Ireland's Presbyterians will meet today to elect a Moderator-designate to succeed the present Moderator, Rev Dr John Finlay, at the Presbyterian General Assembly next June.
Voting will take place in the 21 presbyteries that independently meet around Ireland in locations as diverse as Dublin and Derry, Carrickfergus, Co Antrim, and Omagh, Co Tyrone.
Each presbytery, which has a membership composed of all the ministers and a representative elder from every congregation in its area, can nominate just one name which is then communicated to Church House in Belfast.
There the result is declared out of a total of 21 votes, one from each presbytery, expected to be at about 9pm tonight.
For the first time the only names that can be voted on come from a list, circulated to all presbyteries by the clerk of assembly, Rev Dr Donald Watts.
It is made up of names submitted to him by each presbytery last autumn.
The list has seven names, six men and one woman, all of whom, with the exception of Rev Norman Hamilton, have received nominations for the moderatorship, an office held for one year before. They are Rev Willis Cordner (First Bangor), Rev Norman Hamilton (Ballysillan), Rev Joseph Fell (Ebrington), Rev Derek McKelvey (Fisherwick), Rev Wilfred Orr (St John's Newtownbreda), Rev Dr Ruth Patterson (Restoration Ministries) and Rev Dr Donald Patton (OC Randalstown).
