17.01.2002

Separate church and state

George Carey's decision, announced last week, to take early retirement from his job as archbishop of Canterbury has thrown a large cat among the ecclesiastical pigeons. The succession battle, already marked by leaks, counter-leaks and a racism controversy, seems set to make last year's bitter Tory leadership contest look like the proverbial vicarage tea party. After some 11 years in office, Carey has clearly had enough. His tenure involved the decision to ordain women as priests, a move which led to the embarrassing defection of many high church clergy to catholicism; much of his time was spent counselling the dysfunctional Windsor family through a series of lurid marriage break-ups; and his proclaimed era of evangelism saw a continuing downward drift in church attendance. This is down to around 15% on the latest available figures, to the point where, according to the Church Times, only 968,800 professed Anglicans actually attend church services. Despite the fact that in every opinion poll a majority of respondents say that they believe in god, Carey was honest enough last year to say that from his point of view we live in an atheist society. Why should Marxists take any interest in the shenanigans surrounding exactly who should become the next primate of all England and head of the Anglican communion throughout the world? There is, of course, the amusement value, but more seriously there is the fact that in this country, unique among bourgeois democracies, we have a state religion founded on a church "by law established". This is an institution that has historically been, and still is, deeply enmeshed in the relations of power and privilege that flow from the crown and the state. Since the reformation, with the sole exception of the catholic queen Mary (1553-1558), its titular head or "supreme governor" has been the reigning protestant monarch, who among other resplendent titles rejoices in that of fidei defensor, "defender of the faith". This was bestowed, ironically in the light of subsequent events, on Henry VIII for his excellent writings attacking Martin Luther's heretical views on the doctrine of transubstantiation. The heir apparent to the title of fidei defensor is none other than Charles, prince of Wales, a (more or less) self-confessed adulterer. When he takes time off from chatting with his begonias, musing on eastern mysticism, slaughtering wildlife, and fornicating with his mistress, Charles - a "devout Anglican" - tells us of his desire on his accession, if he ever gets that far, to become, in deference to our multicultural society, the "defender of faith", rather than of "the faith". His evident desire, as a divorced man, to marry the divorcee Mrs Camilla Parker-Bowles represents a looming crisis for the church of England and the state. This may perhaps be kin to the crisis preceding the abdication of Edward VIII, and has much to do with who shall succeed Carey as primate. The decision rests, on the basis of another bizarre historical twist, with Tony Blair. Taking no account of the fact that the Church of England has its own more or less democratically elected synod, a special committee of the crown appointments commission will convene and pass to the prime minister the names of two candidates for the office, of which Blair would normally submit one to the palace. He could, however, follow the example of Thatcher in the case of Carey and submit his own preferred successor. Perhaps exercising this exclusive form of patronage would be a welcome break from acting as president Bush's global messenger boy and, among other things, from engaging in the futile exercise of producing a credible policy for the railways. Citing what they call "inside information" (presumably from terrestrial rather than heavenly sources), the bookmakers William Hill have decided that the favourite for Canterbury is the bishop of Rochester, Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, at odds of 3/1. The problem with his lordship of Rochester is that he is not only not British but is also not white. In fact, to use the terms employed by one Anglican cleric, he is a "Paki papist". "Paki" for the obvious reason that he was born in Pakistan and began his ministry there; a "papist" because, in his teens he attended a catholic school and was a communicant member of the Roman church. Opponents of Nazir-Ali's candidacy have indulged in a blatant smear campaign. Leaks to national newspapers have claimed, among other things, he has been previously married, he 'bought' his first bishopric and he fabricated his academic qualifications. A secret enquiry by the church authorities found that these allegations were false, although Nazir-Ali maintains, in all humility, that he is not worthy to become the next archbishop. Understandably, he has personally commented on the fact that, "One comes across racism in all sorts of places and, in my experience, no place is exemplary" (Daily Mail January 14). Interestingly, the paper began its reporting of Nazir-Ali's comments with the statement that, "The front runner in the increasingly vicious battle for the archbishop of Canterbury's job played the race card yesterday." The palace's own choice for primate has already been made clear, just in case Tony fails to get the message. The bishop of London, Richard Chartres, a sound lower middle class boy made good, is a traditionalist, sceptical about women priests, but who reportedly has no scruples about an eventual church marriage for Charles and Camilla. As one paper put it, "The men are very close and the prince thinks he is great" (The Sunday Telegraph January 13). The Church of England is at the heart of the anti-democratic constitutional monarchy system of the UK state. When it comes to class relations, we should not forget, for example, that it is a major institutional shareholder, including in property - assets derived ultimately from tithes and from the benefactions of generations of believers who hoped thereby to effect their passage into paradise. The CPGB quite correctly included a section (3.17) on religion in its supplement 'Towards a common Socialist Alliance programme', which is based on the relevant passage in the CPGB's own draft programme. In terms of immediate demands, the document calls for the complete separation of church and state. This means not just the formal disestablishment of the Church of England - ie, the complete separation of church from state - but also the removal of all special privileged status accorded to this or any other religious body in political and social life, including the conduct of state-sponsored, legally enforced religious propaganda activity in schools and colleges. The freedom to propagate and practise religion, along with the freedom to conduct atheist propaganda, is, obviously, inseparable from that commitment to consistent democracy that characterises genuine communists. Michael Malkin