In Depth:  John Richardson

When being reminded of the deadline for my Anglican Update this month, I was asked, among other things, to stay off the already much reported topic of gay marriage. This, however, is actually quite hard to do.

One of the websites I regularly visit to get a ‘feel’ for what is going on in the Church of England is grandiosely titled ‘Thinking Anglicans’. It is resoundingly liberal in its theology and utterly persuaded of its own wisdom, but it is depressingly short on variety when it comes to content. Thus their coverage of the recent election of a new Archbishop of Sydney focussed ultimately on his attitude to women’s ordination and same-sex relations. But then that is true of the website as a whole, where these two issues provide the mainstay of news and comment.

The 60th anniversary celebrations of the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II were both a demonstration of the ability of the Church of England to rise to the state occasion and a poignant reminder of how far we have declined as a nation in the lifetime of our reigning monarch.

Watching TV footage of the coronation, I heard more than one commentator remark on the oil with which the Queen was anointed, symbolising that monarchy was conferred on her by God.