In a break with tradition, the bishops did not process, Olympic-style, behind their provincial standards; nor did they wear copes and mitres. They walked in pairs, in Convocation robes, deliberately “undifferentiated” so as to reflect a desire born out of their three-day retreat to be “less triumphal than some might expect Anglicans to be, or had been in the past”, the Australian Primate, Dr Phillip Aspinall, explained afterwards. The only group separated out were the Primates.
It was intended to be less formal and more accessible ”” and it also hid gaps in the representation of some African provinces. There was a ripple of interest among the press when the Bishop of Durham appeared wearing his cassock: was it some kind of protest? No, his robes had been mislaid somewhere on the campus of the University of Kent.