense of smell and hearing, so I’ve found that losing my access to one of the means of grace has resulted in a much deeper experience of God’s grace via the others (prayer, scripture meditation etc.). This is not intended to offend anyone… Read more »
Although I value a weekly eucharist having been brought up in a moderately catholic parish I recall a scholar describing the weekly eucharist as “a jewel without a setting”. The Parish Communion Movement has had benefits but it has narrowed the liturgical diet in most mainstream parishes. Think how many people attended evensong until the 70s. I suspect we have lost over the years many people who might be described as “believing but not especially sacramental”. I do. however, regret that some evangelical parishes have more or less abandoned liturgical worship altogether.In my lifetime the traditions have moved so far… Read more »
Perry – yes, in evangelical parishes here in Canada (the ones that are left, and haven’t gone to ANiC or ACNA), the BCP or BAS services are for the most part still followed, albeit with perhaps some modifications or shortenings. Such modifications, by the way, are encouraged in the BAS; an American priest remarked to me not long ago how struck she had been by the frequent use of the word ‘may’ in the BAS rubrics, where the American 1979 BCP often says ‘shall’. Personally I’ve never felt the need to go beyond authorized forms of service (although I have… Read more »
Good to know Tim. What might be called the prayer book evangelical ethos, fairly evident in my younger days , has largely disappeared here. As has been said younger evangelicals seem to prefer a less anglican /liturgical style.
Prior to Vatican II they were not expected to communicate at every mass they attended. Since the introduction of an expectation of weekly communicating, as opposed to “hearing mass” in the RC, or attending a non-eucharistic service (CofE), most people Protestant and Roman alike have stopped going altogether.
Surely that is because religion in the Western world is dying out.
Well yes Father. but why? It seems to me that the churches have become more demanding and exclusive and that is a major part of the reason. I suppose some, at least, are reluctant to receive Holy communion weekly who would hear mass or attend matins. Have the people left the church, or has the church left the people?
Christianity – like other religions – has initiation rites so that its adherents are distinguishable from non-members. You might regard that as “exclusive”. Fewer people today avail themselves of these rites as their lives seem perfectly happy and fulfilled without a religious framework. Much of what passes for a coherent faith in today’s Church appears as immature and unbelievable.
To clarify. The worship on the agenda at General Synod is additional to the offices and eucharist. There is also a “continuous praying presence” provided by the Community of S Anselm and others.
Be glad that many Protestant Evangelicals are content, for the moment to be in the Church of England. If they pack up their tents, as they may very well do if revisionist agendas advance significantly, the financial consequences for the rest of the established Church will be onerous – to put it mildly.
Presumably “revisionist agendas” refers to the desire of liberal Christians to have an inclusive Church without prejudice to LGBT people. If the choice is between a rich, homophobic religious sect or revisionist closure, perhaps closing an established church built upon hatred would be highly desirable.