L’Eglise d’Ecosse

In Scotland, the General Assembly Act 1592 remains the statutory foundation of the presbyterian character of the reformed Church of Scotland, a church often called simply ‘the Kirk’. At the time of the union between England and Scotland, the Scottish Parliament passed the Protestant Religion and Presbyterian Church Act 1706 (‘the Act of Security’), requiring recognition of the presbyterian governance of the Church as an essential and irrevocable condition of union. (An English Act of 1706, sometimes known as the Maintenance of the Church of England Act, made equivalent provision for the position of the Church of England.)

The nineteenth century saw a number of disputes within the Kirk, some of the most acute concerning the right of the State to intervene in church affairs to disallow church decisions and legislation. A number of separate churches came into being, most of which were re-united in 1921. To facilitate the reunion, Parliament passed the Church of Scotland Act 1921 accepting the separate jurisdiction of the church in spiritual matters and giving the church very considerable freedom in its government. The Act is relied on by the authorities of the Church of Scotland to resist any court action concerning its affairs.

The position of the Church of Scotland is highly anomalous in terms of the traditional categorisation of churches. It is clearly an established church, yet the Church of Scotland Act 1921 gives it such a high degree of autonomy as almost to separate church and state.