A year ago, an experiment in becoming a more listening and discerning local church reached its climax in Liverpool. So how is the ‘synodal archdiocese’ shaping up?

A 2020 study of the conservation of Liverpool’s Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King noted the “unique challenges caused by novel techniques and materials”. Ever since its completion in 1967, Frederick Gibberd’s masterpiece – or “the Wigwam” to those with different tastes – has exhibited deep architectural flaws which have baffled conservators.

“To mend modernism”, as Rebecca Burrows, the heritage consultant who wrote the report, points out, “and to avoid the mistakes of the past, we must first understand the place of worship, and step beyond reductive tendencies to ask the fundamentals.” Even architects are getting synodal these days.

The running repairs that the cathedral requires have their parallels in its diocese, which has been suffering its own structural flaws for decades. The Archdiocese of Liverpool is geographically small, just 450 square miles – the archbishop could see most of his parishes from the tower of the nearby Anglican cathedral – and its fortunes are closely bound to those of the city. Once, the great port to the world had an episcopal see to match it in scale and dynamism, the archbishop’s throne second only in prestige to Westminster. But when Patrick Kelly retired from the post in 2013 it took 14 months to find his successor. Demographic headaches were all the job seemed to offer.