It is divided up into a number of parishes and dioceses; the most senior clergyman in the Episcopal Church is called the Presiding Bishop, whose home church is the National Cathedral in Washington, DC. The British monarch (currently Charles III) is the supreme governor and the archbishop of Canterbury (currently Justin Welby) is the most senior cleric. [6] King Oswiu of Northumbria summoned the Synod of Whitby in 664. He is the focus of unity for the worldwide Anglican Communion of independent national or regional churches. Stephen Cottrell became Archbishop of York in 2020. God makes himself known personally to each believer through the work of the Holy Spirit. Over time, this religion became a major one in both England and abroad all over the world. For example, both churches use the terms priest, bishop, and deacon, and they have similar responsibilities in each church. The Church taught that, in the name of the congregation, the priest offered to God the same sacrifice of Christ on the cross that provided atonement for the sins of humanity. When Elizabeth I became queen in 1558, the independent Church of England was reestablished. The Bible, the Creeds, Apostolic Order, and the administration of the Sacraments are sufficient to establish catholicity. [167], In 2011, the Church of England published statistics showing 1.7million people attended at least one of its services each month, a level maintained since the turn of the millennium; approximately one million participated each Sunday and three million took part in a Church of England service on Christmas Day or Christmas Eve. The three schools of thought (or parties) in the Church of England are sometimes called high church (or Anglo-Catholic), low church (or evangelical Anglican) and broad church (or liberal). It was called the Reformation and saw a great deal of reform and protest in Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries (1500s-1600s CE). [142][143][144], The Church of England is generally opposed to abortion but believes "there can be strictly limited conditions under which abortion may be morally preferable to any available alternative". Elizabeth passed a number of laws that cemented the Anglican Church's position in the country, including the Act of Uniformity. Canons require Royal Licence and Royal Assent, but form the law of the church, rather than the law of the land. Later that year the House of Commons passed legislation that legalized same-sex marriages but prevented the Church of England from performing them.