So how will Justin Welby handle that tension? Rowan Williams’ decade in Lambeth Palace was occasionally difficult and often controversial, with the outgoing Archbishop wearily wishing his successor “the constitution of an ox and the skin of a rhinoceros.” Where Williams ”“ a Doctor of Philosophy ”“ began to irritate politicians and some parts of the press with his interventions, perhaps Welby’s background gives him a surer platform from which to speak?
“It gives me a public profile which is slightly different, but apart from that I have no more or less authority than Rowan Williams,” he insists. But there is, he admits, a clear difference. “I certainly have a less strong background in philosophy and ethics as a professional discipline”¦ certainly more experience of what happens in practice when you try and apply these things. And you need both.”
But how did that career in oil train him for the work he does today? Welby pauses. “I’m often asked that question. I never know the answer.” But the answer is this: Welby understands the world beyond the church.
I hope he lives into the tension.
Well, now that the [b]Bakersfield Californian[/b] has given them the publicity that Bishop Talton wanted, maybe they should write an article about the faithful Anglican Christians who left because their consciences wouldn’t let them let them stay.
Ooops, this should’ve appeared in the article about the Episcopal Church in Bakersfield. My bad!