ELECTORAL SYNOD.

Otago Witness, Issue 3713, 12 May 1925, Page 67

ELECTORAL SYNOD.

APPOINTMENT OF NEW BISHOP. The latest issue of the Church News has the following:— The Commissary (Dean Carrington) has convened Diocesan Synod for the election of a bishop, to assemble on Tuesday, June 9. The resumption of the school after the epidemic having made it impossible to secure the use of Christ’s College, uie Commissary has appointed St. John’s Parish Hall, Latimer square, as the Synod’s meet-ing-place. in order that the laity may have opportunity to be associated in the election, an intercession service will be held in the cathedral on Monday evening. The following morning at 7.30 a celebration of the holy communion will be held in the cathedral with the same intention. Probably breakfast will be arranged for members of Synod, who thereafter will proceed to St. John’s Church for a “quiet hour,” beginning at 10 a.r». Synod will formally assemble in the hall at 11.15 for roll call, the president’s address, and the formal business of inaugurating Synod. In ail probability Synod will then resolve to adjourn to a later hour in order to form itself into an informal conference preliminary to the formal nomination and election of a bishop. Up till this moment the proceedings will ho open to the public, though accommodation for them is necessarily limited, for there are a- couple of hundred members of Synod and ihey have to be provided with tables Immediately Synod adjourns for tho purpose of going into conference, the proceedings become strictly confidential, and i,o details of any kind may be divulged or should be divulged, as a point of strictest etiquette. The election of a bishop being suen a rare occasion in this diocese, we may be pardoned for insisting so much on this point, which no doubt will be duly impressed on members before the proceedings in conference begin. Members of the laity will themselves show consideration if they will put restraint on their natural curiosity and forbear frem submitting Synod members to “third degree” inquisition on the point. We are to deal with the names of men who are not “candidates,” whose consent to nomination or even mention has not and cannot be asked. We are entitled to debate their fitness for the sacred office of a bishop only so long as we do not bandy about their lames and their comparative qualifications beyond the walls of the Synod Hall. . . . . The committee of inquiry has accumulated a good deal of information which will be available for Synod’s private information. Most of it is of a public character, such as is to be found in “Crockford and “Who’s Who”; some of it is reliable opinion expressed at the wish of the committee in strict confidence. Tho committee has drawn up a method of procedure in the conference (for which there is no procedure laid down in constitutional form) which will be suggested to members, but •which they are not thereby bound to adopt or follow. It is based on the experience of other dioceses in similar conferences, and no doubt will simplify procedure and facilitate intelligent election. At present it is the intention to suggest that Synod shall meet formally twice or thrice during the day for formal business and then immediately adjourn into conference until unanimity, or at least practical unanimity, is reached. Then will follow the formal reassembling of Synod and the nomination and election of the bishop as laid down m the Canon. An adjournment will then be necessary while tho invitation is being forwarded to and considered by the bishopelect. With good fortune a successful election may be achieved within the week. In certain * comparatively recent elections in ‘New Zealand it has been achieved within a couple of days. , . In the meantime, all members the church are asked to tnake prayer for the guidance of the Bynod in the election of a bishop an essential part of their private and corporate intercessions. A suitable prayer for the purpose will bo found in those put forward this month by the Prayer Union.