CHURCH-wardens, formerly called church-reeves, are officers chosen yearly, in Easter week, by the minister and parishioners of every parish, to look after the church, church-yard, church-revenues, &c. also to observe the behaviour of the parishioners in relation to such misdemeanors as appertain to the censure or jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical court.
They are to be chosen by the joint consent of the minister and his parishioners; and by custom, the minister may chuse one, and the parishioners another; or, if there be a custom for it, the parishioners may elect both, though it is against the canon. They were sworn into their office by the archdeacon; and if he refuses to swear a church-warden, a mandamus may issue out to compel him: for as the church-wardens have a trust reposed in them by the parish, as temporal officers, the parishioners are the proper judges of their abilities to serve, and not the archdeacon who swears them.
The church wardens are a corporation to sue, and be sued, for the goods of the church: they are to take care of the repairs of the church; and if they erect or add any thing new to the same, they must have the consent of the parishioners, or vestry; and if in the church, the license of the ordinary: they have, with consent of the minister, the placing of the parishioners in the seats of the body of the church, appointing gallery keepers, &c. reserving to the ordinary a power to correct the same. In London, the church-wardens have this authority in themselves: there also they are bound to fix fire-cocks, keep engines, &c. in their parishes, under the penalty of 10l.
Besides their ordinary power, the church-wardens have the care of the benefice during its vacancy: they are to join with the overseers of the poor in making rates for their relief, setting up trades for employing them, placing out poor apprentices, settling poor
persons, &c. It is their duty to collect the charity-money upon briefs read in churches: they are to sign the certificates of those persons who receive the sacrament, to qualify them to bear offices, &c.
CHURCHING of women after child-birth, an office in the liturgy, containing a thanksgiving to be used by women after being delivered from the great pain and peril of child-birth.