An academic and former Church of England priest has called for separation of Church and state in a new paper.
Prof. Martyn Percy (pictured) has said “England’s time for disestablishment has now arrived” in a paper published in the Journal of Anglican Studies.
Calling establishment “an outdated artefact from medieval governance”, Prof. Percy says a bill to end the Church of England’s established status is “long overdue” and “would command widespread support from within the CofE, across England, and throughout the UK”.
He says: “While the UK can claim to have religious freedom, it regrettably lacks religious equality due to the CofE’s continued privileges compared to other religious organisations”.
The UK state is constitutionally Christian. The Church of England is the established religion and the head of state, the monarch, is “Supreme Governor” of the Church. Additionally, 26 Church of England bishops are given seats as of right in the House of Lords (‘lords spiritual’).
The National Secular Society, which has campaigned for disestablishment since its founding in 1866, welcomed the paper. In 2023 the NSS backed a bill to disestablish the Church.
Percy was the former Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, but stepped down from his post and left the Church of England after a four-year acrimonious dispute that resulted in the college paying out a substantial sum in compensation and reimbursing his legal costs.
Prof. Percy spoke in favour of disestablishment at two NSS events in February and May 2023.
Established church “remains rooted in hierarchies and autocracy”
In the paper, Prof. Percy says there are “serious concerns” regarding the Church’s internal culture and a “lack of alignment between ecclesial and public values”.
He says: “The paradox for members of the CofE is that, while the English population is primarily pro-equality and democratic, the established church remains rooted in hierarchies and autocracy”.
He points out the CofE is “unaligned” with standards of public life on its attitudes to LGBT people and female priests, in addition to its resistance to scrutiny on safeguarding. He says safeguarding in the CofE is “totally unworthy of trust or professional esteem”.
The paper calls for reform of the House of Lords to remove the CofE’s privileges, saying: “It need hardly be stressed that to privilege one English denomination with 26 automatic seats in the HoL makes little sense in the context of a Parliament that is there for the whole of the UK”.
Prof. Percy said bishops “cannot meaningfully claim to represent their wider population of their designated dioceses” and “demonstrably do not have the kinds of expertise or experience that most other members of the HoL bring to debates”.
He adds that the bishops can be chosen “through a closed ecclesiastical committee process that primarily gratifies internal church politics”.
As the paper points out, Iran is the only other sovereign state where religious leaders have automatic seats in the legislature.
The paper says other home nations “function perfectly well” without an established Church. It says the bill to disestablish the Church of England in Wales, enacted in 1920, “can be extended” to England.
Prof. Percy highlights how disestablishment would grant the Church the same independence as other religious institutions. He says: “Parliament would cease to have any role in regulating the CofE or its General Synod, and CofE ecclesiastical law would operate at the same level it does for other Anglican churches in the UK”.
NSS: “when Church and state are shackled together, neither are free.”
NSS head of campaign Megan Manson said: “Prof. Percy’s paper makes it clear that when Church and state are shackled together, neither are free.
“As the paper suggests, disestablishment elsewhere in the UK has worked well, and extending this to England make sense both in principle and in practice.
“An established Church has no place in a pluralist democracy which values equality, fairness and freedom of religion or belief. As Prof. Percy says, disestablishment is long overdue.”