The Assembly met on 20–25 May with the Right Rev'd Sally Foster-Fulton BA BD as Moderator. She is Head of Christian Aid in Scotland and has served as a Parish Minister in the Church of Scotland and in the Presbyterian Church (USA). The Rt Hon Lord Hodge DPSC was re-appointed by His Majesty as Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly for a second year. The Church has roughly 284,000 members (2021 figures) and around 1,200 charges.

This Grade 1-listed mediaeval church had a substantial Georgian reredos. It dominated the east end of the church, hiding three-quarters of the plain-glazed east window. In 2012 a faculty permitted its temporary removal to another location in the church while essential works were done to the chancel. Following this, the consequent increase in light coming from the windows was welcomed by petitioners, and fragments of medieval wall painting were discovered behind plasterwork which the reredos had previously protected. The petitioners now wished to make the temporary removal of the reredos permanent, relocating it to hang above the west door.

The Bill of Rights Bill was withdrawn on 27 June, signalling what appears to be a major change of policy. After the withdrawal announcement had been made, The Times quoted Dominic Raab as suggesting that ‘All the wrong people will celebrate’ – among whom is your correspondent.

St Michael le Belfrey (‘the Belfrey’) is a 16th century parish church in the shadow of York Minster. It sits in the charismatic evangelical tradition of the Church of England. With a large, young and vibrant congregation, the Belfrey is a Resource Church and plays a significant role in the life of the Diocese of York, the Northern Province and, more broadly, the Church of England. Through a petition described as ‘of the highest quality’, it sought a faculty for a dramatic re-ordering of its interior, proposals that had been at least 14 years in the development.

In the course of its consideration of a petition for a faculty for a significant re-ordering project, the court commented on the proper approach to such petitions in order to assist their progress through the faculty process.

This petition concerned proposals for major re-ordering works to this Grade II listed church, consecrated in 1933. Of particular interest was the fate of two substantial paintings based on Pilgrim's Progress by Norman Adams, installed in 1972, whose removal was required by the main works proposed. Each painting covered a substantial part of one side of the church above the nave arcades. They were described as being of national importance.

Adjacent to, and connected to, the churchyard was an area known as the ‘church garden’. The land had been given to the church in 1960 for the purpose of adding to the churchyard, the deed of gift conforming with the formula set out in section 5 of the Consecration of Churchyards Act 1867. After a long period of disuse, the land was used to create a garden, separated from the churchyard by a hedge. The garden was never consecrated. As well as containing amenities such as a lawn, trees, flower beds, benches and a ‘fairy grotto’, the garden had been the site of various scatterings and interments of cremated remains. No authority had ever been sought for such interments.

This unopposed petition was for the removal of a commemorative plaque, installed without a faculty, on the windowsill of the south wall of the nave of the Grade II* listed church. In order to protect the privacy of any person affected by the judgment, the names of the church and the people involved were anonymised.

The petitioners sought permission to carry out major re-ordering works including the erection of a new thatched pavilion building. Many aspects of the works, including the creation of the single storey thatched building, had also been the subject of a successful planning application to the local planning authority.

In April 2023, the House of Bishops of the Province of the Church of Uganda elected Canon Godfrey Kasana as Bishop of Luwero. Before his consecration could take place, however, a member of the church submitted a petition alleging that he was unsuitable for consecration on grounds of adultery – and in June the House of Bishops revoked his nomination. The respondents, in effect, sought judicial review of that decision, while the Archbishop argued that the claim was brought against the wrong party and was frivolous, vexatious and an abuse of process.

The petitioners, who were resident within the parish, applied for a faculty for the reservation of a grave plot. The incumbent did not consent to the petition; the policy of the PCC was not to support new applications for reservation as the churchyard would be full in less than ten years.