A congregation issues a call for the pastor's service, but this call must be ratified by the local presbytery.

In rural communities this act obliged local heritors to provide a schoolhouse and pay a schoolmaster, while ministers and local presbyteries oversaw the quality of the education.

Finally, the district has a number of local congregations headed by presiding elders who implement decisions of the District Presbytery with the assistance of their local presbyteries.

In the Presbyterian system of church governance the synod is a level of administration between the local presbytery and the national general assembly.

There he was ordained by the local presbytery, and on returning to England was imprisoned for preaching at Marlborough.

Statues passed in 1616, 1633, 1646 and 1696 established a parish school system, paid for by local heritors and administered by ministers and local presbyteries.

Conservatives in the Kirk argued that the reform would have to be ratified by local presbyteries.

That was amended and approved again in 1990, then submitted for separate votes by the local presbyteries and finally returned to the 1991 gathering.

It is now a conference center owned by the local presbytery of the Presbyterian Church.

More than 50 of the denomination's 171 local presbyteries or districts submitted resolutions about the conference, almost all critical.