Parishes Asked: Will You Give a Bishop a Bed for the Night?

The Archbishop of Canterbury has invited his fellow bishops around the world, and their spouses, to join him in Canterbury next year for the Lambeth Conference. 

Bishop Colin will speak to Synod about developing plans for the Conference.

The Archbishop’s letter includes a general invitation to take part in a Hospitality Initiative being planned by all the dioceses in Scotland, Wales, and England.  The idea is that visiting bishops and their spouses will arrive a few days earlier, on about Friday 11th July, and stay as guests in one of our home dioceses until the conference begins on Wednesday 16th July.

Clearly there are uncertainties about the conference, but we can surely work on this initiative as a fine opportunity for us here in Oxford.  Bishop John has already written to a number of bishops with whom we have special links.  The Lambeth Conference Office is keeping a tally of who is being invited where, and soon we shall receive suggestions about further invitations we might make, so that no one is left out.

We would like our visitors to stay in homes all around the diocese, so that we can arrange occasions for many of us here to meet one or more of them.   Our diocesan Mothers’ Union is holding its summer meeting while our guests are with us.  Many of the bishops, we hope, will be invited to preach in one of our churches on Sunday.  We are not planning a heavy programme of speaking engagements, however, because rest and relaxation are important before the demanding three weeks of the conference itself.

We must now begin to recruit hosts.  It would be good to think of “the host” as a local parish as well as the person or family in whose home the bishop will stay.  We shall arrange to meet arriving bishops at the airport, and at the end of their stay take them to Canterbury, probably in a coach.   However these travel arrangements will not be the host’s responsibility.

If you and your parish would like to consider hosting a bishop and his or her spouse, please contact Martin Peirce, address below.  For many bishops in our communion, English is not their first language.   So if you or some of your parish friends are experienced in, say, French, Spanish, or an African or Asian language, that could be most helpful.

Canon Martin Peirce, 8, Burwell Meadow, Witney, Oxon, OX28 5JQ
Email: martin.peirce@ntlworld.com.