Order papers listing the day’s business
OP2 – Order Paper II (morning)
OP3 – Order Paper III (afternoon)
Stephen Lynas bathwellschap How many years can some people exist?
a summary of the day’s business
Tim Wyatt Church Times General Synod rebels attempt to quash wedding and funeral fees
David Pocklington Law & Religion UK Church of England Parochial Fees – Changes for 2020 to 2024
Harriet Sherwood The Guardian Church of England makes Sunday services non-compulsory
“Synod approves change to ease burden on rural priests, who may have up to 20 churches”
Izzy Lyons The Telegraph Churches no longer legally required to hold service every Sunday, as Synod scraps 17th century law
BBC News Churches no longer have to hold Sunday services
Adam Becket Church Times Synod calls for C of E battle plan on homelessness
Zachary Guiliano The Living Church Synod Takes Up Poverty
Church of England press releases
General Synod approves greater service flexibility for benefices
New code of practice on ecumenical cooperation approved by General Synod
General Synod backs call for homelessness task force
Church of England launches Pastoral Principles for welcoming LGBTI+ people
The Pastoral Principles are here.
Archbishop Welby:
“The biggest and the deepest way of being transformed is through stepping outside the company of those who reinforce our views and listening to those who disagree with us profoundly. Listening, not so as to speak, but so as to hear”
‘Pot, kettle, black’ when it comes to the ‘Elephant at Synod’ such as Bishop Bell.
There are many of us outside the General Synod ‘bubble’ at Church House Westminster who have no wish to be cynical, nor dampen any non-cynical spirits therein, but Archbishop Welby’s exhortations are becoming a little hard to digest by those who take Matthew 7 v 5 seriously:
richardwsymonds.wordpress.com/2019/02/22/feb-22-2019-the-pontificating-hypocrisy-of-an-archbishop/
The Pastoral Principles don’t really get us anywhere. They could say anything… Or nothing.
Reading, briefly, through the ‘Pastoral Principles’ I find there is much to be commended. What is presented, though, will need to be followed through – by bishops and clergy as well as the rank and file of believers. How, for instance, has this presentation affected the action of the ABC – the host of the next Lambeth Conference – on the matter of the need to include all the spouses of bishops, whether hetero- or homosexual? The world will be watching.
The Chemistry teacher was explaining Boyle’s Law relating the pressure of a gas to its volume. A boy put up his hand and asked what used to happen. The teacher asked what he meant. The boy said he meant before they passed Boyle’s Law, what did gases do then? The teacher explained the difference between scientific and human laws. A scientific law is based on observation of what actually happens. It was, she said, as if the headmaster observed the way pupils actually behaved, and then wrote the school rules accordingly. Despite seeing certain attractions in that approach, none of… Read more »
The homelessness task force might well be the most positive thing to cone out of this Synod.