Williams says disestablished church not `the end of the world’

LONDON (RNS) Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams says he believes that severing the centuries-old ties between the Church of England and the British government would “by no means (be) the end of the world.” The comment, in an interview with the British magazine New Statesman, was one of the Anglican leader’s most outspoken statements to […]

LONDON (RNS) Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams says he believes that severing the centuries-old ties between the Church of England and the British government would “by no means (be) the end of the world.”

The comment, in an interview with the British magazine New Statesman, was one of the Anglican leader’s most outspoken statements to date on the touchy issue of church and state in Great Britain.


Williams made it clear that he expects no disestablishment of the Church of England anytime soon, but that “I can see that it’s by no means the end of the world if the establishment disappears.”

The Church of England was formed in the 16th-century break from Roman Catholicism, with the English monarch-currently Queen Elizabeth II-as its head. Later, the prime minister became responsible for senior church appointments.

The arrangement gives the Anglican church a special link with the state that is denied other religions. It also means that laws passed by the church’s governing synod are subject to approval by Parliament.

At the moment, Williams told the BBC that the church’s special position is, in fact, “a helpful umbrella for other faiths” in providing “a foot in the door of secular society.”

“I’d be very loath to lose that,” he said. “I think society would lose from it as well.”

Still, Williams emphasized his belief that “the church exists because of God, not because of the state.”

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