POLITICS
Bishops have apostolic succession from St Peter, but Lord Runcie has chosen a different disciple
BRUCE ANDERSON
Achbishop Runcie is an impressive figure. At parties — which he enjoys — he comes across not only as witty and clever, but as one who has had authority. He had a good war, serving in the greatest of all regi- ments, the Scots Guards, and winning not only an MC but the esteem of his brother officers, as betokened by the nickname 'Killer Runcie'. All this should count heavi- ly in his favour, but he has now behaved like a complete shit.
The Circumstances of his act of betrayal are irrelevant; the responsibility is his, and his alone. Royal confidences are like ther- monuclear material, to be transported, if at all, only under extreme security. But what does Lord Runcie do? A glass of wine, a tape-recorder — and the secrets entrusted to him are anyone's. He blabs away about Prince Charles at Jeffrey Archer's party; he burbles on for hours to Mr Carpenter, blurting out details of conversations which only took place because those to whom he was talking assumed that they could trust him. A solicitor or doctor who broke confi- dences could face dismissal from his profes- sion. No similar sanctions apply to Primates of all England, except infamy, from which there can be no reinstatement.
Lord Runcie told Mr Carpenter that he hoped to die before the biography appeared; his own death should have been the least of his concerns. His Lordship could have decided that he had information which ought to be available to future biog- raphers of King Charles III, who would be writing well after the monarch's death. At that stage, history can be allowed to break in on privacy. But this would not be a mat- ter of a 30-year rule: more like a 100-year rule. Lord Runcie should only have given his account if he could ensure that it was kept under embargo for many decades. If he had any moral sense at all, the Archbish- op would have recognised a duty to ensure an absolute separation between the inner secrets of his dealings with the royal family and the outer version suitable for a con- temporary biographer.
His Lordship has not predeceased the biography. He has left that fate to what remained of his reputation.
One might have thought that in respond- ing to Lord Runcie, other clerics would have been most concerned to apologise, and some letters to the Times did indeed express shame and anger. But there were exceptions, among them the Bishop of St Germans, Lord Runcie's former chaplain, who came to a conclusion which was both erroneous and insolent — that Prince Charles would be incapable of performing his royal duties.
The Bishop was referring to Lord Run- cie's comment that the Prince ... was so disenchanted with it [i.e. the C of E]. But he didn't have a consistent view, because he would go in with the Spectator gang on "the lovely language of the Prayer Book", but then he would say, "Instead of interfering with politics, the Church should be creating centres of healing in the inner cities ought to be bringing together the spiritual, the intellectual and the architectural."' What on earth is inconsistent about that? The Prince was arguing that in confronting the challenges of a new age, the Church should draw on its heritage of spirituality and wisdom. If that left the Archbishop baffled, the Prince of Wales was not to blame. Lord Runcie went on to.aay that 'these . .. were not seriously sustained argument[s] . . . My relationship with him was friendly, but I couldn't get much depth out of it.' One man was incapable of depth or serious argument; it was not the Prince of Wales.
It is almost as if the Archbishop resented the Prince's quest for spirituality; hence the dismissive _references to Laurens van der Post and to exploring Hinduism with people in inner cities. Princes of the Church have always had an uneasy relationship with mys- tics; Rome could never decide whether to canonise them or burn them: either way, it was never happy until they were safely dead. Any Archbishop might well feel that he should try to direct the Prince's spirituality into more orthodox channels — but that mis- sion requires a spiritual dimension, Over the past few days, a number of the Archbishop's acquaintances have expressed doubts as to his spiritual life: on the basis of the extracts, they are right. Lord Runcie seems more interested in gossip than in spirituality, the type of clergyman who is never happier than when snickering away over the teacups with some other old women.
Lord Runcie is also patronising about the Princess of Wales's intellect: When you began on abstract ideas, you could see her eyes cloud over.' Did it never occur to him to blame the poverty of his exposition? He claims that he wishes to support the Princess of Wales. In her contribution to the monar- chy's welfare, she deserves such support.
The Archbishop concluded that 'when it came to his concern to do something about the state of the country, I don't think [Prince Charles] took the Church of Eng- land very seriously.' Others might think that the Prince's assessment of a Church led by Lord Runcie was wholly justified.
In his attack on Prince Charles, the Bish- op of St Germans tried to buttress the insults with bad history; he seems to believe that the monarchy is inextricably bound up with the Supreme Governorship of the Church of England. This is doubly in error. Prince Charles descends from monarchs who ruled England several centuries before Henry VIII seized the Church, and when he becomes King of Great Britain and Northern Ireland he will reign over three nations in which the Church of England is not by law established. Until 1802, our monarchs claimed the throne of France, a title more ancient then than the Governor- ship of the Church is now. If the Church of England were to opt for disestablishment or — a more likely danger — to become so giggling, undignified, wretched and con- temptible that no decent person would wish to remain associated with it, our monarchs could cut adrift, just as their predecessors renounced the claim to France.
There would be the question of corona- tions; it would be sad indeed if the succes- sors to St Augustine were no longer deemed worthy to officiate. But it is all too easy to imagine a future with Archbishops of Canterbury more unworthy of the See of St Augustine than the immediate pre- Reformation Popes were of the See of St Peter. The Church of England is in as big a mess now as the Western Church was in the mid-10th century, when Otto the Great swept down on Rome, sacked the Pope and most of the cardinals, put in his own men and gave the Church a new lease of life which lasted until a renewed German onslaught 550 years later. It is hard to con- ceive of any English equivalent of Ottonian measures, but the survival of the Church of England may require nothing less, It certainly does require an expunging of Runcieism, both the treachery and the inanity. When Lord Runcie was consecrat- ed as a bishop, he joined an apostolic suc- cession stretching back to St Peter. He has now proved himself to be a worthy succes- sor of a different disciple: Judas Iscariot.
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