Church of England

In the Telegraph Nigel Farndale calls on patriotic Englanders to rally in support of our ailing national church:

Is there a true Englishman alive who has not taken that word “kingdom” to mean, in a poetic sense at least, England? As well as worshipping Jesus, the Church of England also worships England. That is why its churches are so often adorned with regimental colours and roll calls of the Glorious Dead.

And here’s the rub. I feel an almost patriotic duty to defend the Church of England against its enemies. I hate to see it on its knees, not in prayer but in cowering submission to political correctness. I feel a deep emotional attachment to it. Affection is not too strong a word. Yet I am an atheist.

I wouldn't go as far to call myself an atheist, but I am agnostic; yet still, there's nothing that lifts my heart as much as the sight of an English parish church with a Cross of St George fluttering above it. Unfortunately the flying of England's national flag is about as close as the Church of England gets to being a national church. Rather than argue for a national parliament for England (as the Church of Scotland's leaders argued for a Scottish national parliament) bishops of the Church of England argued for England's balkanisation, many of them playing leading roles in England's dismemberment with the regional constitutional conventions and the Campaign for the English Regions.

Others, like Lord Carey, whose thoughts prompted Nigel Farndale's article, seem more interested in bolstering British identity than English identity:

Does it matter if we consign Britain to the detritus of history, concluding that it has served its useful purpose?

Indeed, some would argue, we should ditch it because it no longer has any relevance left. Once you have affirmed your identity as English, Scottish, Welsh or Irish, extra identities are unnecessary. I find this argument unconvincing. We are all used to multiple identities. I could say for myself, having been born in London, that I will always remain in some part a Londoner, an Englishmen, a Briton and a European. My wife, with Scottish blood flowing through her veins, will proudly affirm her Scottish identity which always becomes more visible when we go north of the border on holiday, as we did this summer, or when Scotland is playing England at any sport. She too, I am confident, would not see British and Scottish identities as either meaningless or in competition. Linda Colley shows in her book that Great Britain in 1707 was not at all a trinity of three self contained and self-conscious nations but more like a patchwork in which all three were cut through by strong regional attachments with porous boundaries. So it is today. This would not be affected if devolution proposals were to give England greater independence. It is possibly the case that anger and frustration at the present state of devolution has led some, but certainly not the majority, to prefer their English identity over British. What, however, would be the consequences if Scotland were to revert to a pre-1707 situation in which complete independence were the prize? We should all be the poorer, perhaps in more ways that we realise- culturally, economically, historically and socially.

The Archbishop of Canterbury is the spiritual leader of the Anglican Communion, of which the Church of England is the Mother Church, and due to his constitutional role the Archbishop of Canturbury is very much part of the British Establishment. The Church of England, like Parliament itself, extends its influence beyond England, often to the detriment of England, or to England's exclusion as a nation in its own right. The Church of England is England's national church to about the same degree that the Houses of Parliament can be called England's national parliament.

Nigel Farndale unwittingly sums this up near the beginning of his article:

To be British is to be one of Her Majesty’s subjects. It is also to be a member of the Church of England by proxy - unless you want to be awkward about it and opt for one of the other religions, or declare yourself an atheist.

And at its end:

I may no longer believe in God, but I still feel I belong to the Church of England. It’s called being British. One of Her Majesty’s subjects.

The Church of England is an Imperial Church in the same way that Westminster is an Imperial Parliament; Church and Parliament bound together through the Imperial Crown, under which we are British subjects (British Nationality Act 1948 notwithstanding).

When the Church of England starts acting like a national church, I will rally to it, but not before then.

Previously I wrote:

Given the attitude of the Church of England towards England the nation - with the honourable exception of John Sentamu - I think disestablishment and a name change is long overdue.

And yesterday up popped John Sentamu to deliver a speech that he alone amongst the Church of England's archbishops is capable or willing to make. 'Englishness', he says, 'is back on the agenda'.

Now I say, hold off on the disestablishment, and hold fire on the name change, but make this man the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Cranmer takes on the Bishops of England:

Our church bells are one of the glories of the Church of England and of English social life, so ringing them loud on our national day would be entirely appropriate. It would be a celebration of England’s national identity, which other nations manage to celebrate without apology. It is time for the English to express pride in who they are and give thanks for the Christian faith which forged a distinct identity. Ringing out the church bells would not be an expression of triumphalist nationalism or an assertion of superiority, but a celebration of all that is good about England, and an expression of thanks to God for the blessings and mercies he has bestowed.

Personally I think that if the Church of England is uncomfortable acting as a national church, then it should be disestablished and change its name to "The Anglican Church".

BritologyWatch offers a typically thought-provoking comment:

I think the Church is caught in a bit of a double bind. As the established Church, it is inevitably implicated in the British Establishment per se and has to play a careful political game. In this instance, as questions about the Church's established status have conveniently just been indirectly raised via the red herring of the Act of Succession, the Church does not want to rock the boat further by appearing to associate itself with the English 'nationalist' cause - an association that would inevitably be made, even if it were not intended, if the Church enthusiastically embraced the suggestion of ringing out the bells on St. George's Day. Clearly, the British Establishment does wish to suppress English nationalism and calls for an English parliament, etc. So I think the Church has been sent a message that if it wants to keep its established status, it should not undermine the British Establishment of which it is a part.

On the other hand, the CofE is established, precisely, as the Church for England. So it should be a national church and body that speaks for England both in its general public pronouncements and within the political Establishment. In fact, it is arguably the only official English voice and national institution within the British Establishment, which is one of the reasons why there are so many people who are keen to disestablish it.

In this area, the Church is essentially confronted with a dilemma as to whether it is primarily British or primarily English: a microcosm, in fact, for the dilemma and the decision confronting the whole of English society.

There may be some truth in what BritologyWatch has to say. However, if the England-Britain dilemma is a factor in the Church of England's attitude towards England the nation, then I think it is only a very small factor. The truth is that the Church of England is hideously politically correct. As an institution it believes, rightly or wrongly, that in order to be the established church it must conform to the politically correct dogma of the British State: Never risk offending anyone by asserting your own identity, unless you are a minority. And in attempting to be inoffensive to everyone, they've become nothing to everyone.

The bells of Gloucester Cathederal will sound for St George's Day but I expect that these churches will play dumb. For fear of offending whom exactly?

UPDATE

This letter in the Scotsman lends more credibility to Mr BritologyWatch's thoughts on the subject.

The latest CEP press release tackles the Church of England's inclination towards ignoring England's national day.

What the response of the bishops indicates is that the great majority of them share with both UK Government and the UK Establishment an attitude of disdain towards England, their country, the country of which they are the Established Church, an attitude of disdain towards English patriotic sentiment, something never found in Scotland, Wales and Ireland, an attitude not just one of indifference towards a sense of national identity and belonging, but also of hostility towards England itself as a distinct nation -their nation despite themselves. They are in England but not of it. Hostility towards the concept of Englishness runs very deep within the UK Government and Establishment to which the bishops belong.

It didn't always used to be that way.

"The Church of England is the most venerable and the most influential of all the factors which have gone into making English history and English character. Broadly and deeply planted in the land, mixed up with all our manners and customs, one of the main guarantees of our local government, and therefore one of the prime securities of our common liberties, the Church of England...is part of our history, part of our life, part of England itself." - Bishop George Bell

Given the attitude of the Church of England towards England the nation - with the honourable exception of John Sentamu - I think disestablishment and a name change is long overdue.