Convocation

A convocation (from the Latin convocare meaning "to call/come together", a translation of the Greek ἐκκλησία ekklēsia) is a group of people formally assembled for a special purpose, mostly ecclesiastical or academic.

[2] Their origins date back to the end of the seventh century when Theodore of Tarsus (Archbishop of Canterbury, 668-690) reorganized the structures of the English Church and established a national synod of bishops.

[2] Under Henry VIII and his successor Edward VI between 1534 and 1553 the Convocations were used as a source of clerical opinion but ecclesiastical legislation was secured by statute from Parliament.

[4] Later between 1559 and 1641, Elizabeth I, James I and Charles I gave the force of law to decisions of Convocation without recourse to Parliament by letters patent under the great seal notably the Thirty-Nine Articles (1571) and the 141 Canons of 1603.

[4] The Convocations were abolished during the Commonwealth but restored on the accession of Charles II in 1660 and they synodically approved the Book of Common Prayer which was imposed by the Act of Uniformity in 1662.

[9] The opposition was formidable: half the clergy and most of the laity rejected the idea, many politicians were against it and the two archbishops—John Bird Sumner and Thomas Musgrave—had no desire to revive Convocation.

Over the next eight years it was established that it could debate and act provided it did not try to discuss or frame canons and that the archbishop could only prorogue (adjourn) a session with the consent of his fellow diocesans.

In 1851, Canterbury received a petition, in 1853 it appointed committees and by 1855 Archbishop Sumner was convinced of the value of Convocation and those bishops who had opposed the revival were taking part positively in its debates.

[7] At the beginning of the twentieth century, both Convocations together with their respective houses of laity began to meet as a Representative Council which however had no legal authority or position.