A good man in a naughty world
William Oddie
KNOW THE TRUTH by George Carey HarperCollins, £25, pp. 468, ISBN 0007120303 A11 Archbishops of Canterbury fail. Dr Carey quotes Archbishop Cosmo Gordon Lang's famous dictum: 'The post is impossible for one man to do, but only one man can do it.' It is not simply that there is too much for one man to do. The real problem is that the internal contradictions of Anglicanism have become impossible to resolve. What do Anglicans believe? Archbishop Lang could have referred an enquirer to the catechism of the Book of Common Prayer. But that shiny little black volume is no longer to be found in most churches today, and the possibilities for schism and chaos have multiplied.
Poor Dr Carey. He cannot be accused of ever having wanted this poisoned chalice; his appointment was as much a shock to him as it was to everyone else. That night, he confided his feelings to his diary: 'Had a terrible night and simply could not sleep. Fear was present. Will I be ridiculed and mocked for my lack of experience? . . . What an awesome responsibility.'
All too soon, his fears were to be realised; ridiculed and mocked he often was, for reasons which do not necessarily reflect discredit on him. It is difficult at times not to read his memoirs as the confessions of an innocent abroad. His strong and simple faith shines through this narrative of a good man facing an often complex and menacing reality; but the effect, it has to be said, is often not a little absurd. It is surely hard to read with a straight face Dr Carey's distinctly Adrian Moleish account of the invasion of his pulpit in Canterbury cathedral by Peter Tatchell and a group of gay activists:
appealing to the better side of the interlopers,
but this fell on deaf ears. I sought to attract
some attention so that someone might assist [this is all happening in a packed cathedral]. I was relieved when I saw a senior police officer in the Lord Mayor's party getting police reinforce ments ... The problem was that although the pul pit can hold up to eight people, the stairs up to it ... can only be ascended by one person at a time.
But despite Dr Carey's often attractive simplicity and its accompanying uncertainties, there is paradoxically also a streak of stubbornness, a refusal to take seriously the possibility that he might be wrong. When this was in defence of a clear consensus fidelium, it was arguably a strength; many would say, for instance, that his stand on the question of the blessing of homosexual 'marriages' was such an issue. He was well aware of the theological arguments on the other side (there is a fascinating account of a discussion in Lambeth Palace with, inter alia, Rowan Williams, then Archbishop of Wales, and Canon Jeffrey John); but having weighed the arguments he concluded that 'there was no .... consensus in the Anglican Communion nor in the wider Church for this even to be considered'; elsewhere he identifies the issue as 'a moral teaching shared with the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches'.
The trouble with his deployment of such arguments is that when they do not suit him they are introduced only to be dismissed. The Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches made their firm opposition to the ordination of women to the priesthood clear to him; his replies have about them an obdurate certitude that makes one blink. When Ann Widdecombe converted to Rome over the issue he wrote, regretting that they had not had 'the chance to chat', as he would have 'enjoyed explaining ... that one day the Roman Catholic Church will accept women priests'. One suspects that such a 'chat' might have been less enjoyable than Dr Carey imagines.
Dr Carey was the 103rd Archbishop of Canterbury; and he is the first to write his memoirs — unless, that is, one counts Humphrey Carpenter's riveting biography of Dr Carey's predecessor, Robert Runcie, which was based so heavily on long taped interviews that it almost counts as autobiography. Dr Runcie was heavily criticised for his revelations about the royals in general and the Princess of Wales in particular. Dr Carey is even more indiscreet. He refused calls to condemn the royal couple's adultery on the grounds that 'to have done so would have been a betrayal of my duty of pastoral concern'. But it does not seem to have occurred to him that to reveal even the fact of his conversations with them, let alone their content, is just as much a betrayal. He tells us of 'claims ... that I was prone to gaffes'; this is surely the biggest and most incomprehensible of all. An official complaint has now been lodged against him, and if it goes the wrong way he could have his licence to officiate removed. It would be a sad end to a dedicated and often courageous attempt to be true to a call he saw as coming from God.
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