National News

A new £500,000 fund for cathedral fabric repairs today announced that six successful cathedrals (out of 18 applicants) are to receive grants towards major projects costing a total of more than £4.5 million. The successful applicants are Durham, Ely, Lichfield, Lincoln, Rochester and York.

In a joint statement, the Archbishops’ Council’s Ministry Division and St Stephen’s House, Oxford said today: We have accepted the recommendations of an appeal to the Ministry Council by St Stephen’s House following the inspection of November 2008.

Dr Jonathan Spencer, Chairman of the Church of England Pensions Board, has opened The Allan Bridgewater Wing at the Board’s Manormead Care Home in Hindhead, Surrey (on Monday, December 13th). The new wing was blessed by the Bishop of Dudley, the Rt Revd David Walker, who chairs the Board’s Housing Committee.

A five-way partnership has today published guidance for churches interested in hosting community shops on their premises - The Guidelines and Best Practice for the Provision of Community Shops in Churches and Chapels.

The Dioceses Commission today publishes its 120-page report on the four Yorkshire dioceses of Bradford, Ripon & Leeds, Sheffield and Wakefield and their boundaries with the Diocese of York. Recommendations in the report must be debated by the relevant diocesan synods before any scheme can be submitted to the General Synod, which is unlikely to be before July 2013.

Welcoming Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke’s announcement of a Green Paper Breaking the Cycle: Effective Punishment, Rehabilitation and Sentencing of Offenders, The Revd Dr Malcolm Brown, Director of the Church of England’s Mission and Public Affairs Division, said:“The Government’s proposals offer an approach which is courageous...

The new Bishop of Chelmsford, the Rt Revd Stephen Cottrell, has issued an Advent challenge – make a difference with ‘God’s big society’. Bishop Stephen is one of the authors of Church House Publishing’s 2010 Advent book Ready Steady Slow, which includes contributions from the Archbishops of Canterbury and York.

Couples who have already been married following publication of the alternative form of banns should have no cause for concern about the validity of their marriage.

The fourth edition of Protecting All God’s Children, the Church of England’s child protection policy since 1995, has been published today (Wednesday, November 24). Since the last edition, in 2004, a significant amount of new legislation and statutory guidance has been produced concerning the safeguarding of children, most notably the Children Act 2004 and Working Together to Safeguard Children 2010, which has been incorporated into the revised policy document.

The Church of England has today added its voice to those calling for News Corporation not to be permitted to buy the remaining shares in broadcaster BSkyB.

A ground-breaking initiative at Lambeth Palace on Tuesday (16 November) sought to reconcile one of the apparently irreconcilable priorities of our natural and man-made heritages: bats in churches. 

Visitors to the Archbishops’ Council’s Weddings Project website have increased in number by 74 per cent over the last year; over the 10 months to 31st October 2010 the site received more than 242,000 visitors, compared to 139,000 visitors during the same period in 2009.

“We very much value the contribution that Church of England schools and academies make to our education system,” said Schools Minister Lord Hill at the Church of England’s Academy Family Conference at Lambeth Palace today. The CofE is currently the largest provider of academies, with the majority replacing failing or vulnerable schools in areas of social deprivation.

The Government should enable affordable rural housing schemes to proceed where needed on the basis on a parish plan and not require complex and expensive referenda, and the Church should strengthen its contribution to sustainable communities as a basis for engaging with the Big Society agenda, a conference of churches and leading thinkers in rural affairs has recommended.

The Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams said today that the provision of mental health services in the countryside must not be cut under the current Government Comprehensive Spending Review. He said this was his greatest concern when looking at the possible shrinkage of services in the rural communities.

Her Majesty The Queen will inaugurate the Ninth General Synod of the Church of England in Church House, Westminster on Tuesday 23 November. The Inauguration ceremony will follow the Eucharist in Westminster Abbey, at which the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, will preside and Dame Mary Tanner (a President of the World Council of Churches) will preach.