Religion: British Christian

Dr. Geoffrey Francis Fisher is a deeply pious Christian. He is also a gentleman of rational disposition, settled habits and scholarly inclinations. This blending, perhaps more frequently found in the British Isles than elsewhere, has made him just about the ideal man for his job: 99th Archbishop of Canterbury,* Primate of All England and the active spiritual head of the Anglican communion.

This week Dr. Fisher is in the U.S., passing a vacation as guest of the Right Rev. Henry Knox Sherrill, Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church. Those who have met him find him a relaxed, modest man, the proud father of six sons, the possessor of a brisk British wit,† and the personification of his church.

Central Churchmanship. Geoffrey Fisher’s father was a country vicar in Warwickshire; so was his father before him. Geoffrey grew up in the calm Christianity of the family parsonage, and never forgot it. After a brilliant record at Exeter College, Oxford (where he was a crack lightweight oarsman), he turned to the church. He was ordained in 1911. Three years later, at 27, he was appointed headmaster of Repton School.

In 1932, Dr. Fisher became Bishop of Chester, and later, Bishop of London. After the death of Archbishop William Temple in 1944, Winston Churchill appointed him to the see of Canterbury. His appointment was not overpopular. One London paper ticked him off as “an old-school-tie bishop.”

The new archbishop took office at a period of crisis. Wartime bombings had wrecked or damaged hundreds of Britain’s churches. Service as chaplains or enlistments in the armed forces had called away many priests and candidates for the clergy. The church also had a grave internal problem. Archbishop Temple had been a militant Low Churchman who accentuated the Protestantism of the Anglican Communion. His predecessor, Archbishop Lang, had been an equally strong Anglo-Catholic. As a result of the strains of these sharply contrasting administrations, the historic balance between the two factions was wavering.

Dr. Fisher stepped in to restore the balance. Temple, one of the great churchmen of modern Christianity, had driven the church toward social reform by the force of his personality. The new archbishop merged his personality into the unifying force of his office. “I am a central churchman” was his favorite reply to leading questioners, and no one ever found out much more about his personal churchmanship.

Truth & Tension. In 6½ years of office, the archbishop has done more repairing than innovating, has advised more than he has ordered. This is to his taste and suits the present limitations of his office. The Archbishop of Canterbury, although the ranking official of Protestant Christianity since the 17th century, is, by Fisher’s own description, “a constitutional governor.” In Britain, he has direct authority only over his own diocese. Although he presides over the Church Assembly and deals with the government on ecclesiastical issues, he cannot of himself commit the church to any major decision.

Since taking office, Dr. Fisher has been anxious to work out a new relationship between the established (official) church and the British government, which still has an embarrassing amount of authority over church matters. His goal is a sensible British compromise, which would effectively give churchmen the right to run church affairs, while leaving titular authority with the state.

Inside the church, the archbishop feels that the consciousness of “Anglicanism” is stronger than ever. As long as the “circle” of fundamental doctrines is kept intact, he believes that the very tension between High and Low Church factions is insurance against error. Says he: “In the church there must always be tensions. The Anglican Communion is the one church in Christendom which is trying to preserve within a fundamental unity the necessary tension apart from which truth deteriorates. The glory of the Church of England is that we’re all in the circle; we’re all wrong and we’re all right.”

This philosophy of the archbishop’s has been strained by two well-known extremists: Bishop Ernest Barnes of Birmingham, who has denied much of the church’s doctrine, including the Virgin Birth, and Dr. Hewlett Johnson, the Red Dean of Canterbury, who walks a tight Communist line. Although Dr. Fisher is annoyed by both, he has taken no action on either.

The Middle Way. As spiritual leader of the worldwide Anglican Communion, Dr. Fisher is one of the six presidents of the World Council of Churches. He also favors church unity—as an ideal. But, practically speaking, he has his reservations. “The World Council of Churches,” he sums up, “is not a church. It is none of its business to negotiate a reunion between the churches. The World Council and the Council on Faith and Order (see below) can go on forever without ever discussing the question of doctrinal change.” If the council tried to force any changes in his church’s creed, said the archbishop, “we should clear out.”

In this ultimate stubbornness, the archbishop is supported by most Anglican churchmen. In his quiet way, Anglican Fisher has intensified the predilection of his flock for their middle way in Christendom, and has added to their confidence that it is a true way, a good compromise between Geneva and Rome.

*By Anglican count. By Roman Catholic reckoning, the see of Canterbury became vacant in 1558 at the death of Reginald Cardinal Pole, the last archbishop in communion with Rome.

† In 1948, when Danny Kaye’s automobile narrowly missed him in a London street, the archbishop told the comedian: “Young man, you very nearly attained a measure of real fame.”