The first time I saw Justin Welby as Archbishop of Canterbury was at his enthronement in the Cathedral in 2013. I covered the occasion for the local TV news as a presenter. The last time I saw him as Archbishop he was sat across from me in the Home Office – and I was getting mildly frustrated.
The meeting included almost all of the most senior clergy of the various Christian denominations in the UK, and they were there to explain the role of their churches in the conversion or pseudo-conversion of asylum seekers to the UK.
This was in the wake of the Clapham “acid attack” (actually, it was a corrosive alkaline) by 35-year-old Abdul Ezedi who threw the substance over a 31-year-old woman and her two children on a street in London. It has always bothered me but almost all the focus afterwards was on Ezedi, and very little on the condition and ‘life changing’ injuries of his victims.
As police hunted Ezedi, it came to light that he had been twice refused asylum in the UK by the Home Office, but at an independent tribunal having convinced a retired octogenarian methodist minister that he was now a committed Christian it was deemed he could not be safely returned to Afghanistan, and he should finally be granted asylum. This despite him being a proven liar, committing two known sexual assaults whilst in the UK, and only having the personal judgement of a clergyman who acknowledged his dishonesty but insisted that his conversion was genuine.
At one point in the meeting the clergy suggested that the Government was guilty of not understanding the Christian mission, and that it was their duty, and their calling, to welcome those who came to them in search of Christian fellowship. That was understandable – up to a point.
The government view was there was evidence that most conversions were confined to Muslim asylum seekers, whilst British Muslims hardly ever sought it. The point was also made, and later publicly, that there really is no reliable test, or method of proving with any independent confidence that a conversion is genuine. This surely made conversion an unreliable game changer at asylum tribunals.
It was at the end of the meeting I gently pointed out that my boss might have more understanding of the mission of the church than the Archbishop imagined, since Justin Welby had ultimately been my father’s boss as a parish priest in the Canterbury diocese. I had grown up in vicarages and observed my dad’s ministry over many years.
We didn’t fall out. Justin Welby is not an aggressive man or deaf to a counter argument. The conversation was frank but useful, though I never saw a promised written document about the criteria upon which clergy vouch for the solidity of conversions.
He may not have been the “turbulent priest” that his Cathedral is world-famous for, but he had, around the same time, been making speeches in the House of Lords attacking the Conservative government on its immigration deterrent policy, in Rwanda.
I do not bring this up as an excuse for looking at his present dilemma. It’s about what he said. He insisted that the safety of Rwanda Bill would:
“outsource our legal and moral responsibility for refugees and asylum seekers”.
I have no personal or political animosity towards Justin Welby. It is not me, or this site, but some of his own clergy who are now increasingly of the view that, in light of what he knew in case of John Smyth, a Christian barrister and serial abuser, he should no longer remain Archbishop.
Why? Because a damning report claims Welby had “some knowledge of the concerns” around Smyth and young men in the 1980s and demonstrated a “lack of curiosity” about them when they re-surfaced eleven years ago, the year he became Archbishop.
It’s hard not to argue that that is an accusation of outsourcing his own legal and moral responsibility. That’s exactly what some clergy, including a bishop, are now arguing. The Right Rev Helen-Ann Hartley, the Bishop of Newcastle, one of the 26 Lords Spiritual, told yesterday’s BBC World at One:
“I think sadly his position is untenable. So, I think he should resign.” She also questioned how the church could “continue to have a moral voice” if “we cannot get our own house in order with regard to something as critically important”.
Pointing this out is not a clergy vendetta against Welby but a call for an Archbishop to be held to the same standards for leadership of any organisation. A Prime Minister, a Director General of the BBC, and others in senior positions have had to stand down because of what they knew – and what they didn’t know, but should have- about individuals within their organisation, related to the abuse of power and people.
It seems at least legitimate to ask: should the head of the Church of England not be held to the same standards?
Politicians often get frustrated when the church interferes in politics, I suspect my late father would suggest I was interfering in matters of the Church but I’m not. I’m pointing out that you can see why some parts of the Church of England are asking whether Justin Welby should actually practice what he’s preached on moral responsibility.