Welsh Church Act 1914

3 Ecclesiastical law and courts. U.K.

(1) As from the date of disestablishment ecclesiastical courts and persons in Wales and Monmouthshire shall cease to exercise any jurisdiction, and the ecclesiastical law of the Church in Wales shall cease to exist as law.

(2) As from the same date the then existing ecclesiastical law and the then existing articles, doctrines, rites, rules, discipline, and ordinances of the Church of England shall, with and subject to such modification or alteration, if any, as after the passing of this Act may be duly made therein, according to the constitution and regulations for the time being of the Church in Wales, be binding on the members for the time being of the Church in Wales in the same manner as if they had mutually agreed to be so bound, and shall be capable of being enforced in the temporal courts in relation to any property which by virtue of this Act is held on behalf of the said Church or any members thereof, in the same manner and to the same extent as if such property had been expressly assured upon trust to be held on behalf of persons who should be so bound:

Provided that no alteration in the articles, doctrines, rites, or, save so far as may be rendered necessary by the passing of this Act, in the formularies of the Church in Wales, shall be so far binding on any ecclesiastical person having any existing interest saved by this Act, as to deprive him of that interest, if he, within one month after the making of the alteration, signifies in writing to the representative body herein-after mentioned his dissent therefrom.

(3) The said constitution and regulations of the Church in Wales may, notwithstanding anything in this section, provide for the establishment for the Church in Wales of ecclesiastical courts, and, if the Archbishop of Canterbury consents, for appeals from any of the courts so established being heard and determined by the provincial court of the Archbishop, and the Archbishop may, with the approval of His Majesty in Council, give such consent, but no such courts shall exercise any coercive jurisdiction and no appeal shall lie from any such court to His Majesty in Council.

(4) The power of making by such constitution and regulations alterations and modifications in ecclesiastical law shall include the power of altering and modifying such law so far as it is embodied in F1 . . . any F1 . . . Act of Parliament.

(5) As from the date of disestablishment the bishops and clergy of the Church in Wales shall cease to be members of or be represented in the Houses of Convocation of the Province of Canterbury, but nothing in this Act shall affect the powers of those Houses so far as they relate to matters outside Wales and Monmouthshire.

Textual Amendments

F1 Words in s. 3(4) repealed (22.7.2004) by Statute Law (Repeals) Act 2004 (c. 14), s. 1(1), Sch. 1 Pt. 6 Group 4