The show, which features Tom Hollander as a well-meaning pro-gay inner-city liberal vicar, is “ great entertainment” but it “doesn’t truly tell the whole story,” according to the Most Rev Justin Welby.
Writing in the Radio Times about the Sandford St Martin Trust Awards, which celebrate programmes that explore the relevance of faith, Archbishop Welby says: “It would be no surprise if BBC2’s Rev makes the awards shortlist next year. The show amusingly depicts some of the challenges facing clergy up and down the country. But while it’s great entertainment, it doesn’t truly tell the whole story.
“I have a friend who runs a growing church in Reading city centre, filled with young people with no church background; I have another friend who has had to plant two new churches because his congregation is bursting at the seams.
“Other churches have few people but great impact, again with visionary and inspiring leadership….”
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I watched the first episode of the new series. The local imam was shown as gracious, his mosque as packed, his people as generous. The vicar was shown as bumbling, his church with a tiny congregation, his people not able or willing to give money for a community cause. This is the worldview of a metropolitan London media elite: mocking our own tradition, talking up the others on some kind of outdated multicultural spree. I can’t help but feel that somehow, deep down, there is a kind of self-hatred here: contempt for our traditions is surely contempt for all that has made us who we are. I shudder at the popularity of this series. A recent poll reported in the newspaper today says that the UK is the third most sceptical nation in Europe about religion, behind Denmark (1st) and France (2nd).