In December 2013 Stephen Heap, the then Church of England National Advisor for Higher Education, issued a document entitled: ‘The Identity and Character of Anglican Universities: A Contribution to the Discussion’. It resulted from work undertaken by the ‘Anglican Identity Project’ carried out under the auspices of the Church of England Board of Education for which Stephen Heap was the project manager. What is presented here is that Document (in bold type) with an inserted commentary that seeks to offer further theological reflection and suggest, very briefly, how chaplaincy can contribute to characteristics discerned. As one of those who help to draft the Document I am in a good position to understand its intentions, but also wish to distinguish between my own particular commentary and the process of broader discernment that led to its final form: hence the distinction in type used below.
Introduction: This document seeks to express what Anglicans may wish to foster and nurture in their universities in this generation.
Following the founding of Oxford then Cambridge in the 12th and 13th centuries, it was fully six hundred years before the next universities emerged in England. By the time they did, an essentially Christian understanding of what it meant to be a university had been firmly established. Thus in the 19th century development of universities, led initially by University College London (1826), King’s College London (1829) and Durham University (1832), churches and individual Christians were heavily involved (Heap, 2012). Today there are more than 150 diverse Higher Education Institutions in the UK yet, due to this common cultural inheritance, they share a strong family resemblance whether founded as consciously secular or church institutions. When asking about the identity of the Anglican members of the Cathedrals Group, therefore, one needs to exercise care. To look only for what is different, what is distinct from other HEIs, may lead to odd results since it has been one of the gifts of the Anglican Church to help shape what is understood by a university. Instead, it is more appropriate to ask about the character of our Anglican universities, characteristics which may very well be shared more widely across the sector, but which should very definitely be found in universities of an Anglican identity.
It must be remembered, of course, that Anglican identity is not, however, static, unified or wholly independent entity. Rather it is a particular, historical and contemporary mediation of Christianity that contains a fair degree of internal variation and dispute. It is also geographically diverse. Although the term ‘Anglican’ is used to connect us to what is now a global tradition, in what follows we are essentially speaking about the Church of England (with apologies to the one Welsh Anglican member of the Cathedrals Group). This distinction is important because when we think of Anglican we import all that comes with the particular legacy and reality of establishment, along with, it must be admitted, the consequences of the weakening of the Church of England as a unifying force in society, particularly over the course of the twentieth and now twenty-first centuries.
But the meaning of Anglican is also rendered mobile for good theological reasons. As a church we must, by definition, remain under the permanent critique of Jesus Christ (as understood through the lens of the Old and New Testaments, the Ecumenical Creeds and subsequent doctrinal reflection), the critique of the hope of the coming Kingdom of God, of Spirit-guided interpretation of experience, and the critique of other historical and contemporary mediations of Christianity. When we add this theological unsettling to the fast-changing environment of Higher Education in which Anglican identity has to be lived out, it quickly becomes apparent that what we mean by an Anglican University is an always moving target. It is a question that must and should remain open to continual revision. Thus an inability to pin down an answer once and for all is not necessarily a sign of failure; it may well be a sign of the authenticity of the quest.
1. The instinct to include: Extending the opportunities afforded by Higher Education (Widening Participation) is an instinct arising from the Anglican desire to serve and include. Though never perfectly executed, this instinct is perhaps most clearly seen in the parish system in England in which every member of the population, regardless of faith, has a claim upon their local church. As Archbishop William Temple had it, the Anglican Church is a society that exists primarily for the sake of its non-members.
In seeking to be the Church for the Nation, the Anglican Church hopes to witness to the universality of God’s concern. All exist by reason of the gift of creation. At the cross God meets us not at the point of our diverse gifts and strengths, but in our common lack: in our sin and suffering and as those who are subject to transience and death. Through the cross all, in principle at least, are reconciled to God, and through the resurrection of Jesus the prospect of the Kingdom of God – that is of this present creation made perfect – is opened to all. It was a concern for the poor and least, rooted in the conviction that there is no outside to the reach of God’s love, which led to the founding of the institutions of teacher training that lie at the historical roots of our Universities.
Chaplaincy, especially as practised according to the Anglican tradition, shares in God’s lack of respect for boundaries which grounds this ‘instinct to include’. The Gospels reveal Jesus’ astonishing boundary-crossing freedom that goes to meet ‘the wicked’ and ‘sinners’ and which later propelled the church to embrace the great Jewish-Gentile divide. Every member of our institutions, every student (however part-time) every staff member (however lowly or exalted), has an equal claim on our attention.
2. The priority of conversation: Anglicans will recognise that teaching, learning, research and good leadership all involve conversation. They do so not only in the light of good practice, but also drawing on Christian faith, rooted in a God who is Trinity, whose Persons exist in ongoing dynamic conversation. Such a God engages the world in conversation through incarnation and the work of the Spirit.
Anglican theology has long placed emphasis on the self-revelation of God as Trinity. The ‘Glory be…’ that punctuates Anglican liturgy is a constant reminder that highest reality is held to be relational – a rhythmic reminder admired by the great German Reformed theologian Karl Barth whose own work initiated a renaissance of interest in Trinitarian theology in the 20th century. The world-wide Anglican Communion is also a demonstration of the principle of conversation. Despite deep and often bitter difference, the Anglican Communion has made constant efforts to stay together, trying to work out a form of common life. At its best this persistence is rooted in the conviction, stemming from Trinitarian theology, that the other is always first of all gift, before rival or competitor.
A university is essentially a place of conversation because teaching and learning, research and scholarship are fundamentally communal tasks (Higton, 2013). Learning requires a partnership between staff and students; research demands taking one’s place within the wider conversation of scholarship as one contributor amongst many. Good leadership also requires diligent conversation with those one seeks to inspire. Accordingly, an Anglican university should be home to multiple and diverse forms of questions – provided by its different academic disciplines – and these should be enabled to converse in such a fashion that they can mutually relativize, test, provoke and encourage each other ( Rowan Williams). In prioritising conversation in this way, universities contribute to the urgent task of learning how we can live together in a world of complex differences. Given that the most beneficial conversations come from engaging with the one who is other, who sees things differently, who inhabits another world, so-called ‘widening participation’ is thus more than an act of service; it is a necessity for the sake of deeper insight (Heap).
Chaplaincy must contribute to the quality of conversations taking place within the university because this directly shapes the quality of community experienced. And the experience of community can, in turn, have profound effects: it can mean the difference between decisions made by genuine consensus or imposed dictate; it can cause the accomplishment of the same work to be a matter of either joyful co-operation or a destructive competition for who can gain best advantage. A helpful barometer for the quality of community present is people’s willingness to participate, or not, in university social events beyond the round of necessary commitments. More deeply, conversation matters because chaplaincy work is utterly dependent on the quality of relationships enjoyed. Good conversations lead to meaningful relationships.
3. Openness to critical self-examination: The Anglican University will wish to organise its life in such a way that it remains open to the critique of the Gospel of Jesus. Via governance and management arrangements, and by giving permission for the chaplaincy team (amongst others) to speak truth as it understands it, an Anglican university will subject itself to critical self-examination, seeking to ensure that every aspect of its operation – from the manner in which it treats its staff and students, to its estates, catering and procurement policies – is informed by its Anglican character and identity.
At the heart of Anglican worship, both Eucharistic and non-Eucharistic, is the provision for the opportunity for self-examination and confession, leading to repentance, forgiveness and new beginning. Dispensing with the unhealthy pretence of perfection, such realistic appraisal gives permission to embrace the future afresh.
The expectation that chaplains might contribute to the University by speaking truthfully about the discrepancies they detect between, on the one hand, its professed ideals and values, and on the other, its actual practice, is one of great privilege. To be effective this ministry needs to be undertaken with great tact and diplomacy, yet with resolute conviction. There is also a crucial judgement to be made about when to speak and when to keep silence. The greater good must sometimes come before the self-justification and self-demonstration of chaplaincy’s worth.
4. Respect for the inherent dignity of the whole person: A fundamental Christian insight, upheld by the Anglican tradition, is that all human beings are made in the image of God. Therefore, students and staff will be treated as whole persons and with dignity. The university will do its best for all its members, because, being made in God’s image, they are of inestimable value.
While students are rightly and properly subjected to assessment and staff to appraisal, persons should never be reduced to merely a measureable attributes as if this could exhaustively capture their worth. Rather people need to be treated as whole persons – mind, body and soul – and as those with particular histories, aspirations and relationships. Being made in the image of God means, in the words of George Herbert: “…that which God doth touch and own/ Cannot for less be told.”
Chaplains can contribute much here by personal demonstration, that is, through signifying the inherent dignity of each person they encounter through the manner of their relating. More, at the level of structures, there is the delicate yet urgent task of preventing the institutional machine from undermining community and sacrificing individuals in the name of some abstract efficiency, be that financial or managerial (C.f. Sullivan, 2007, p.97). Dignity cannot be a luxury for good times only; its genuineness is tested when times are hard. This may mean, of course, helping people to leave with dignity. However, the inherent dignity of the person means that the grounds for someone’s leaving needs always to be examined.
5. Personal character and public citizenship: Anglicanism is concerned with the common good and the contribution of the individual to that. An Anglican university will be obliged to envisage and contribute to the common good, in dialogue with Christian convictions about vocation, service and love of neighbour, and encourage it students to engage in such work. Public theology will inform its grappling with these issues.
Anglican thinking demonstrates indebtedness to the seminal mediaeval theologian Thomas Aquinas (who, for example, profoundly influenced Richard Hooker). Aquinas, building upon Aristotle, gave attention to the habits of mind (virtues) that require cultivation in order to lead a good life, a fulfilled life. Building upon Aquinas’ response, Anglican education has commonly sought to give space to the ‘cardinal virtues’ of prudence, courage, temperance and justice, alongside the ‘theological virtues’ of faith, hope and love. To be a moral person one needs more than right thinking (be that of the deontological or consequentialist persuasion); one needs to have developed good habits in advance.
Beyond the acquisition of knowledge and skills, therefore, the Anglican university should be a place for the formation of good academic habits, such as precision, honesty, and the ability to confront reality (Higton, 2012) which spill over into broader living. By growing questioning citizens, who can distinguish between a good and poor argument (Rowan Williams), the university will serve the interests of democracy, complementing its calling to test presumed knowledge. The formation of personal character will seek, however, to balance intelligence with compassion (Stewart) as people are prepared to take their place in a global, but still inequitable, human community that requires to learn how to live sustainably in relation to a fragile earth.
A commitment to public service is written into the DNA of our institutions by virtue of their origin as centres for teacher training. But a conception of the priority of service to others will escape the confines of the explicit curriculum to manifest itself in enthusiastic support for volunteering and charitable giving (Warner). Chaplaincy, as an important site for both, thus has much to contribute. Further, the work of chaplaincy will wish to challenge and deepen the notion of mere employment by placing before the institution the claim of vocation as this is rooted in the practice of love. Jesus not only upheld the central principle of love of neighbour, he extended it and instantiated it. In the parable of the Good Samaritan we learn that it is not up to us to split the world safely into those we consider neighbours and those we do not. Rather, and disturbingly, the power of definition lies with the one who desires our help. The question of vocation, then, is not one simply about our choice of career; it runs much more deeply and concerns what sort of person we seek to be. Chaplaincy thus needs to put this question: How can becoming my best self coincide with serving the needs of those around me?
6. Education for Life: Anglicanism, with its stress on the incarnation of God in Jesus, is a world-affirming faith. That includes the world of work, for which universities will seek to prepare people. It also includes an engagement with culture, spirituality, sport, exploring the mystery of creation, including issues of sustainability, and developing wisdom for living in a complex world.
For the Hebrew Bible, wisdom is not abstract intellectual prowess. Rather, because God created the world through wisdom (Prov 8:22ff), it is in seeking wisdom – which remains God’s gift – that we learn how to live in life-enhancing relationship with the community of creation and with God. When it came to wrestling with the identity and significance of Jesus, when his resurrection overcame the rebuttal of his godforsaken death, leading to a reappraisal of his life and person, the authors of the New Testament drew upon this wisdom tradition. In Jesus we encounter the one ‘in whom all things were created…and in him all things hold together’ (Col 1:16f). In the incarnation, therefore, the principle of life takes residence in the midst of life, for the sake of overcoming death and all that cramps and distorts the flourishing of life.
Giving attention to the preparation of students for the world of work (employability) will be important, not least because work can afford a route to personal satisfaction and contributes to the common good (Heap). But Anglican universities will also seek to provoke a broader ‘cultivation of the mind’ (Newman). Learning will be valued primarily as the yearning to understand reality in all its mysterious depth (Stewart). The curriculum will be enhanced through wider opportunities for artistic, cultural, sporting, and spiritual engagement as students and staff are inducted into the riches of an ‘educated and cultured life’ (Warner).
Chaplaincy serves the interest of ‘life in all its fullness’ (Jn 10:10); this is perhaps one of the best single descriptions of our task. We thus have a role in encouraging a rich experience for members of the university in terms of the physical environment they inhabit, both buildings and open spaces, and the cultural environment that is available. Chaplains will also wish to offer particular encouragement for the consideration of so-called ‘ultimate questions’, those of purpose and meaning, through the provision of resources to provoke their open consideration.
7. Shaping society: Jesus proclaimed and enacted a new order called the Kingdom of God, a world of justice, peace and healing. An Anglican university will be concerned with the way the world is, with envisaging how it might be, with working for a better world and with preparing people to work for such a world.
At the centre of Jesus’ teaching, as presented in especially the synoptic Gospels, is the announcement and initiation of the Kingdom of God – the world remade in accordance with God’s desire for healing, justice and peace (shalom). For Archbishop William Temple this conviction meant continually asking which parts of the current fabric of existence were contrary to or forerunners of God’s highest desire for creation. In other words, asking what is or is not compatible with the Lordship of Christ. With its language of hope, of kingdom and of new creation, the Christian faith presents us with engaging visions of how the world could be; visions which are to inspire action. Not because humanity can on its own achieve this future (this is the danger and lie at the heart of revolutionary movements), but because we are called to anticipate now something of what it is believed God will achieve in the end.
Ron Dearing, building upon Lionel Robbins’ call for universities to be responsible for ‘the transmission of a common culture’ (1963), suggested universities were ‘to play a major role in shaping a democratic, civilised and inclusive society’ (1997). The Anglican university will wish to take this seriously, contributing to the forming and testing of the visions by which we seek to live, fuelling the imagination for how we would wish the world to be. It will ask: What serves the good? In an era that tends to see market forces and competition not just as pragmatic tools but rather as harbingers of a new world order, this task takes on new urgency.
The task of Chaplaincy concerns creating anticipations of the Kingdom of God: in liturgy and worship; in pastoral concern; in discussion and debate; in witnessing to the priority of love and grace. In each of these ways we point, in word and deed, to the possibility that things could be other than they are. This may lead to specific forms of agitation for change through support for such concerns as ‘Christian Aid’, ‘Fairtrade’ and various forms of ecological justice. It might mean sponsoring particular actions in relation to disasters on both a local and international scale. In these ways we invite members of the university to join with us in action for the sake of a better ordering of the world.
8. Respect for faith and reason in the search for truth: Anglicanism is concerned with truth. It takes religion and its insights into reality seriously; so will an Anglican university. Following Richard Hooker, it also affirms the importance of reason. An Anglican university will do likewise. Indeed, in an Anglican university, reason, science, philosophy and theology will flourish alongside each other for the better exploration of truth. Academic freedom is part of that search, and part of humankind’s liberty to explore the world God has made.
Christianity has a long tradition of seeing no conflict between the book of revelation and the book of nature, since it assumes both have the same author: God. God is the one (uni) source of all truth (veritas). The Anglican tradition, following Richard Hooker (and the work of the Latitudinarians) took the same view, giving a decisive place to reason alongside a theological method that grants authority to Scripture and to the wisdom of past church tradition. Moreover, the broad composition of the Anglican Church has required giving space to personal conscience and belief over against any overly centralised authority; the use of critical reason has been the hallmark of its most respected thinkers.
The Anglican university will thus understand and appreciate the scientific method, that of generating hypotheses and predictions, and testing these via empirical and repeatable experiments. But it will also appreciate the limits of this method because not all reality is determined and so predictable. Important contrary examples include: human freedom; love and the existence of God. Thus other ways of knowing, both philosophical and religions, will need to be taken seriously, though also subjected to critical testing. An Anglican university will be unafraid of the pursuit of the truth, though fully aware of the provisionality of what counts as true.
Chaplaincy exists in part as a sign that faith is taken seriously in the university. We also stand as witnesses to a reasonable Christianity that does not need to defend its claim to truth via defensive protection, but through the invitation that all consider its claims. Particularly in Anglican form, our conviction of God’s loving concern for all should manifest itself in generosity toward those who think differently from ourselves. The principle of hospitality will mean, therefore, that alongside the chapel and chaplaincy programme, provision for the practice of other faith and spiritual traditions will need to be made. Chaplaincy can contribute to a good level of religious literacy – including forms of atheism – which is essential to proper debate and respect for the other. Through the sponsoring of interfaith dialogue chaplaincy can assist the university to model the kind of interactions wider society requires. Such actions do not compromise our belief in the truth of Christianity; they follow from it.
9. Theology: Taking faith seriously includes engagement with theology and religious studies as disciplines which deal with the broadest conception of reality. As such they make creative conversation partners with any academic discipline.
As the academic discipline that grounds their founding, Anglican Universities will seek to encourage the academic study and advancement of Christian theology, often in coordination with Religious Studies. Theology seeks to engage with the broadest accounts of what constitutes reality and so is powerfully resistant to all forms of reductionism in its view of persons, purposes and values. Consequently, it generates testing questions to apply both within and beyond the university.
Theology includes but goes beyond the scientific study of religious matter (e.g. the critical reading of religious texts, the psychology of religious belief, the history of the development of doctrine) to risk first order accounts of God’s relationship with the world. But far from repeating unchanging and unalterable (dead) definitions, theology seeks, through dialogue with contemporary insight, to ever-again formulate the basic convictions and questions of the Christian community, to capture afresh their transformational potential. As such, theology properly belongs in a contemporary university.
Whether or not chaplains share in the formal teaching and research in theology in their institutions, all chaplains are public theologians. We are interpreters and bearers of the Gospel. We are thus those who ask, for Jesus’ sake, how God is related to the world in which we participate. By the questions we provide, and the questions we provoke, both in speech and in action, we witness to the presence and relevance of the theological perspective.
10. Opportunities for worship and celebration: The Anglican tradition has been deeply shaped by regular daily, public prayer and the celebration of the festivals, marking out the Christian (and academic) year. Creating opportunities for prayer, celebration, and individual and communal exploration of faith and spirituality, will be part of an Anglican university.
The Anglican tradition of public prayer has been shaped by the monastic and then cathedral patterns of practice. The Book of Common Prayer and Common Worship both display this inheritance. Through the rhythm of prayer, space is rescued from mere geometrical extension and time from mere chronological duration. Rather space and time are sanctified as the mediators of God’s presence and love.
Chaplaincy has an axiomatic role to play in providing opportunities for public worship, be they to mark the great Christian festivals, which still shape the academic year, key occasions in the life of the university or to sustain the daily pattern of chapel liturgy. Attendance will be, of course, a matter for individual choice, though many of those who remain absent will appreciated knowing that prayer continues to be offered – the phenomenon of vicarious religion (Davie).
That the chapel is home to a practicing Christian community authenticates the metanarrative of Christianity within which the founding our institutions find their place. It also keeps alive the possibility that the day to day tasks of life can open onto a mysterious, transcendent beyond.
11. A living connection to the (local, national and international) Anglican Church: Anglican identity will be nurtured and encouraged via a network of reciprocal relationships with the local dioceses, the national church (particularly the Board of Education) and the world-wide Anglican communion. The university will also act as an intellectual resource and critical reflector for the Church. Networks such as the Cathedrals Group and Colleges and Universities of the Anglican Communion will also facilitate such exchanges and chaplaincy can play a vital bridging role between the institution and the wider church.
At the heart of Anglican sensibility is the conviction that it is not possible to be Anglican in isolation. We need each other. Thus parishes are part of deaneries and deaneries dioceses. Dioceses belong to provinces and provinces cohere together via the world-wide Anglican Communion. This conviction flows from an essentially Trinitarian logic: person and relation are equally primary.
Chaplaincy exists as a conspicuous ‘outpost’ of the wider Anglican church in the university, and as a representative of the university in the in the local, national and international Church. We have a vital mediating role to perform, one that requires simultaneous translation (c.f. Shakespeare, 2007) as we seek to make each transparent to the other. Sometimes relationships between the university and the church will bypass us in ways that are frustrating, even hurtful. At such times our task is to rejoice that communication is taking place and to stand ready to catalyse such conversations when we are again required.
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