A very warm welcome to Lambeth Palace. My wife, Eileen, and I are delighted that you have been able to join us this evening.
The title of this lecture is ‘Holding Together: Church and Nation in the 21st Century.’ And with the ‘national’ part of that title in mind, it won’t perhaps have slipped your notice entirely that today is St George’s Day. As a George myself, I ought to declare an interest. But even allowing for the entirely natural tendency for ‘Georges’ to stick together, it does seem that my namesake, the Patron Saint of England, has suffered a rather unfair press in recent times. Perhaps patriotism is out of fashion, or at least certain expressions of it.
I am no friend of the ‘little Englander’ mentality, nor of the kind of nationalistic fervour that can all too easily be tinged with jingoism and xenophobia. But patriotism - a measured pride in the values, achievements and aspirations of a culture and society - seems to me to be a positive thing.
How far St George himself can be held up as a model of such virtues will be a matter of debate. Part of the problem is that we don’t know for sure who he was or what he did. There is, sadly, no evidence for the dragon-slaying rescuer of maidens. A more reliable tradition, however, does identify him as a fourth century Roman who converted to Christianity, and was martyred in Palestine for refusing to worship Roman deities.
We might well wonder what his connection is with England! But then England is not the only country to have adopted St George as its own. At various times, Germany, Portugal, Armenia, Hungary and Lithuania, to name just a few, have all claimed him.
The international breadth of his appeal - dragon slaying aside - appears to derive from his example of Christian self-sacrifice and service. The Church and the Crown clearly enjoyed some success in adapting the medieval chivalric code in general - and St George in particular - to new purposes.
The rituals of knighthood and Christianity became intertwined. On receiving his arms, a knight took a sacred oath to place his sword at the service of good causes: to defend the Church, and protect the widowed and the poor. He became one of the pillars of the social order and an expression of God’s purpose in society. These ideas found further ceremonial expression in the founding by Edward III of the Order of the Garter and the construction of St George's Chapel, Windsor, as its official sanctuary in the fourteenth century.
Clearly the values and virtues attributed to St George as knight and martyr were important to what we might now term the cohesion of a society in which the role and place of the Christian Church was crucial and central. To refer to the title of this address again: it was a means - institutional and organic - of ‘holding together’.
Well that was then and this is now, I hear you say! Seven hundred years and a great deal of history have flowed under the bridge. True enough, but a central part of my purpose this evening is to consider what the relationship of Church and Society can and should be in the very different world of today and what is at stake in that relationship.
And it seems to me that Lambeth Palace offers a good point of departure for that exploration. Certainly you only have to consider a little of the history of this remarkable place to appreciate the long interweaving of traditions of spiritual and temporal governance in this country. It was here for example that the young Thomas More began his career as a diplomat and that another Thomas - Thomas Cranmer - wrote much of the Prayer Book.
For centuries, successive Archbishops of Canterbury have had their main base here, just across the river from Westminster, rather than down in Kent. That proximity is clearly more than fortuitous - though the weight of traffic on Lambeth Bridge can give a somewhat misleading impression of journey times and make me yearn occasionally for the return of the long departed Archiepiscopal barge!
In fact, the Church in this land is in some senses older than England itself. Certainly before there was a united England, there was a united English Church. Churchmen played an important role in the development of the idea of England, as counsellors and advisers to the Anglo-Saxon kings. And sometimes as their critics, though some of my predecessors found it wise to offer their moral insights from the safety of northern France or Germany!
Despite the occasional falling-out, the Church and the King supported each other. And nowhere was this more clearly demonstrated than at the great coronation of King Edgar at Bath in 973. In a new and splendid ceremony, the King promised to fulfil the three duties of a Christian Monarch: to protect God's Church, to punish malefactors and to rule with justice and mercy. In return, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York anointed him, bestowing God’s blessing and setting him above all other lords. That promise - or covenant - has remained central to royal coronations right up to modern times.
A strong sense of continuity flows in other channels too. It is sometimes forgotten, conveniently or otherwise, that our constitutional arrangements in the United Kingdom vest sovereignty in the Monarch in Parliament under God. Not Parliament alone, but the Monarch in Parliament, and both accountable to a higher, indeed a divine, moral authority.
But if this can be forgotten, or too easily disregarded, can it be said to really matter? Or is it a bit like the Cross that perches on top of the Clock Tower housing Big Ben? It is there sure enough, but it is ornamental rather than instrumental. It has no bearing on whether the clock at Westminster strikes the hour or keeps good time.
My answer to the question ‘Does it matter?’ is a simple and direct one: yes, it matters a great deal. And I believe that it matters because so much else flows from it. It is through the sense of a higher, transcendent authority, to which we are all subject, that key concepts like service and duty, self-restraint and community, neighbourliness and solidarity, draw much of their sustaining strength and power. Without that sense, our human arrogance and selfishness, our inability to distinguish adequately between what is temporarily expedient and what serves the long-term common good, may all too easily get the better of us.
In England, the interweaving of church and state and nation have come down to us through the long and steadily evolving set of relationships known as establishment - a partnership that has also taken various forms in other countries at different times. No one would argue that the process has been simple; few that it has been without flaws. But the fact is, of course, that we cannot abstract ourselves from the particularity of history. My main purpose tonight - as the title of this address makes clear - is to look forward rather than backward. What does, what can, this set of relations offer now and for the future - both for the work of the Church and for society as a whole?
Some will have a categorical answer. It can be summed up in one word, and that word is nothing. Well, I have to say that, with respect, I think they are wrong, seriously wrong.
Establishment has evolved. One can only speculate as to how it may evolve in the future. What I am very clear about, however, is that no steps should be taken which would weaken the links between us, without the very closest examination, both of their historic significance and of their wider impact on the community as a whole.
From the perspective of the Church of England, establishment helps to underwrite the commitment of a national church to serve the entire community and to give form and substance to some of its deepest collective needs and aspirations. Part of the expression of that commitment may be so deep-rooted that it is taken utterly for granted as right and proper. At times of national celebration or mourning, for example, we expect great cathedrals to be a focal point of attention. That was true in the aftermath of the tragedies of September 11 last year. It was true earlier this month with the passing away of the Queen Mother. It will be the case again in June when we celebrate and give thanks at the Queen’s Golden Jubilee.
At the regional level, Church of England bishops play major roles as community as well as spiritual leaders. Some are now being asked for example to chair bodies considering the implications of devolution; requests that reflect their standing as independent and respected senior figures strongly committed to the wellbeing of their areas.
But it is at the local level, perhaps, that the commitment that establishment underpins is most characteristic. The Church of England alone among religious groupings has a comprehensive network of parishes and priests covering the entire country. Some thirteen thousand parishes in all, offering a ministry that is available to every member of the community. The strength and value of that undertaking was well demonstrated during the foot and mouth crisis last year, when local networks based round churches and parishes provided a vital life-line.
In urban and industrial communities too, the draining away of services and resources at periods of economic hardship has meant that the parish priest has been at times a crucial focus for keeping beleaguered neighbourhoods afloat and for breathing into them a vision of new life and worth and purpose. Sometimes, the parish priest is the only professional person still living in the area he or she serves.
Now I am not claiming for a moment that all these things would automatically cease were not the Church of England - to put it formally - ‘by law established.’ I can say with both pride and conviction that I do not believe it conceivable that the Church of England would willingly walk away from such commitments. But I do think there is a risk that over a period of time the open and inclusive culture of the Church of England, the range of its partnership and involvements, might tend to become thinner and narrower. There would be the likelihood, it seems to me, of a greater focus on looking after one’s own; a tendency to regard the church community as more closed and self-contained.
Of course, all of this interprets the Church and its interaction with the wider community in what might be called institutional terms. It is based primarily upon an understanding of the church as a big, national organisation with the equivalent of members and branches, with fields of social activity and engagement, not entirely dissimilar from a very substantial NGO or voluntary organisation. In one sense, of course, that is a fair description and understanding. The Church of England is, in reality, the biggest voluntary organisation in the country. The range of its commitments and participation in the life of the national community is probably unparalleled. In education alone, the Church of England has one in four primary schools. Through agencies like the Church Urban Fund, it is involved in hundreds of grassroots projects supporting the most poor and marginalised members of society. Through its involvement in Christian Aid and through diocesan and other links overseas, it also seeks to support some of our most needy fellow human beings in countries round the world.
But none of this does full justice to the fact that the Church has a deeper life and purpose. It is also the body of Christ, and at its heart is a set of spiritual values and beliefs that look beyond both time and place to eternity. It is here to draw people to the claims of Jesus Christ and to build the kingdom of God in the hearts and minds of men and women.
This is the point at which many, who are generally sympathetic to the Church and its role in society, tend to part company. They find it difficult to accept the claims of Christianity and are in some cases troubled and unsettled by those of us whose lives are shaped by it. From a Christian perspective, I am of course saddened by this, but I am also saddened by those people of faith who seem to think that it is only fellow believers who can really be inspired to build their life round ideas of service and selflessness, round a sense of the inalienable dignity and worth of all humanity. The implication seems to be sometimes that others are just playing at it or doing it for some ulterior, self-serving motive.
This is not only wrong-headed; it misses a fundamental point. The values inherent in Christianity, and one needs to include here other faith traditions - including the Jewish, to which Christians owe a great deal - are fundamental to the historical development of our culture and civilisation, our concepts of justice and dignity, of service to others, and above all our understanding of the transforming power of love.
I have already mentioned the Church’s role in education, which as many of you will know, here in England predates state provision. But a similar point can be made about many other aspects of society: about medicine and health care, about our legal system, about scientific research.
The reality is that Christianity has played a profound role in shaping the values and aspirations, institutions and forms of our society through the ages. I believe that it has been an overwhelmingly positive influence and remains crucial today for the sense of moral purpose and shared endeavour of the nation. I heed the warning of T.S. Eliot that a people without religion will in the end find that it has nothing to live for.
My concern is that without a sustaining belief in a source of moral authority lying beyond the individual's desires and ambitions, there is a real danger that principles may be reduced to a matter of private opinion. Questions of right and wrong may become merely relative to what each person feels, so long as no actual harm is done to anyone else. I fear that the privatisation of morality threatens to undermine our sense of cohesion, as society itself is broken down into a multiplicity of individual atoms; each doing its own thing with no commitment to agreed moral goals.
In today's world, of course, we shall not all agree about the precise source of authority which validates these values. But we need to understand that without the faith, hope and love that God plants in human hearts, without the commitment to living by a sturdy code of moral values, generation after generation, our collective prospects will be weakened. Without honesty, trust, faithfulness to an obligation, respect for the rights and interests of others and love of neighbour, civilised society falls apart.
I believe that process would become all the more pronounced in a society that abandoned its historic spiritual framework in favour of an avowedly secular one. Removing the spiritual underpinning of the state would inevitably tend to cast religion as a purely private matter; one of a range of life-style options, like buying organic food or living in the country, of no greater public or communal import perhaps than, say, stamp collecting or bird-watching.
Some would argue that the lessons of September 11th should point us firmly in that direction: that religion really has to be taken out of the public and the political arena and carefully corralled in the church and temple, synagogue and mosque, thereby making the world safe for its secular future.
Now is not the time or place for a detailed debate about what September 11th tells us about religion and politics. But those who would dwell on the misuse of religion in world affairs might also like to reflect upon the mass slaughter of civilians under the messianic, but secular, regimes presided over by Stalin, Hitler and Pol Pot. These, it can be argued, are examples where the absence of true religion, and the abandonment of basic moral values anchored in it, helped to make genocide both possible and, shamefully, acceptable.
Overall, I believe that far from clinching the case for the close confining of religion as a dangerous and potentially destructive force, September 11th challenges us anew to incorporate the best of what faith communities have to offer into contemporary society for the well-being of all.
Once again, I believe that the historic framework of establishment can serve us well here. That doubtless will seem odd to those reared on the view that the established status of the Church of England is all about privilege. Other believers, Christian and non-Christian, are placed, it is argued, in a position of disadvantage. So how can an apparently exclusive concept like establishment nurture a model of greater religious inclusivity and involvement?
The first thing I would say is that the privileges conferred on the Church of England by establishment in the twenty-first century can be easily overstated. They include for example the dubious ‘privilege’ of shouldering the huge financial burden of the upkeep of much of the nation’s most precious architectural heritage. This, incidentally, is a burden that does not have to be borne entirely by the Church in the secular state of France. There, it is the state that pays for the upkeep of historic churches.
In any case, an attempt to interpret establishment today as an exclusive provision, hostile to all others, would simply fly in the face of reality. Of course, it is the case that history hands down to us an inheritance with challenging elements. The intermittent public debate over the Act of Settlement, for example, reflects that fact. Understandably, the debate tends to focus on the provisions concerning Roman Catholics.
I certainly have no wish to add to a sense of grievance, wherever it is genuinely felt. So, I trust I will not be misunderstood or misinterpreted if I simply note that some of the loudest voices raised in the debate on this subject are not religious - neither Roman Catholic nor those from other faith communities, to whom, incidentally, parts of the Act would also apply.
Instead, the loudest voices tend to be those backing a clearly secular, and at times republican, agenda. It would be most unfortunate if presenting issues about religious allegiance were to be used as a stalking horse for another campaign altogether.
As I indicated earlier, the Church of England’s own understanding of establishment is centred squarely on the concept of service - not of privilege. And what we contemplate as establishment today is clearly very different from, say, two centuries ago, when the dominance of the Church of England as a religious point of reference in virtually every area of public life had a very different feel and impact.
Within the Christian traditions, I rejoice that in recent decades, and especially over the last ten years or so, ties have become so much stronger. And as they develop, there are new challenges for us all. For example, I hope our deepening ecumenical partnerships will lead the Roman Catholic Church to a new understanding of Anglican Orders, which to Roman Catholics officially remain ‘null and void’. Separately, I also note that Anglicans are re-examining their understanding of issues surrounding the Orders of the Free Churches. Such developments may also impact, in time, on the continuing evolution of establishment.
Of course, if one looks outward again to the wider world, there are those who regard the engagement with government and state that flows from establishment as compromising or demeaning, or even potentially corrupting - for the Church I assume that is, not for government! They see it as constraining the prophetic voice of the Church, making it too much part of ‘The Establishment’ with a capital E, leaving it unable or unwilling to speak truth to power. It is a rather odd argument in some ways - especially when you reflect that the enduring caricature of the priest remains that of an unworldly innocent of utopian inclinations. It would seem on this basis that the alleged risks associated with establishment have had very limited effect over the last five hundred years.
Certainly, there are potential risks that go with this kind of engagement. But from my own experience, I do not feel that establishment has constrained criticism or plain speaking when appropriate. Nor, as I recall, was that a charge levelled against my immediate predecessor. Indeed, I seem to recall the Church of England being described more than once in the nineteen-eighties as the ‘main opposition.’
It seems to me that the Church of England’s strong commitment to being involved in the life of the nation makes it more, rather than less, likely to speak out. It sees and hears a great deal. That knowledge and experience surely provide the soundest basis from which to comment. And I can assure you that we do - not always publicly and at maximum volume, but in the way that we consider to be most likely, at the time and on the issue in question, to yield results. For it also seems to me morally incumbent upon governments that have a say in the life of a Church to listen carefully when that Church has something to share which it regards as important. Again, that has certainly been my own experience.
Part of the Church’s service - born out of establishment - must be on behalf of faith generally. That is the basis on which bishops in the House of Lords have interpreted aspects of their role. It is also the basis from which we have strongly supported the broadening of the faith presence in a reformed Second Chamber.
We are committed to what I would call a ‘hospitable establishment’. Hospitality requires a host. So, it is part of our role, I believe, to seek to provide space and access, opportunity and the right atmosphere for the many dealings and interactions between faith communities and the wider society, however and wherever we can. As, I said, we seek to do this as a servant not as a master. There is nothing worse than a condescending host or one who seeks to hog the limelight incessantly.
No one pretends that establishment does not involve challenges; no one doubts that it will continue to evolve and develop as it has always done. Equally, no one should pretend that the secular agenda to separate church and state would not have far-reaching consequences.
It is interesting that moving towards a secular basis for the state is something that many leaders of other faith communities strongly oppose. They see in establishment and the historically rooted role of the Church of England an important protection against an unwanted and possibly unstable outcome. Those who dismiss establishment as the vestigial remains of religious privilege risk dishonouring not only the Church but also the concerns and aspirations of many other faith communities, whose rights they might claim to be championing.
This also provides a useful setting for the comment some years back by the Prince of Wales about understanding the role of the Sovereign as ‘Defender of Faith.’ Without compromising in any way the centrality of Christianity and the Church of England to the spiritual life of the nation, it chimes well, I believe, with the concept of a ‘hospitable’ establishment to which I referred earlier.
It also chimes with the observation of that distinguished Anglican student of Islam, Bishop Kenneth Cragg, who has spoken of the way in which the concept of ‘hospitality’ in relations between different faiths is linked crucially to the idea of ‘home.’ Put simply, in order to be hospitable to others, one first needs a home of one’s own.
For we live in an increasingly rootless society. The patterns of our lives seem to become ever more provisional, improvised and at times, random. Of course, there is a sense in which mobility and novelty, chance and improvisation, can be both exciting and stimulating. The cult of the new clearly has some lasting appeal. I am certainly no enemy of change. I think any objective view of my time as Archbishop of Canterbury would give the lie to that. And I have always seen honest doubt and a questioning spirit as two of faith’s most stimulating friends.
But there is a sense in which we all need roots, all need security. Roots earth us in the rich soil of our shared history and traditions. Not, I believe, so that we are mired there, earth-bound and unable to move and develop, but so that we are able to draw strength and vitality for new growth and new flowering. Personal roots are important, but so are institutional ones - they are vital to the continuing organic growth and development of church and society and to our sense of moral purpose and direction.
I started this lecture with some St George’s Day reflections on England’s patron saint. But in thinking over the themes of this address, another symbol of England also came to mind. The Oak Tree. The oak, you might say, has deep roots in English soil and English tradition. The same is true of the Church of England. It too reaches a long way back into our history. Like the roots of the oak tree, the Church helps to hold things together; and like its spreading branches, the Church can offer shelter and make space for others to grow. When the winds of change blow - secularist or separatist - it is well enough established to offer sanctuary from the storm; it has withstood destructive squalls and hostile gusts.
The ecology of our national life is a rich and complex one, involving a constant process of growth and change and interaction. It is our human responsibility and duty to shape it to moral ends. It is this moral purpose which inspires the Church of England to go on helping to hold things together - root and branch - in the service of God and of humanity.
+ George Cantuar