864 behind or above a holy table’ is clearly outside those limits.

In a lesser degree, the rejection of the Prayer Book measures caused a difficulty for diocesan chancellors. They would be asked to decree faculties for the installation of aumbries. Could they rightly do so in connexion with a practice which they knew or believed to be unlawful? In the course of time, this question appears to have been answered in accordance with common sense. The duty of a diocesan chancellor in this matter is ancillary. He is not responsible for the reservation; but if he finds that reservation is in fact practised with the sanction of the bishop in a church within his jurisdiction, it is his duty to see that the provision made for keeping the consecrated bread and wine is both safe and seemly.

He dismissed the appeal but referred the appellants to the chancellor’s offer to consider revised proposals for the installation of an aumbry, rather than a tabernacle. In general conclusions the Dean stated:

(1) That reservation of the Blessed Sacrament for any purpose is still, strictly speaking, illegal; (2) that nevertheless reservation for the communion of the sick may be practised, not only with impunity but (from every point of view except that of strict law) blamelessly and rightly, provided that the conditions laid down in the Alternative Order for the Communion of the Sick are complied with; and (3) that where the bishop has sanctioned the reservation a diocesan chancellor is justified in granting a faculty for an aumbry, but not for a tabernacle or pyx immediately behind or above a holy table.

Thus reservation gained judicial recognition, albeit with the curious qualification of it being illegal yet allowable. This was a major change in the judicial practice and represented a volte face from the Capel St Mary case in the same court. The significant change that had taken place in the meantime was the rejection of the 1928 Prayer Book and the Bishops’ granting of a general economy as set down by the Convocations’ resolutions of July 1929. The significance of the Dean’s judgment was that it gave added weight to the bishops’ decision and judicial recognition o f their authority to take the step that they took.

864 The distinction between an aumbry and a tabernacle is that the latter aroused suspicion o f its being used for the purpose o f adoration. The former was less susceptible to such suspicion.

This judgment, in giving such recognition, gave the resolutions of the Convocations the dignity of legal authority. The general economy granted by the bishops and, more particularly, the specific grants of economy of individual bishops to individual parishes regarding, for instance, the reservation of the sacrament, became a means by which the law was set aside. It could be argued that this is the same as saying that the law was changed by these resolutions. It could further be argued that, even if state law did not change as a result of the resolutions, that the canon law of the Church of England did change.

Subsequent cases on point referred to the Lapford judgment. O f particular note are those in the consistory courts of the northern province. These courts are not bound by the precedent set in the Court of Arches although the Dean of the Arches is also the Auditor of the Chancery Court of York, the appeal court for that province. Had Chancellors considered the view of the Dean to have been a misreading of the liturgical law of the time then they would have had the opportunity, in a number of cases in the late 1950s to have delivered opposing judgments. They did not. In Re St Mary, Tyne Dock*65 Chancellor Hylton-Foster declined to pronounce on the legality or otherwise of reservation, but allowed the installation of an aumbry. In the second hearing866 of the same case Deputy Chancellor Wigglesworth, specifically followed the Lapford judgment, in which he had sat at the first instance, stating that the Dean

considered that a faculty could be granted authorizing the introduction of an aumbry in a case where the bishop has sanctioned the reservation of the Blessed Sacrament, and where there is compliance with the provisions of the rubric in the Alternative Order for the Communion of the Sick contained in the Prayer Book approved by the Church Assembly but rejected by the House of Commons in 1928.

In Wakefield Consistory Court, Chancellor Vaisey, whose contribution to the debate on lawful authority is discussed above, also followed the Lapford approach

If I am told that the sacred elements are to be reserved in a church with the sanction or, at any rate, not contrary to the directions or express wishes of the bishop (that is a fact to which I am bound to pay attention), I regard it as my duty as chancellor of the diocese and, as such, custodian of all churches in it, to

865 Durham Consistory Court, [1954] P 369.

see that such reasonable steps are taken to secure the sacred elements, which are in point of fact to be reserved in the church, from anything in the nature of

867