Topic: News

As Rowan Williams steps down as Archbishop of Canterbury there is much to appreciate.  Many will have met Rowan as he has visited this parish three times in the last 20 years, to preach and lecture.  He has a warm and engaging character that is so evidently likeable.  He shows immediate interest in those he is with; he is always very present in any conversation, never giving any sign that he wishes to be elsewhere.  These are great pastoral qualities which encourage people and give them confidence that their lives matter – not only to Rowan but also to God.  I have heard stories from around the country testifying to this: that when he visits schools, parishes or Old People’s homes, everyone is buoyed by Rowan’s grace, humility and attentiveness.

As a member of the archbishops’ Council, I have firsthand experience of his superb ability as the Chair of complex meetings.  Rowan is tremendously skilful in shaping a discussion, ensuring that quiet and less insistent voices are heard, and then summarising accurately with focus on future action.  These skills, usually associated with top class managers, are actually rooted in his monastic character.  Benedict’s rule emphasises the art of listening: patiently and wisely to all members of the monastic house, showing respect to the enthusiastic inexperienced ones as much as to the senior leaders.  When I sit around the boardroom table with Rowan, I am comfortable and confident that I am being led by someone who is totally capable and deeply prayerful.  Those two characteristics are fully integrated in Rowan.

What I have particularly appreciated about Rowan is his wisdom in interpreting what is going on, both within the church and, more importantly, within the nation.  His book “Lost icons” presented a superb understanding of childhood, its possibilities and vulnerabilities, and challenged the whole country to provide our young people with protected time to grow into mature adults.  Throughout his time at Canterbury, for example, his Dimbleby lectures, his New Year messages and his speeches in the House of Lords have all been worthy of careful attention.  His famous lecture on Sharia Law may be regarded as naïve or ahead of its time; but he was successfully drawing our attention to the need for our national culture to be open textured, in law as well as in generosity of heart.

So what next?  I hope the next archbishop will take the established nature of the Church of England seriously.  This will make it difficult as the Church of England negotiates its way around such issues as Gay Marriage; but there are such great opportunities to exercise graceful influence on our country if only we do not retreat into a sectarian mindset.  We need to be less worried about the purity of the church and more focussed on the health of the nation.

I hope the next archbishop will have confidence that relationships do not need to break when difficult decisions are taken.  Indeed, delaying decisions can sometimes increase the pain for everyone.  So the legislation for Women Bishops needs to be passed, adopted with joy, and implemented with imagination, releasing new gifts and showing that we are a church that can be positive about serious change.  The Anglican Covenant is likely not to be adopted by the Church of England; but there is a deep commitment across the country to remain part of the international fellowship of the Anglican Communion, supporting churches and countries that have to cope with disasters, dictators and tsunamis.  The Anglican way has always been based on relationships of maturity, honesty and generosity.  We do not need a Covenant to legislate for that; this project, though worked at hard by Rowan, will be quietly dropped.

I hope we will focus less on one person and more on what the church can do collectively, within parishes, communities and throughout England.  Rowan was intellectually so much head and shoulders above others that it was easy to collude with the modern obsession of concentrating on the personality of the leader alone.  There are forces at work, in both society and church, that relish this because they have the power to bring enormous pressure to bear on any one individual, and so bend them to their will.  So I hope the next Canterbury will be part of the dynamic that brings about a mood of confidence and courage throughout the Church of England, that is ready to adapt to what the nation needs, guiding people, and showing all that gracious goodness is attractive and influential.

I was disappointed to miss seeing the Leonardo exhibition in London earlier this year.  I was given the book of the exhibition for Christmas, and loved it – but was too late to arrange tickets.  So I tried for the Hockney exhibition instead – and was too late.  Determined not to make a hat-trick of disappointments, I booked early for the exhibition at the British Museum on “Hajj: journey to the heart of Islam”.  I have already read the book and go to see the exhibition itself today.

How different our history would have been had the Church taken pilgrimage as seriously as Islam did!  Making the Hajj, a pilgrimage to Mecca, is one the of five pillars of Islam, and is a spiritual requirement placed on all Muslims (provided they are able to undertake the journey).  Christians have long recognised the importance and value of pilgrimage, but approached this in different ways to Islam.  When the Roman persecution stopped at the beginning of the 4^th century AD, the first pilgrims started to journey to Jerusalem.  In this period, the original sites of Jesus ministry, his death and resurrection, were identified; these then became holy sites attractive to later travellers.  But pilgrimage developed as an attractive possibility rather than a universal requirement.  Perhaps this was influenced by the fact that the idea of “the Holy City” was transferred from Jerusalem to Rome, and then to Constantinople.  The Holy City came to the people – rather than vice versa.  In the 11^th century onwards, pilgrimage to Jerusalem surfaced again as an important spiritual expression – though, this time, it was associated with the Crusades, thereby creating an unhelpful mixture of pilgrimage and power.  As the Crusades became less and less successful, other centres of pilgrimage were developed: Santiago di Compostela being the most famous.  Even St David’s in Pembrokeshire was regarded by some as a significant site: two pilgrimages to St David’s were worth one to Rome, and guaranteed N years off your time in Purgatory.

In all this, one theme that is being addressed is: how can a faith be both universal and local?  For Islam, there is one “People of God” throughout the world (though they live in different countries), one language for their holy book (though the people have many vernaculars), one supreme holy site (Mecca), and one direction of prayer (all must face Mecca).  So, with this emphasis on the universal, Islam struggles with different local traditions – there have been many brutal conflicts (in history and today) between different strands within Islam – not least because each is claiming to be the one and only true way.  Islam also struggles with acknowledging different expressions of the faith that arise in different ages.  There is a natural tendency to desire uniformity and be very wary of change within Islam.

Speaking in broad terms, Christianity has always been readier to emphasise the importance of the local.  I refer you again to MacCulloch’s magisterial “A history of Christianity” which describes and relishes the variety of expressions of the Christian faith throughout the world and through different ages.  We are called upon “to proclaim the faith afresh in each generation” (to quote a phrase from the Ordination service).  And you will be familiar with the lines “till we have built Jerusalem in England’s green and pleasant land”.  Certainly the Anglican tradition recognises the importance of expressing the faith in local language, customs and culture.  Other denominations which emphasise the universal more, struggle (as Islam does) with the variety that comes from national cultures and change across generations.

So today, having read the book, I am going to see the exhibition.  That has been the experience of pilgrims across the ages: to read about something first; and then to make the journey to gain firsthand experience.  Face to face experience matters; pilgrims are changed by that.

For 15 years I have been walking a dog on Pewley Down.  It’s not my favourite walk – I find that in the Chantries.  But it is the closest open space, and it remains, even after all these years, amazingly beautiful.

Our puppy is still young enough to benefit from, and demand, two walks each day.  So on most mornings, I take her to Pewley Down for 20 minutes. The changing weather makes the walk interesting.  Meeting other dog owners is noteworthy too.  But at times, it becomes rather monotonous doing the 20-minutes circuit. Yet, boredom can be a signal for lack of imagination.  So, today I wandered off my usual track, not quite knowing where I might be heading. A new path opened up, and I saw views that I had not seen before – yet still within the same few acres of Pewley Down.

Benedict urges his monks to be stable, to remain rooted and not to meet boredom with running off after new fancies.  Stability is a tool and a challenge to go deeper.  Our culture is scared of boredom and deals with that fear with unnecessary novelty.  Lent too is a time to be stable.  Yet we may be called to have the courage to stray off our familiar paths, and appreciate afresh what is already part of our lives.

I’ll admit that I was nervous, as in previous years, about the wisdom of allowing the Guildford Shakespeare Company to perform for two weeks inside Holy Trinity Church.  We can cope with the disruption and the dirt that comes from having so many visitors in such a short period.  After all, it’s great to see the church being well used.  We can re-arrange the chairs for Sunday worship; after all, this gives us an opportunity to experience worship slightly differently.  No, my main worry is about whether the words and actions will dis-honour the Church and the God whom we worship.

Well, when I saw the production of Richard the third last night, I was convinced, once again, of how right it is to hear such drama in the context of our church building.  The production is superb.  Yet again, they have brought passion, beauty, insight and energy to a classic Shakespearean text.  There is great emotional honesty: the untrustworthy nature of evil is awful, yet often appears seductive.  But our church building plays its part, providing and excellent backdrop for the terrors of civil war.

The lighting design, in particular, conveys this message: that above all people there is the One who sees all and judges all.  Nothing escapes God’s notice; no actions or intentions can be hidden from God’s understanding.  However much we may want to conceal our base motives and behaviour, we are all “acting” on God’s stage, so there will be a final reckoning.  King Richard tried to avoid that; we try to hide from that, at times.  We delude ourselves if we seek to live outside the backdrop of God’s judgement and mercy.

Watch the show, and see this in action.

After a long, passionate and tense debate, Synod decided today to press ahead with the legislation for Women Bishops.  The “final approval” debate should happen in July 2012.  Today’s debate was essentially about whether we should try again for a formula which would have provided two bishops in each diocese – with “co-ordinate jurisdiction” – to satisfy those of differing views on the ministry of women.  Synod had basically rejected this in 2010, but some wanted to try again.  So we listened, we repeated arguments, and most people stood firm.  This was not standing firm against “opponents” – but holding clearly to a view that what was being proposed would not work.  A bit of new space was created so that the opinions of the minority can be recognised and honoured.  This was asked for by the Archbishop of Canterbury.  I hope he will take the opportunity that Synod has given to clarify some of the theology – but this will belong in the preamble to the legislation, not in the legislation itself.

That point is significant because for the last 6 months dioceses across the country have been consulted on the current legislation.  They have said an overwhelming “yes” to what is on the table.  For the final vote to be on something different would be scandalous.  It may be that a few commas and semi-colons need to be changed – but the people of this land have said they support what is currently on view.  It would be an abuse of process to force the final debate to be on something substantially different.

But one of the main difficulties we are facing is that the people currently in power are the ones who are being consulted.  Within our parish, it would be like the situation if I asked the congregation at St Mary’s whether they liked their service being at 1115.  Asking that question almost certianly would give me the answer “yes” – because the timing suits those who are able to attend; and those are the people I would be asking.  So, leadership sometimes requires us to engage with those who are not currently “in the room” – those who are not at the moment in power, or in a position to answer.  If a business only seeks to satisfy its current customers, it will eventually fail.  Equivalently, in the Church, a large amount of attention is being paid to those who already serve in the Church – what about those who find themselves on the margins?

The day ends with a reception at Lambeth Palace for members from Guildford diocese and some others.  It is awesome and humbling to be in a place such as Lambeth.  Today some of the rhetoric has been “unless we get this legislation right, this is the end of the Church of England”.  But, standing in Lambeth, I am reminded that archbishops have been executed for their faith – and in other times, different factions burnt each other at the stake.  We don’t do that now.  This makes me want to take some of the rhetoric I hear with a pinch of salt – and to remember those across the world who are truly persecuted for their faith.

It’s been a good but tough day. But, at least I am not a Christian living in Syria trying to keep hold of life and family.