From the Living Church, an interesting sidebar to the question of how bishops get appointed—this time, from Great Britain. The Church of England does not have a full say in who gets to be bishop in each diocese. The involvement of the British government, however, may be reduced significantly as a result of a proposed constitutional change in which the Prime Minister will no longer be given a choice between two bishop candidates, of which only one could be formally nominated by the Queen.
The British government is set to give up its role in appointing bishops to the Church of England in one of a number of sweeping constitutional changes being proposed by new Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
The constitutional green paper titled “The Governance of Britain,” was presented to Parliament July 3. Among changes proposed in the paper are that the prime minister should no longer use the royal prerogative “to exercise choice in recommending appointments of senior ecclesiastical posts, including diocesan bishops, to the Queen.”
The proposal will be debated at the Church of England’s General Synod, which begins July 6.
The whole thing is here.