Church of england

Barometer | 27 April 2017

Pippa goes public Church of England lawyers ruled that the public must be allowed to attend the wedding of Pippa Middleton at St Mark’s Church, Englefield, Berkshire on 20 May. Other rulings that could put the dampers on your celebrity wedding: — Marriages are public services. All parishioners, and possibly all members of the public, must be let in ‘unless a genuine question of safety or security arises’. — It is not legally clear whether marriage services can be ticketed, but if they are then they must be publicised. — No video can be produced without the consent of the organist. Time off Jeremy Corbyn wants another four public holidays.

In defence of the Church of England

The Algerian government’s official tourist guide describes ‘the walled town of Beni Isguen — normally closed to foreigners — where the women, clad entirely in white, reveal only one eye to the outside world’. Rod Dreher’s Easter call to devout Christians to separate themselves as a community from what he believes to be the degeneracy of our western culture puts me in mind of that sad, disturbing place. Beni Isguen is one of the oasis towns near Ghardaia in southern Algeria. I visited many years ago and can be sure there has been little change since, for the community has clung to unchanging and uniting beliefs for hundreds of years.

Christians are now a minority – and need to act as one to survive

Hannah Roberts, an English Catholic friend, was once telling me about her family’s long history in Yorkshire. She spoke with yearning of what she had back home and how painful it is to live so far away. I wondered aloud why she and her American husband had emigrated to the United States from that idyllic landscape, the homeland she loved. ‘Because we wanted our children to have a chance to grow up Catholic,’ she said. It’s not that she feared losing them to the Church of England — it’s that she feared them losing Christianity itself. She and her husband Chris, an academic theologian, are now raising their four young children

The Spectator Podcast: Keeping the faith

On this week’s episode, we discuss the future of Christians as a minority group, consider whether Trump has found an ally in Britain, and dissect the 21st century phenomenon of the ‘flake’. First, with Easter just around the corner, the fate of Christianity in an increasingly secular Britain came under scrutiny. In this week’s magazine cover story, Rod Dreher advocates for ‘the Benedict option’, where Christian communities develop stronger personal identities. But Matthew Parris argues against this proposal, and they go head-to-head on the podcast. As Rod writes: “The collapse of religion in Britain has been perhaps the most striking feature of the last generation. The sheer pace of the decline has been recorded by

Give me the Anglican option

The Algerian government’s official tourist guide describes ‘the walled town of Beni Isguen — normally closed to foreigners — where the women, clad entirely in white, reveal only one eye to the outside world’. Rod Dreher’s Easter call to devout Christians to separate themselves as a community from what he believes to be the degeneracy of our western culture puts me in mind of that sad, disturbing place. Beni Isguen is one of the oasis towns near Ghardaia in southern Algeria. I visited many years ago and can be sure there has been little change since, for the community has clung to unchanging and uniting beliefs for hundreds of years.

The Queen is a true Christian leader. But what about Prince Charles, who seems more interested in worshipping himself?

Every time I suggest on social media that the Queen is Britain’s most inspiring Christian leader, there’s a chorus of agreement – with Catholic voices among the loudest, interestingly. Churchgoers in this country have noticed that Her Majesty is quietly uncompromising about her beliefs; her Christmas message doesn’t skate over the teaching that the infant Jesus is God incarnate: typically, it affirms it without qualification. But, as of this month, the Queen has been reigning for 65 years. Attention is inevitably focussing on the next Supreme Governor of the Church of England, presumably Prince Charles. And here the same people who recognise his mother as a Christian exemplar tend to

The Church of England should be agnostic towards homosexuality

Let me state the obvious for a moment: the Church of England does not know what line to take on homosexuality. The traditional line, that it is contrary to God’s will, is opposed by most Anglicans. The clergy in General Synod showed their opposition last week by refusing to approve a report by the bishops that upheld the old line. But the minority that likes the traditional teaching is not for budging. Does the leadership have the stomach to pursue a reform that will create a schism? No. Is a compromise possible? In theory, the Church could drop the ban on gay clergy and the ban on the blessing of gay

Camp vicars and smug gossips: is this really the Church of England’s best look?

I have mixed feelings about ‘the Reverend Richard Coles’, whose new
memoir I have just read. It’s great that a vicar has such high
 visibility – and why shouldn’t there be one or two luvvie-priests, who
 mix smoothly with celebs? And I have no doubt that he combines this
 with being an excellent parish priest, preaching great sermons,
 patiently attending to the needy (in a way that the rest of us don’t). And yet…how shall I put this? It’s not totally ideal that the most
 famous vicar of our day represents the camp-smug-gossipy wing of the church. His love of vestments and incense and saucy humour is in a 
long and

Who will be London’s next bishop?

In typical theatrical style, the outgoing Bishop of London, Richard Chartres, he of the sonorous voice and imposing beard, ‘never knowingly underdressed’, ‘the last of the great prince bishops’, attended his final service as bishop at last Thursday’s liturgy at St Paul’s Cathedral for Candlemas — the day on which Simeon spoke the words, ‘Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.’ Some say Chartres has become rather too fond of dining with the royal family recently and has neglected the duller duty of getting to know his lesser clergy; but the general consensus is that, in his 21 years in the post, through sheer charm and force of

How the Church of England changed my life

It was October 2010 the night the priest came to our door. The knock startled Tim’s dullard beagle into a howl just as Tim’s mother was serving up dinner. She and her husband had flown in from New York a few weeks earlier to care for their dying son. Tim and I had moved to London the year before. Our friends — newsroom colleagues — visited sometimes, though only with advance notice. Tim’s brain tumour had severely blunted his wit. I was prone to crying jags. As a couple, we did not inspire drop-ins. Tim’s mother told us to start eating and went to answer the knock. The beagle ricocheted

Letters | 12 January 2017

Freudian slap Sir: In his Notes (7 January), Charles Moore explores the uncharacteristic reaction of Matthew Parris to the referendum result. What is most puzzling about Parris and so many others like him is that their present outrage has so little in common with their rather tepid support for the EU in the run-up to the vote. Such a mismatch of cause and effect suggests a Freudian explanation may be appropriate. When an impulse is felt to be so dire that it cannot be expressed, a new object is substituted and the feelings are thus ventilated. Yet what original threat could be so catastrophic as to provoke such end-of-our-world hysteria

A priest at the door

It was October 2010 the night the priest came to our door. The knock startled Tim’s dullard beagle into a howl just as Tim’s mother was serving up dinner. She and her husband had flown in from New York a few weeks earlier to care for their dying son. Tim and I had moved to London the year before. Our friends — newsroom colleagues — visited sometimes, though only with advance notice. Tim’s brain tumour had severely blunted his wit. I was prone to crying jags. As a couple, we did not inspire drop-ins. Tim’s mother told us to start eating and went to answer the knock. The beagle ricocheted

In praise of Advent

The first Sunday of Advent is 27 November this year. For those of us who prefer Advent services to Christmas ones, the earlier the better, frankly. I relish the frisson of gloom, foreboding and fear of judgment you get at Advent, alongside the hope. ‘The Holly and the Ivy’ is all very well, but it’s the minor chord at the end of ‘O Come, O Come, Emmanuel’ that I crave. So do thousands of others, it seems. The Advent service at Salisbury Cathedral, for example, is so oversubscribed these days that it’s repeated on three consecutive evenings, starting on the Friday before Advent Sunday. So, tears barely dry from the

Brexit, Trump and the pious rage of the liberal clergy

Here are some statistics you’re unlikely to hear on Thought for the Day. Churchgoers in America backed Trump by 56 to 42 per cent – while six out of ten British Christians backed Brexit. Now, clearly these aren’t identical constituencies: I didn’t spot much enthusiasm for the US president-elect among Christian Leave voters. But we can spot one shared trend. Churchgoers on both sides of the Atlantic ignored the earnest but quietly hysterical entreaties of liberal church leaders to spurn Leave and Trump. (You might say: American evangelicals don’t have left-leaning bishops – but American Catholics most certainly do, and they still voted for Donald Trump by 52 to 45 per cent.) What

Vicar, can you spare a dime?

‘I am a Messianic Jew,’ says the jittery young man at the rectory door. He is pale and drawn, with a close-shaven scalp and several days of bristles on a sharp chin. The bloodshot eyes search for me swimmingly. ‘A Jew, a Messianic Jew,’ he emphasises. I should have a clever rejoinder, but I am assessing if he has a knife so I only manage, ‘Ah yes, and how can I help?’ ‘Is this you?’ is thrown back at me, as he jabs his finger at the screen of his phone and then holds it up to my face like a mirror. I admit my identity (an image from our

Why didn’t I celebrate Oscar Wilde’s birthday?

On Wednesday 19 October at the Grosvenor House Hotel on Park Lane in London, a reception was held to celebrate Oscar Wilde’s birthday. Invited by the excellent Gyles Brandreth, I arrived in good time. But as I approached the doors of the reception room, something stopped me. These are the facts. But what is the explanation? A few months ago Boris Johnson wrote two newspaper columns, one in favour of a proposition, one against. As an exercise in clearing one’s mind, the approach has much to commend it. So, to clear my own mind, let me try the same plan. There follow two alternative submissions of the diary item that

Letters | 20 October 2016

Russia’s war crimes Sir: In his article ‘Vanity Bombing’ (15 October), Simon Jenkins quivers with contempt at MPs digging ‘deep into the jaded rhetoric of a superannuated great power’ and ‘shouting adjectives and banging drums’. But he does Parliament and decent, careful motivation a deep disservice. I don’t know what preceded his splenetic outburst, but Syrian analysis deserves better. The position is very simple. The Russians are committing war crimes and using their position as a veto-wielding member of the United Nations Security Council to shield themselves from international humanitarian law. They are not bombing formations of Assad’s military; they are hitting hospitals with bunker-busting bombs and attacking civilians cowering in

Why cathedrals are soaring

Something strange is happening in the long decline of Christian Britain. We know that church attendance has plummeted two thirds since the 1960s. Barely half of Britons call themselves Christian and only a tiny group of these go near a church. Just 1.4 per cent regularly worship as Anglicans, and many of those do so for a privileged place in a church school. Yet one corner of the garden is blooming: the 42 cathedrals. At the end of the last century, cathedrals were faring no better than churches, with attendances falling sometimes by 5 per cent a year. With the new century, everything changed. Worship in almost all 42 Anglican

Pilgrimage’s progress

If Christian Britain is fading away, what will survive of it? One answer seems to be pilgrimage. In the past decade, 30 pilgrimage routes have been created or rediscovered; holy places have seen a 14 per cent growth in visitor numbers since 2013. These figures are recorded by a new organisation, the British Pilgrimage Trust, which wants to ‘revive the British pilgrimage tradition of making journeys on foot to holy places’. The BPT stresses that not all pilgrims are religious: ‘Bring your own beliefs’ is the slogan. Guy Hayward, who co-founded the BPT with Will Parsons, observes: ‘We have to tread very carefully around the language of spirituality and religion.’

Church attendance isn’t everything. It’s authenticity that counts

When there’s a story about Christianity in decline, or in crisis, you always get a few loudmouth lifestyle columnists gloating – sorry, imparting their secular wisdom. Barbara Ellen was not very surprised that a new report says that Christians (at 44 per cent) are now outnumbered by ‘Nones’ (at 48.5 per cent). After all, the main thing religion claims to offer is ‘community’, and in practice that probably means ‘sitting in a draughty hall with a Bible group and a digestive biscuit’. This is a good snapshot of secularist arrogance. If Ms Ellen attended a local group in which a genuine social mix assembled (unlike at her book group) in