Poor, poor Archbishop!

It's gloomy and dismal in New York right now, but I take comfort in the fact that I am not Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury. You'd think that being the head of the worldwide Anglican Communion would be something of a cushy job, but that's just not the case, certainly not now, with the American Episcopal church and the conservative African bishops at each others' throats. I'm sure that Archbishop Williams, a theologian and poet, doesn't want to go down in history as the man who let the Anglican church fall apart, but it looks like it might happen. So when things get bad, I think to myself: at least I'm not the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Then, last week, in a speech and a BBC interview, Rowan Williams allegedly proposed “constructive accommodation” for Muslim communities in Britain who wish to use Sharia law. At least that's how the New York Times reported it. But at least the Times reporter added this:

“The archbishop’s speech was made at the Royal Courts of Justice, before an audience of leading judges and lawyers. Typically, it was steeped in historical and philosophical nuances that risked being lost in the headlines.”

It seems that other newspapers were not so kind. There were calls for resignation. There was a delightful Chaucer spoof (“Whan in Februar, withe hise global warmynge / Midst unseasonabyl rain and stormynge…”). Spengler was vividly critical:

“Violence is oozing through the cracks of European society like pus out of a broken scab. Just when liberal opinion congratulated itself that Europe had forsaken its violent past, the specter of civil violence has the continent terrified. That is the source of the uproar over a February 7 speech by Archbishop Rowan Williams, predicting the inevitable acceptance of Muslim sharia law in Great Britain.”

I'll admit a cynical thought that crossed my mind: the Archbishop is trying to lose his job! He wants to get kicked out for something that doesn't have to do with gay bishops! But then I read the speech. Philosophical nuances indeed.

I wonder if the Archbishop could have made the same point using a less controversial example. His basic point seems to be that if the law treats religious duties as voluntary, it can't make sense of the claims of religious people for exceptions: religious holidays, conditions for employment, etc. There is, I think, an implicit condition running through the entire speech: if certain people are duty-bound to abide by religious law, and this does not bring them into serious conflict with the spirit of the national law, and religious authorities can tell the court that these obligations aren't frivolous or imaginary, then the courts should take these obligations seriously. A judge could distinguish, for example, between a Catholic doctor who won't perform an abortion, even to save a life, and a Catholic doctor who won't perform a tracheotomy, even to save a life.

Williams wanted to avoid the difficulties of the “primitivist” reading of Sharia in order to focus on the theoretical aspects of law and communal identity. It's right there in the beginning:

“Even when some of the more dramatic fears are set aside, there remains a great deal of uncertainty about what degree of accommodation the law of the land can and should give to minority communities with their own strongly entrenched legal and moral codes.” (emphasis added)

To which one could conceivably respond: what if in reality these dramatic fears are entirely justified? (This question is, of course, not one that I can answer.)

In the BBC interview, Williams seems very confident that there exists an interpretation of Sharia law that is largely compatible with the British common law tradition, citing Muslim scholars and legal theorists. But what of the situation on the ground? I don't know anything about religious life in Great Britain, and I don't think I learned anything from this speech.

I am so glad that I am not the Archbishop of Canterbury.