PROFILE The New Archbishop Of Canterbury

Press, Volume C, Issue 29474, 28 March 1961, Page 20

PROFILE The New Archbishop Of Canterbury

IBV

SIMON KAVANAUGH!

LONDON Dr. Arthur Michael Ramsey, Archbishop of York, treads the Pilgrims’ Way to Canterbury at a time when the Church of England badly needs driving leadership. As future Primate of England he must face the appalling apathy of a diminishing flock. For, out of 27 millions baptised in the name of Christ, only three million parishioners are registered as practising Christians. The new Archbishop of Canterbury is undaunted by the mental and moral gulf dividing the Church from those outside it. He has scolded clergy for talking over the heads of people who could grasp the formula for sulphuric acid but who found the language of religion with its “last trump,’’ “the Lamb of God’’ and “regeneration” as meaningless. “Regeneration,” he says, “means born afresh —and it is better to say so.” Significant Decision Dr. Ramsey’s translation to Canterbury calls for new ideas to regenerate a Church blessed with vast estates but staffed by under-paid parsons preaching to near-empty pews. The appointment, surprising as i( may seem to those who regard him as a high churchman standing uncompromisingly on the catholicity of the Church of England, was hailed by some as a significant decision. Lambeth Palace, it was hoped, would now show spiritual leadership instead of mere administration.

Although undoubtedly a political choice based on a career unmarred by meddling criticism from the pulpit. Dr. Ramsey has for years been schooled for the task of leading the Anglican Church. With a brilliant reputation as a theologian—he was professor of divinity at Durham University and later Regius Professor at Cambridge—he became Bishop of Durham, the plum of the northern bishoprics. It was a stepping stone to York where he worked for more than four years.

Nat * "Hearty” . Michael Ramsey looks like a front row forward. He might easily be expected to bulldoze a sleepy parish into action. He takes an outsize in gaiters and his cassock swathes a massive 18-stone frame that is more in keeping with a mediaeval friar than with a modern Anglican.

But he is definitely not a “hearty.” A benign many-chinned face topped by a shock of white hair proves his gentle diffidence and wins him friends. He eats grapes, drinks barley water and loves to wear baggy flannels on holiday.

He is in fact a remote scholar, unaffected, subtle, distinguished by profound learning and with great clarity of expression. The Lord Bishops have found him a formidable opponent in Convocation debates. On the platform he makes fluent, precise impromptu speeches and always has a ready retort. An Oxford undergraduate once asked him to differentiate between reason, knowledge and faith. Unhesitatingly, Dr. Ramsey replied: “Reason is an action of the mind; knowledge is a possession of the mind, but faith is an attitude of the person. Faith means you are prepared to stake yourself on something being so.” But he is not without his critics. Unjustifiably—for there Is nothing in his sermons and speeches to warrant it—he has been called “an eccentric with a massive spirituality.” This Jibe may have stemmed from Cambridge days when he was invited to a party “with someone who is not your wife." Understandably outraged, he took his cook. He is also said to lack vigour and directness of approach. But when it cc...es to the point he is decisive. In the hanging debate in the House of Lords he claimed: “It is a fallacy that the New Testament disallows the taking of life by the State for justice or to protect the citizen from violence.” Clerical Background Dr. Ramsey’s early life in the church was peaceful enough. Born in Yorkshire

in 1904, he stemmed from a clerical background. His paternal grandfather was a Congregational mini* ster and his maternal grandfather was an Anglican clergyman. Later he was to receive his father, a Cambridge mathematics don, into the Church of England. He was educated on the banks of the river Trent —in the sleepy village of Repton, at the public school where the name William Temple, late Archibshop of Canterbury, is inscribed in gold lettering among the names of other renowned sons. Young Ramsey, in tall coat and wing collar was taught by the headmaster. Dr. Geoffrey Fisher. With glee it is said that Dr. Fisher beat him —but this is denied as “an exaggeration in the gathering dust of years.”

Ramsey was not good at games. But as a scholar he was outstanding and became head of the school—a distinction that carried with it the impressive privilege of growing a beard and getting married.

He did not, in fact, marry until he was 37—long after gaining a first class theological tripos at Cambridge (where he was president of the union) and spending six years as subwarden of Lincoln Theological College. His bride was Joan Hamilton, the pretty daughter of an Army officer. She joined him at Boston, the Lincolnshire town where he was lecturer at the parish church until 1938. Only Parochial Work

Then followed two years at Cambridge where he was vicar of St. Benedict’s—the only parochial work in more than 30 years in the Church. This is one of the main objections to his appointment to Canterbury. Some critics hoped for a man of the

people—someone who had worked for years groping with the human problems of an industrial parish. But Dr. Ramsey sampled life among the tough little Durham miners in more than 10 years’ work at the city’s university and as its bishop. Pomposity does not go down with miners. He managed to keep the dignity of a bishop and yet win their hearts. Once he went straight from a confirmation service wearing full episcopal rig to pray by the bed of a local grocer who was paralysed. They loved him for it. Only when he was celebrated did the rows start—at York in 1958 when his election was challenged by the 74-year-old secretary of the Protestant Trust Society, John Alfred Kensit.

Kensit wa» a life-long campaigner against high church and "Romish” influences in the Church of England. Dr. Ramsey was episcopal president of the AngloCatholic organisation, the Church Union, that upholds the doctrine and discipline of the Church.

Although kensit’s chargee —that as Bishop of Durham Dr. Ramsey had done nothing to fulfil his consecration vow to banish "all erroneous and stranee doctrine contrary to God's word”—were waived. Dr. Ramsav resigned from the Church Union. "Intolerance”

But the biggest blast came from the Church of England Newspaper, which thundered: “He mounts his throne as the candidate of a group known for its intolerance, for its suspicion of comprehensiveness.”

Dr. Ramsey takes his high church views to Canterbury —in time to follow up Dr. Fisher's recent move for a closer bond with all churches. The new Primate has not in the past been against a move to draw Methodists towards the Church of England although he was doubtful about the wisdom of receiving Methodist bishops to its bosom without confirmation.

But he is not a Papist. He does not believe in the infallibility of the Pope. Nor does he believe in the infallibility of Ramsey. He has the breadth of mind to see 'frhat Dr. Fisher has started, he must carry on. Principally he will do it with ideas—for above all he is an ideas man, modern enough to realise the powerful flickering influence of television in publicising religion in remote homes.

The sparks are unlikely to fly from Lambeth Palace while he is there. The Church will look to him for leadership and he is only too well aware of the need for it. "Modem man," he says, “is not becoming sinless—he is just becoming lacking in a sense of sin."—(Express Feature Service.)

A British survey revealed that people in lower income groups are more likely to get ulcers than thoae in higher bracket*.