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May you begin maybe by giving simply two or three phrases to summarise what you are taking away from every of the 4 locations we visited?
Rome: the immensity of the Church Common praying collectively. Azerbaijan: the problem of discussing with a pacesetter who has simply gained a struggle and understanding what to ask and the way laborious to problem. Georgia: the ache of a rustic separated for 15 years from a part of its territory by an invasion that was unlawful. Armenia: the agony of powerlessness.
Let’s begin in Rome. What state are [Roman] Catholic-Anglican relations in?
I feel Catholic-Anglican relations have moved on within the years since Michael Ramsey and Pope Paul VI met — and even earlier than that, the years since Archbishop Fisher met unofficially with John XXIII. From theological dialogue to a deep private relationship, in addition to theological dialogue — to which was added the event of frequent mission to the needy and the poorest, and which now encompasses an ecumenism of service — and an ecumenism of going through the challenges of the fashionable world.
You had an extended, non-public dialog with the Pope. How a lot does that private relationship imply to you?
Personally, it means the world. He’s somebody I pray for day-after-day, who I really like dearly, in whom I discover a knowledge that’s each reassuring and deeply encouraging. And significantly this time — not within the private dialog however within the vigil on the Saturday night, with the widest group of Church buildings one can think about, from all elements of Orthodoxy to Pentecostal and every thing between — I feel I noticed most clearly the Pope in his function as common Primate.
In Azerbaijan, you had a gathering of a distinct character, with the President of Azerbaijan. Have been you inspired by what he mentioned?
Sure, I used to be on the time . . . [but] additionally a really massive pinch of salt.
He’s simply gained a struggle that, in his phrases, achieved all of Azerbaijan’s territorial ambitions, of re-integrating Karabakh into Azerbaijan, which is lengthy recognised in worldwide legislation as a part of Azerbaijan. However there’s at all times in a single’s considering an anxiousness that, within the exhilaration of navy victory, there would be the temptation of pushing additional.
And that was the primary content material of the dialogue. As a result of there should be a transfer that signifies that by no means once more do Azerbaijanis and Armenians kill one another on the battlefield — as we knew in 1945, between, say, France and Germany, or Britain and Germany — if there’s to be a safe future, with happiness, with safety, with financial prosperity and flourishing for the poorest in each international locations.
The assembly with refugees from Nagorno-Karabakh: does that put a distinct complexion in your assembly with President Aliyev?
Sure, in a really predictable method. I needed to satisfy refugees, as I’ve so typically previously, in locations of struggle, as a result of it brings the atrocity of struggle proper in entrance of you, nose to nose. The lady whose face I cannot neglect: a nurse whose husband was killed within the 2020 struggle and couldn’t include her tears. The boy of 16, who didn’t inform me, however I feel informed you, that his brother was killed a few weeks again, within the newest invasion. The older individuals who spoke of the Turks coming as they did in 1915, and the nice killing of Armenians of that yr.
If you hearken to that, from individuals who have simply fled for his or her lives, the idea of geopolitics and struggle takes on a very completely different color and texture. You may really feel each thread, and in feeling the threads one is once more gripped by the appalling nature of struggle. So, sure, it modifications the complexion; it modifications the understanding.
Every renews one’s horror, which is a rightful horror.
How do you steadiness all these narratives and people folks with out shedding your individual clear image of what you suppose and what the appropriate factor is to do and to say?
First, by no means think about you’ve acquired a transparent image. The very first thing is to concentrate on how toddler is aware of. If you hearken to individuals who’ve lived right here all their lives, they nonetheless have typically blended footage. So, acknowledge one’s ignorance.
Second, compartmentalise between the leaders and the refugees or the wounded troopers or the traumatised kids. Compartmentalise: maintain every dialog in a separate compartment, and don’t attempt to synthesise — as a result of in synthesising you’ll over-simplify. And you’ll lose sight of the humanity of the query.
Third, maintain the poorest and essentially the most susceptible on the prime of your thoughts. That’s how I do it, to the extent I ever handle to do it.
Are you able to mirror on what you took away from visiting the border area with these two elements of Georgia that had been de facto annexed [following the war with Russia in 2008]?
We had been all very lucky to be invited and accepted by the EU monitoring mission. I feel we had been all intensely impressed by their calmness, their measured and disciplined method.
What I took away with was one thing I’ve typically considered earlier than, and it’s in all probability pretty banal. It’s the absurdity of those strains we draw within the floor — actually, as you keep in mind: we stood on an empty hilltop with a ploughed line in entrance of us, and the opposite aspect was Ossetia, occupied by Russians, FSB. It was actually a ploughed line . . . not even a river or a mountain vary or sea.
And also you suppose: Why are folks within the village, within the valley, the place the road goes straight by means of folks’s gardens, why are they struggling? Due to this absurdity of human greed and ambition, and pleasure, and energy.
And why couldn’t the native FSB chief say: “Look, draw the road around the village — not by means of somebody’s backyard.” Why is there such cruelty? These are banal questions, nevertheless it brings it house to me. I don’t know in case you keep in mind after we had been standing on that path, with coils of barbed wire throughout the trail, which was the primary path by means of the village. And also you get midway — bushes are the identical one aspect as the opposite, every thing’s the identical — besides it’s a distinct nation, and in case you cross it, you’ll be detained.
I feel that absurdity actually hit me afresh in that a part of the go to. It’s very laborious to see simple solutions for the time being. However one needed to say one thing ridiculous like, Repent; flip away from this idiocy.
The papal nuncio to the Caucasus mentioned to me after the service in Tbilisi that there’s there’s way more that unites us than divides us. Do you suppose there’s an absurdity in a few of these breakdowns of relationship?
Sure, there’s, since you’ve put your finger on it: it’s a breakdown of relationship. It’s about human relationship, not the surpassing glory of God, who didn’t think about equality with God a factor to be grasped, however humbled himself, and have become a slave for our sake and died on a cross. And earlier than that big, monumental, overwhelming reality, every thing is made small, if we have a look at it rightly. And we should always begin from that perspective, all of us. I’m speaking to myself as nicely.
However we’re so simply mesmerised by the close-up of what looks like the big situation till we raise our eyes and see the glory of God.
It’s a must to steadiness that with the truth that what to me could also be an idiocy is, to the particular person within the centre of it, essentially the most gigantic, monumental factor — and they’re a brother or sister in Christ after we’re speaking inside church arguments; they’re somebody for whom Christ died, after we’re speaking about something or anybody in creation. And the decision is to not choose them, however to discover a method of displaying them Christ, of displaying them the God who reaches out to allow them to search out one another as fellow creations.
I seen in press stories in Azerbaijan, the native press stories described you as the pinnacle of the Anglican Church. Within the Anglican Communion, headship has been an advanced situation, to say the least. Does that trigger you any concern? Is it potential, and also you’ve spoken about it your self, that the management of the Anglican Communion and the management of the Church of England could possibly be in a roundabout way separated?
You’re precisely proper to ask the query, as a result of that’s been on my thoughts; it’s been introduced house to me on this go to. I feel the reply is, if we do it proper, then it mustn’t have a foul impact. In truth, it ought to have an exquisite impact if we do it proper — if we handle to reveal that it’s potential to have grave variations [and yet] to like each other, to worship God, and, by motion and phrase, to share the excellent news of Jesus Christ, all on the similar time, and to maneuver away from a colonial-style construction to one thing that may be very clearly catholic with a small c, common.
This journey has identified very, very clearly that there’s an especially tough problem, as a result of the model of Anglicanism may be very intently related to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Now, you may’t simply change these issues immediately and anticipate everybody to have a distinct perspective. There’s an enormous communication factor; greater than that, there’s a substantive factor: of being obedient to God’s calling, after which trusting in God’s actions and windfall.
One thing else that’s come house to me from this journey is how vital the crew round you’re.
I’ve been very lucky over the previous ten-and-a-half years to have labored with exceptionally good folks, and proceed to be surrounded by very expert and sensible folks. I feel anybody who thinks they know the solutions and may, because it had been, stand alone on this function is in cloud-cuckoo-land. In the event you’re one of the best theologian in historical past, you might not perceive the geopolitics or the challenges of recent science or the psychology, or you might not have the emotional intelligence. In the event you’re an exquisite church historian, you might not perceive different types of historical past, and so forth and so forth. Subsequently, the crew is at all times going to be higher than an Archbishop by themselves.
They usually’re additionally a launch of stress. I imply, banter, jokes, teasing — [it] lets you change gear between seeing the President and seeing a refugee, which is a big change of substances. The lightness of contact from them permits you to deal with moments of deep inadequacy, which come pretty continuously.
You’re on the ultimate night as we converse, flying early within the morning, and, solely in a few days, you’ve acquired a Home of Bishops assembly, an enormous one. How tough is it to leap proper again into conversations about very completely different matters on very completely different scales?
Sometimes, it goes fully mistaken, however usually, I discover it fairly simple to do. As a result of, between from time to time, I might have learn my method by means of all of the papers once more, for subsequent Monday, and subsequently reset for a really completely different dialog. However at their coronary heart, each Monday and this week, in all its assorted elements, is [something] about obedience to Christ, and love for Christ, and love for the folks of Christ, and love for many who don’t know Christ. That binds these points collectively. So, the fixed query shouldn’t be what’s expedient. . . It’s what is correct earlier than God: how do I — recognising that I might be judged by God on the finish of all issues — how do I act in a method wherein, on the very least, I do know that I’ll have been mistaken, however I haven’t simply been enjoying politics.
I feel the Home goes to be trying on the very difficult problems with how — whereas motivating and holding the Church collectively, holding our ecumenical relationships, interfaith relationships, intra-Communion relationships collectively — we act in a method that, inside England, is most trustworthy to the gospel of Jesus Christ. That’s the query. How can we serve the unity of Christ, which is upheld so powerfully within the New Testomony, and, on the similar time, act rightly and obediently to the Holy Spirit in a tradition that’s so radically completely different to the one we’re sitting in, even right here in Yerevan in Armenia, not to mention the tradition of far-flung locations around the world the place Anglicans are worshipping as we converse.
You’ve obtained numerous presents on this journey, a outstanding array of issues. However what is going to you connect essentially the most worth to whenever you get house?
That’s simple. My reminiscence of assembly the refugees. They gave me the present of their time, of being keen to satisfy me. That’s a treasured present.
Take heed to the interview on the Church Instances Podcast here
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