IN HER presidential address on the Tuesday morning, the Archbishop of Canterbury said partially:
I stand here amongst you certainly not for the primary time, but for the primary time because the Archbishop of Canterbury. It is a humbling privilege to be called to serve on this role. It brings with it huge weight of responsibility, at a time when people like to remind me that the church faces significant challenges.
But when the wind and the waves are rocking the boat, I’m reminded that what I would like to do is to deal with Christ, who calms the waters and stills the wind. With your help and with God’s grace, I pray that I’m in a position to approach this ministry with calm, consistency and compassion — as we seek to be what the Church has for thus long been: a stable presence in an unstable world. . .
At my Confirmation of Election, I used to be deeply moved to be asked, through the Charge, to “help the Church love itself more . . . believing that its best days are still to return”. And I do imagine that that is true. Through every challenge, our hope in Christ stays — and our confidence within the Gospel, pretty much as good news for our nation and for God’s world, is just not shaken.
R.S. Thomas, in his poem “The Bright Field”, says:
I even have seen the sun break through
to light up a small field
for some time, and gone my way
and forgotten it. But that was the
pearl of great price, the one field that had
treasure in it.
I see God’s Kingdom, the pearl of great price, revealed in countless places across the Church of England and the Anglican Communion. I rejoice in every example I see of this . . . glimpsed in faithful, local, sensitive, intelligent ministry which embodies and speaks of the Kingdom. . .
I used to be also told during that Charge that I’m expected to be an evangelist, a pastor, a prayerful, penitent, and resilient disciple, and a teacher. I’m also to be faithful, prophetic, an indication of unity, trust, and accountability, and supply Christ-centred moral leadership, loving the Church in all its breadth and variety, and inspiring others to like her. I used to be told to work collegially and enabling the gifts of others to flourish.
Well, I’ll try. But what encourages me most within the trying is that I’m in the corporate of all those that are represented by that diverse and wonderful group of people that took part within the Confirmation of Election. . .
So, what form of Archbishop do I feel called to be? . . . I remain rooted in my first calling: to follow Christ, to know him — and to make him known on this planet. . .
And so, I feel that I even have been called to like and serve the diocese of Canterbury, the Church of England, and the Anglican Communion, not through developing latest programmes and initiatives, but by being a shepherd, who works collaboratively and in partnership, enabling others to flourish.
And I’ll work with you, Synod, with my fellow bishops, and with our national church bodies, striving to make sure that the Kingdom is being nurtured in all places — in parishes, chaplaincies, cathedrals, and schools, within the smallest and most fragile communities, in addition to the larger and more confident expressions of Church, wherever disciples seek to be salt and lightweight.
I even have all the time, in any leadership role, been committed to accountability and transparency. . . And nowhere is accountability more imperative than in relation to safeguarding, where previously we now have fallen tragically short. Safeguarding is a fundamental, non-negotiable responsibility, sharpened by our past failings and shaped by the work we still must do. I’m committed to bringing an approach of seriousness and focused direction to all matters regarding safeguarding in all contexts within the Church. This approach should be trauma-informed, put victims and survivors at the center of all we do, and be committed to proper independence. . .
We should be wholly committed to listening to victims and survivors, to independent scrutiny of our safeguarding practices, and to delivering timely and robust trauma-informed processes. We should be willing, all the time, for light to be shone on our actions and our decisions. We can only begin to rebuild trust and confidence through openness and integrity.
The role of the Archbishop of Canterbury is a fancy and difficult one. But at its heart is something profound and straightforward. Along with my fellow bishops, I’m called to share the hope that we now have present in Jesus Christ — and what which means for us all as individuals, and as a society. I pray that the thread running through my time as Archbishop can be that of nurturing confidence and hope, rooted not in institutions, but in God and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. With our confidence in God, we are able to imagine that indeed, the most effective is yet to return for the church that we love and nurture, and due to this fact for the world that the Church known as to serve.
It is typically said that hope is a muscle that we must construct and develop. In the seemingly not possible situations we see world wide, we must flex the muscle of hope, strengthening our sense of God’s work and presence on this planet. This doesn’t mean that we deny the challenges which can be in front of us — the challenges of inequality and injustice, the volatility of world politics, the climate crisis and more — but it surely means we are able to say with confidence that God is within the midst of us.
As a Church we now have many reasons to be hopeful. There is a visual sign of hope within the anecdotal and statistical evidence that, during the last 4 years, people have been returning to church. There are early indications of that rise in attendance and participation having continued last 12 months. Of course we should be cautious — these are early figures — however the trend is evident. People are returning to church. They are finding welcome, friendship, community, meaning, and purpose, and we rejoice with God in these green shoots of hope. . .
One of the glories of each the Anglican Communion and the Church of England is that we’re, and all the time have been, an intentional Church which embraces the breadth of traditions. Just as we must always never underplay our unity in Christ, it could be naïve of any of us to underplay the challenge our differences bring. Reflecting on the parable of the pearl of great price, we’d recall that pearls don’t come out of nowhere. Pearls are formed over an extended time frame due to grit within the oyster. There isn’t any pearl without grit.
For us, the grit often is available in the form of the challenges of difference, conflicts, and misunderstanding amongst ourselves. This grit is real — it is just not just uncomfortable — at times it could actually be deeply painful. At times, it is simple to be tempted to withdraw from each other or throw stones from a distance. But we’re limited in our understanding, fragile in our humanity, and in need of each other. Only by finding the humanity and the courage to stay in each other’s presence can we truly, as individuals and communities, turn out to be places where the pearl may be formed.
This doesn’t mean that we must always not challenge each other, as iron sharpens iron. But we do that all the time with kindness and all the time with a view to encourage each other. We do that with a view to construct each other up, never to tear each other down. We do that because we’re called to interrupt bread together because the apostles did, around God’s table.
And so I pray that my ministry, shared with you, can be of hospitality and of breaking bread, that together we learn to be good guests and good hosts, that we’d create places where people can grow towards each other in trust, where difference is held with grace, where we provide deeply of ourselves and value the gift of each other, where we’re accountable for each other’s flourishing and where healing is feasible.
And I pray that our practice of hospitality could also be offered as a model to a polarised world, speaking into the deepening divides in our society with the potential of hope and of healing. Our calling is to live out that hope in a fractured and anxious world. And so, we must bridge the gap, for many who haven’t any experience of church, to come across Christ, by offering spaces of belonging, dignity, and conversation, where the love of God is encountered and the world is modified.
As a shepherd, I’ll strive to be calm, consistent, and compassionate to all on this role. I commit myself to enabling the Church to be the Church. May we proceed to supply ourselves in God’s service for God’s world: our hope rooted within the Gospel, and our confidence rooted in God, who holds the Church and its future in love.
Please pray for me as I pray for you. Amen.
The full speech may be read at: archbishopofcanterbury.org
Read more reports from the General Synod Digest here
