Vestry Vestry Resin application server Category="Church architecture"Category="Local government of the United Kingdom"A vestry is a storage room in or attached to a church. A vestry is also an administrative committee of a church.

Architectural vestry

A vestry is a room within or attached to a Church which is used to store vestments and other items used in worship. It is usually of sufficient size to allow those using vestments to change into them, and thus in England and elsewhere was often used for meetings dealing with the Administration of the local Parish.

Administrative vestry

In England, from the 16th century until the 19th century, vestry was also the standard term for what would today usually be called a Parochial Church Council. Vestries were commonly responsible not only for the ecclesiastical affairs of the parish but such items of lay business as the local administration of the Poor Law. A system of elected civil parish councils was established in 1894 to replace this.

In the Episcopal Church in the United States of America the vestry remains a body of lay members, elected by the congregation as a whole, which elects the Rector of the church and conducts its secular business. The Rector is an ex officio member of the Vestry and usually chairs its meetings, but usually only votes in order to break a tie. The leading lay members of the Vestry are generally the Wardens. In some provinces of the Anglican Communion, the PCC is a committee elected only from members of the vestry.

References