Daniel French | The Spectator columnists & writers

The C of E’s misguided obsession with statues

The Church of England has once again misunderstood the mood of the nation. Guidance published this week urges the country’s 12,500 parishes and 42 cathedrals to address, search out, assess and remove offensive artefacts of ‘contested heritage’. The framework follows the call by Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, for a review of church statues. Of course racism must be taken seriously, but I doubt I was the only cleric who, upon hearing this development, let out a loud groan. The edict is both a concession to advocates of divisive identity politics and a distraction from the more pressing issues on which the church should be focused. Covid unleashed untold misery and suffering across Britain, with the church being afforded a chance to play a leading role in healing divisions and championing national positivity.

Vicars like me are struggling in lockdown

A year of living through a pandemic has taken its toll on the best of us. Vicars like me are no exception. As a healthy and normally upbeat 52-year-old, this feeling of gloom is frighteningly new. Anecdotal stories from clergy friends tell a similar story to my own: the urge is to curl up and mask the misery with binge marathons of Netflix box sets. But this brings only short-term relief. A cursory look at social media posts show that a good number of vicars are struggling to keep it together. The pressures on vicars come from every quarter. Some vicars have been landed with the impossible task of maintaining empty churches as elderly volunteers withdraw to shield or isolate. I know one vicar who seems to have doubled up as a cleaner, flower captain, gardener, painter and a handyman, up ladders fixing broken windows.

What was the point of the Vicar of Dibley’s BLM sermon?

The first rule of preaching is not to be preachy – and it’s here that the Vicar of Dibley slips up in lecturing her parishioners on Black Lives Matter in an episode broadcast last night. When I am training curates, I show them Alan Bennett’s skit ‘Take a pew’ from Beyond the Fringe (1961), where a clergyman’s painful attempts at being hip are sunk by the rising of his sing-songy parsonical voice. Dawn French’s character would have been wise to watch too. The normally inoffensive sitcom, which is being broadcast this Christmas in a series of ten minute specials, features the TV vicar ‘taking the knee’. Surely this year, more than ever, we could have done without sermonising like this in a sitcom. Some sympathetic clergy are, of course, scrambling to the programme’s defence, proclaiming that this is ‘the’ Christmas sermon we all need to hear.

Vicars against lockdown

Is it time for vicars to speak out against lockdown? As an Anglican priest, I've watched in bemusement as some of my colleagues have waded in on Brexit, Black Lives Matter, or Dominic Cummings's trip to Barnard Castle. But why are many of these same voices silent on an issue that affects far more of us: the Prime Minister's drastic order for us to stay at home and the curtailing (again) of church services? The church used to pride itself on robust debate. It was a seedbed for intellectual giants who were not afraid to say their mind. But whatever happened to those colourful canons, dotty theologians, and rebellious bishops who made the Church of England so gloriously interesting, if not fun? To be fair to the CofE, there is at least now an acknowledgment of the possible harms of lockdown.

A Covid carol concert? No, thanks

To imagine that the Church of England could contemplate effectively cancelling Christmas may sound like the stuff of Dickensian melodrama or scripted out of the Grinch. Of course, not even the Pope has the power to erase the 25 December. But this year's church celebrations could be so muted that Christmas effectively becomes a minor feast. Just as exhausted people need their spirits lifted, toning down Christmas could be the final straw. Oliver Cromwell would be delighted. None of this might seem plausible, of course, until you consider the heavy handedness of church authorities during the initial lockdown. Parish churches were closed, even for private prayer, and vicars were banned from entering. While essential shops stayed open, it seemed that deep cleaning pews was beyond our volunteer capacity, unless the holy site was doubling up as a food bank, of course.

Salcombe and the tourist invasion of ‘Chelsea-on-Sea’

‘The invasion of ‘Chelsea-on-Sea’, screamed the headline on the Mail Online above a report of how Salcombe’s mayor had blasted ‘disrespectful tourists for failing to socially distance’. As the local vicar, I find myself hearing the consternation from all sides: tourists who don’t recognise themselves as ‘invaders’; shopkeepers and pub owners who rely on tourists for their livelihoods; and locals who are welcoming (or not) these people arriving for their summer holidays. This week’s heatwave has only heightened tensions and added to the influx of people arriving here. Roads are gridlocked, beaches packed and narrow streets filled with holidaymakers. The manager of the local tourist information board sums up the struggle to find spare accommodation: ‘It’s like Bethlehem; no room in the Inn.

Welby’s bid to placate statue topplers could backfire

I’m a Church of England vicar and I’m worried about the Archbishop of Canterbury’s planned review of statues and monuments. The church, we have been told, hopes to ‘play a leading role’ in facilitating ‘meaningful dialogue’ and apply ‘justice’ with ‘real outcomes’ in assessing statues. But what does this mean for churches like mine? Anglicanism prides itself on being a highbrow form of Christianity. It operates in subtleties and niceties. In Anglican-speak, the expectation is that a ‘review’ is a modest bureaucratic exercise where a few monuments are quietly mothballed into vestries and some ethnically diverse depictions of Christ commissioned. If so, there is little to worry about. But will that be enough for the statue topplers? I’m not convinced.

Could an underground church now emerge in Britain?

Coronavirus and the fallout from it could have been a chance for the Church of England to talk about the grand vision of Christian hope and mortality. The Bible warns us of plagues and pestilence. It tells us that we live in a broken world. It makes it clear this pandemic is far from unprecedented. Yet it also has a message of good news. Instead, too many of the Church’s senior figures have ditched this vision, choosing rather to scare us or play politics when it comes to coronavirus. This missed opportunity, sadly predictable, uncovers a deeper Anglican crisis than push button issues like gay bishops, transgender liturgies, or declining congregations. Ultimately it stems from a lack of confidence among bishops and theologians when it comes to the supernatural.

Today

The C of E’s misguided obsession with statues

The C of E’s misguided obsession with statues

Sunday

Vicars like me are struggling in lockdown

Vicars like me are struggling in lockdown

Tuesday

What was the point of the Vicar of Dibley’s BLM sermon?

What was the point of the Vicar of Dibley’s BLM sermon?

Tuesday

Vicars against lockdown

Vicars against lockdown

Friday

A Covid carol concert? No, thanks

A Covid carol concert? No, thanks

Thursday

Salcombe and the tourist invasion of ‘Chelsea-on-Sea’

Salcombe and the tourist invasion of ‘Chelsea-on-Sea’

Thursday

Welby’s bid to placate statue topplers could backfire

Welby’s bid to placate statue topplers could backfire

Monday

Could an underground church now emerge in Britain?

Could an underground church now emerge in Britain?