Since I’m a cheerful unbeliever, like most people in Britain now, there’s no reason why I should be more than marginally interested in the C of E’s expensive guilt-trip for its historic links to the slave trade. Except that I have a fondness for ancient architecture and language that, as with Richard Dawkins, includes old churches, old liturgies and the music that goes with them. I contributed to the renovation of the bells of the fine Norman church in my village because I like the sound they make. Like the liturgy, it’s an important facet of British history and the church’s bells are actually much more prominent in village life than its church services. For several years, they have only happened when a peripatetic vicar can include us in his rounds every few weeks. As to the slavery issue, the villagers, who only enter the church in large numbers for services at Christmas, Easter and harvest-time, seem to feel much less guilty than the new Archbishop of Canterbury. I agree with them for a reason that hasn’t been mentioned in the recent beating of ecclesiastical breasts or even in newspapers and journals that are unhappy with the idea of compensating the descendants of slaves and the governments of the present-day countries where the slaves were captured.
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade was Only an Extension of Longstanding African Practices
