WHY ANGLICANS STILL?

God save the nation: Gay bishops, dwindling congregations: the Anglican crisis continues, and some are calling for disestablishment. But, says Peter Hitchens, the link between Church and State is vital for our wellbeing (Peter Hitchens, The Spectator)

In a few unreconstructed Anglican churches the vicar still prays each week for the Queen in words identical to those used in the days of the first Elizabeth, ‘that under her we may be Godly and quietly governed; and grant unto her whole council, and to all that are in authority under her, that they may truly and indifferently minister justice, to the punishment of wickedness and vice, and to the maintenance of thy true religion and virtue’. These are all reflections of the invocations during the coronation service as the monarch is presented with the sword, ring, spurs, sceptre and crown, and reminded of the solemn duties which are the accompaniment of power. Nobody reading these things could doubt that the fundamental contract binding this country together is a Christian one, or imagine that it has no effect, even now. Others may manage without such a contract. They have different histories, different ways of keeping the sword in its sheath and remaining peaceful. But could we manage without our contract between Church and State? Or would its dissolution endanger us? Already there are many signs that the contract is breaking down, in the greater use of arbitrary power, increased disorder and declining trust between rulers and ruled.

That contract is governed by the belief that authority is only granted to those who hold it on condition that they exercise it according to a higher law which they cannot overrule or challenge. This is the secret English ideology. Here are the origins of the great ideas which, slowly growing in an uninvaded island, have brought about the unique combination of liberty and order for which we were once famous and which we passed on to a few other lucky nations. Law, which is divine in origin, is above power at all times. Actions are judged not only by the effects that they have now, but on an eternal measure, so that what we do here matters somewhere else and can be judged on some other scale apart from our own immediate advantage. The duty of the law, to discover what is right and just through precedent and reason, derives from this. So does the ability of the courts and of Parliament to question the absolute authority of the sovereign. And when the Reformation placed the Bible in the hands of every boy that drove the plough, the law became the property of the whole people, who obeyed it not because they were forced to but because they understood and shared the principles it embodied. Modern coronations are celebrations of our sovereignty over ourselves, as a free and Christian people.

What do the secularists offer as a substitute for this? What is the origin of the new Godless authority, and what restrains it from absolute, lawless power? The current government seems to think that the personal virtue of the Prime Minister, who appears to be a Christian of a very modern sort with a rather Marxist belief in the ‘hand of history’, should be enough to reassure us that we are in good hands. All other checks and balances, from the hereditary peers and the law lords to the old neutral Civil Service, are being ruthlessly reformed into equal-opportunity servants of party and state.After the case of Dr David Kelly and all that has followed, this is not terribly reassuring. Others might suggest that democracy itself is the rock on which our society is built. But democracy, without the restraint of law and tradition, easily turns into a tyranny of the majority. It has no special virtue of its own, and with its intolerance of minorities and its tendency to elective dictatorship and crowd-pleasing it often threatens liberty, without which democracy is not all that much use. The Thatcherites seemed to think that the market could replace religion, a folly that hastened their downfall and left them morally and culturally empty. As for the left-wing virtues of the egalitarian social conscience, unlike individual conscience this tends to lead people to think that their acts of power and war are justified, not restrained, by the higher good they serve. In many ways they are more autocratic--if they get the chance--then any mediaeval Christian monarch would have dared to be. History, they proclaim, will forgive them.

Well, perhaps it will, though it’s not clear whether such forgiveness is worth having and it depends quite a lot on who writes the history. But history is better at giving warnings than at giving absolution, and what it seems to show is that our liberties, laws and safety do have quite a lot to do with the existence of the Church of England by Law Established — and that a country whose parliament says its prayers and where bishops sit, whatever their private romantic inclinations, will be a better place to live than one which does not have these advantages.

The split with Rome never made much sense in the first place, but one wonders if now isn't the time to push for a reunification of the Church of England with the Catholic Church. It would especially help the cause of doctrinal conservatism. Posted by Orrin Judd at August 10, 2003 12:03 PM