As Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams was a cerebral head on the shoulders of the Anglican Church. Now safely back in academia, he talks to Richard Nye about politics, faith, Magna Carta and why progress isn’t always what it seems.
June 1215 and Stephen Langton has a lot on his plate. After years of wrangling between King John and his barons, the Archbishop of Canterbury is set to broker a deal. Church rights, swift justice, feudal taxes: all this and more will feature in one of the most celebrated documents of all time. Its reputation as the fount of English liberty may have swelled to fantastical proportions down the years, but by the unexacting standards of the day, Magna Carta was a heavy-duty challenge to the iniquities of arbitrary rule.
Eight centuries on, Langton’s ghost can reflect on a good month’s work. True, both John and the barons violated Magna Carta before the last drop of ink was dry. Yet in time, the principles of this document – signed at Runnymede on June 15, 1215 – would capture the imagination, infuse English law and cross the Atlantic to inspire the American Constitution. No mean legacy to celebrate at its octocentenary – and Rowan Williams, one of Langton’s most recent successors as Archbishop, is happy to give it two cheers.
“It wasn’t the thing of romantic myth, but it did put down some markers,” he reflects. “The monarch was reined in, and there were principles of justice and religious freedom on which we’ve built. After Magna Carta we were no longer just a top-down society.”
A nuanced analysis from a man for whom thinking is practically a trademark. Now Master of Magdalene College Cambridge, Lord Williams of Oystermouth – as he has since become – had already enjoyed a distinguished academic career before his decade in the Chair of St Augustine, from 2002-12. His 11 languages range from Ancient Greek to Welsh, though he once confessed to a certain clumsiness of style in Russian. He only took it up, one reads, so as to study Dostoyevsky in the original.
When we spoke, Britain was midway through the recent, interminable election campaign, and Lord Williams had a characteristically cerebral prescription for the remainder.
“No more discussion,” he urged. “Just go away for three weeks and think about it.”
Advice which, no doubt, he himself pursued to a fault. He may be a self-confessed “hairy lefty”, but the idle caricature of a turbulent priest ideologically handcuffed to the state is clearly wide of the mark.
“A Christian in politics, whether of left or right, should begin by asking: ‘What would a society look like when it’s open to the grace of God?’ We mustn’t be sentimental about the state – it was, after all, responsible for all manner of tyrannies during the 20th Century. The temptation to equate state aid with Christian compassion is relatively recent: since the 1940s, in fact, when the welfare state really emerged.”
For all the persuasive pledges of an electorally febrile spring, Lord Williams is clear that politics can never provide more than partial relief for the problems of mankind. In this, as in other things, he rejects the Whig view of history: the idea that human affairs must inevitably tend towards freedom and progress.
“We’re inclined to see history as a tale of goodies and baddies, in which the goodies are the ones like us!” he reflects. “But the truth is far more nuanced. In the 17th century, the Parliamentarians were the progressive force, yet they ended up by giving us a military dictatorship. It was the Royalists who held on better to certain values.
“Things aren’t simply bound to get better all the time. For example – and I hope this won’t happen for ages – we may eventually have to choose between health and wealth. Do we want to maintain a minimum level of health provision, even at the expense of a better economy? Different goods are not always compatible. As Christians, we don’t do what we do just because it works, or because it puts us on the right side of history. We do it because it honours the dignity of humans made in the image of God.”
A “really serious democracy”, he says, is one which “enables really unpopular views to remain on the table”. Yet this is not a charter for unfettered expression. The victims of this year’s Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris were more a threat to civility, he feels, than martyrs for the cause of free speech.
“It’s a bit odd to regard freedom of expression as the freedom to offend. That is not a good place for us to be. You don’t build society by giving offence, but by patiently developing understanding.”
The low, lilting tones scarcely rise above a murmur, muffling the colours of a mind graced with wit as well as wisdom. As Archbishop, Lord Williams was sometimes accused of being too opaque, leading to misunderstandings over issues such as Sharia law. Yet his approach is neither pompous nor detached. Asked about the ontological necessity of Christ for salvation, he twinkles audibly.
“Ah yes,” he says, not missing a beat. “A big issue on the Clapham omnibus.”
Point taken. But put it like this. Does Lord Williams, with his liberal leanings, struggle with Christianity’s claims to a unique saving power? In omnibus speak, is heaven for Christians alone?
“Well, I’m a Christian because I think it’s true. Anyone who is finally reconciled with God is reconciled because of Jesus. Do they always know it? That’s not for me to say. It may be that somewhere in the intensity of their Judaism, or Hinduism, or whatever, Christ is at work.
“The Gospel is an attractive truth, but Christians shouldn’t get too involved in trying to sign people up. They may miss out on what God wants to do in that relationship. Working with people of other faiths can be colossally enriching.”
Does he think that God reaches out to people beyond the grave?
“I believe so, yes. As CS Lewis writes in The Great Divorce, it’s for us – not God – to close the conversation down. That’s not to say that what we do here doesn’t matter – it absolutely does. The decisions we make now affect those we make later, so it’s not just a case of saying that it will all come right in the end. There is no guarantee that a particular person will ever turn to God.”
A hopeful creed, nonetheless, but not without its troubling implications. For if divine love pursues sinners even beyond the veil, might not the camp guard – unrepentant here on Earth – share the blessings of his victims in heaven?
“I’m not comfortable with that, but I can’t rule it out,” reflects Lord Williams. “Bishop Leonard Wilson, who was jailed and tortured by the Japanese, later went to Japan to confirm one of his captors. If torturers and victims can be reconciled in this life, why not thereafter?”
Hope for unbelievers; hope beyond death; hope eternal even for the most benighted soul. A sudden, angry mooing fills the air: the sound of sacred cows being slain.
But then, Lord Williams is used to that. His decade at Canterbury was pocked by squabbles between traditionalists and liberals over issues such as gay clergy and women bishops. At times the whole fabric seemed ready to break beneath the strain: an Anglican Communion, if not quite prepared for the abattoir, then certainly ripe for intensive care.
And while the Church of England talked to itself, its membership continued in steady decline. Yet for many people in the wider world, unbelief has nothing to do with church politics: it has to do with the intractable problem of evil. Put simply: if God exists, why do the innocent suffer? For Lord Williams, the answer lies partly in what he calls the “membrane” between God and us that seems to hinder the success of our prayers.
“It’s as if certain forces in the world – selfishness and so on – prevent God from breaking through; keep the membrane thick, if you like. Even Christ, in his home town, couldn’t do any great works there. On the other hand, we never quite know what spiritual conditions are in place, so it’s always worth praying – even in seemingly hopeless situations. In Africa, for example, I’ve seen wonderful healing power break through. I have no problem with the idea of miracle.
“Then again, I sometimes find myself reminding people that we do ultimately die and that Christians are meant to be addressing that. We fall into the trap of thinking that we’re no more than bundles of desire; that technology will constantly make things better. It’s the Whig view of history again. We need always to be reminding ourselves that we’re actually deeply vulnerable after all.”
Caught between King John and those pesky barons, no doubt Rowan Williams’s illustrious predecessor was aware of that only too well.
Find out what's on in Surrey this month for the Magna Carta 800th anniversary
