Following my whimsical, not to say preposterous “tall tale”, just posted, I thought I should add a little gravity to the situaiton by quoting the words of an English friend who is much more informed about these things than I:
I recall reading (can’t remember where) that Williams had in fact already made up his mind to step down soon – I don’t think it can be directly linked to the Holy Father. One can always hope, I suppose: Fr X – who knows Williams well – told me years ago that Williams had come very close to becoming a Catholic when he spent some time at Parkminster trying out a possible vocation to the Carthusians. He is a knowledgeable admirer of Balthasar, de Lubac, Maritain, John Paul II and Benedict XVI, and his relations with Benedict seem to be genuinely very warm. On sexual matters (including homosexuality) he does seem a wooly liberal, but I believe he has serious reservations concerning same-sex marriage (he may even be against it): I am not a Williams watcher, so to speak, and can’t say for certain. It may be uncharitable to suggest, but I suspect he is resigning because he doesn’t want to preside with authority over the huge same-sex debate that is just beginning to erupt in the C of E. His generation is uncomfortable with authority (the new generation of leftists is not): he will want to participate actively in the debate but not direct it. Still, when the smoke clears from the ruins, I can think of less-likely converts than Rowan Williams.
The former Anglican Archbishop becoming a catholic? That would be an interesting thing to see indeed!
My own two cents: I agree with your english friend, I think it has to do with this whole same sex “marriage” blowout. That would be a guess of course, but I know that I’d hate to be leading the C of E in that mess!
Recent Convert,
An Archbishop of Canterbury converting would indeed be a most welcome “first”.
As a matter of interest, R. H. Benson, the convert, priest and novelist, was the son of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Ronald Knox, the famous convert, priest, translator of the Bible and writer of detective fiction, was the son of the Anglican Bishop of Manchester.
Most interesting, Joseph.
Your remarks inspired me to do some googling, and I came up with the following uncomfortably astute remark by William Oddie, in a recent article on the online UK Catholic Herald site:
“the Church of England isn’t a Church at all, it’s a theme park: you wander about and choose the rides you want to go on.”
In 2008 Archbishop Rowan Williams gave a talk at Lourdes which was so thoroughly Catholic it could have been ghost-written for him by his friend Pope Benedict. The text is on his web site, at http://www.archbishopofcanterbury.org/articles.php/1221/archbishop-of-canterburys-sermon-for-the-international-mass-at-lourdes