Key issues of leadership will be discussed by more than 110 Anglicans from all over the southern Pacific at a six-day conference in Christchurch beginning this Sunday.
The General Synod / Te Hinota Whanui is the biennial forum of the Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia, involving 18 bishops, more than 90 delegates, plus youth stewards and officers from New Zealands largest denomination.
Twelve international delegates will represent the Anglican Church in Samoa, Tonga and Fiji.
Topping the Synod agenda is the election of a new Primate (head) for the Church, and also the shape of the Primacy. The present Archbishop, The Most Rev Whakahuihui Vercoe, is stepping down next week after completing his two-year term.
The Synod begins on Sunday, May 7, with a powhiri at 3.30pm in Cathedral Square, outside the Cathedral. It re-convenes at 7pm that evening at the Holiday Inn, (cnr of Cashel and High Sts) with an opening address from Archbishop Vercoe.
The business sessions begin on Monday, May 8, and will run until Friday, May 12.
The meeting will be presented with three future leadership models, and most of Monday will be given over to debating the options.
Those options include leadership shared between the senior bishops of each of the three Tikanga, or cultural streams, within the Church. Whatever the model chosen, the results of the election that will follow will be announced, probably around Tuesday lunchtime.
At the Service of Installation on Thursday evening at the Cathedral, the new Primate - or Primates - will be sworn in.
There are three major tasks to be attended to at meetings of the General Synod- to receive reports from the Church's many commissions, agencies and organisations; to elect people to the many bodies that carry out specialist and ongoing support work for the life of the Church; and to pass laws that will regulate the common life of the Church as a whole.
For more information, please contact:
Lloyd Ashton
Media Officer to the Anglican Church
in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia
Phone: +64 (09) 521-0192
Fax: +64 (09) 528-2219
Mob: +64 (021) 348-470
Email: mediaofficer@ang.org.nz