‘Establishment’ is a controversial term that can be defined both narrowly and widely - often depending on whether it is being attacked or defended. A church is usually said to be ‘established’ when that church enjoys some kind of legal and constitutional position in the polity of the state, though ‘legal recognition’ is not the same as being ‘established by law’. That recognition usually involves some form of obligation to the state on the part of the church concerned. From the Church of England’s perspective there is above all, a responsibility to bring the ministry of the gospel, the sacraments and pastoral care to every community in the land and to make the Christian voice heard in the arenas of public policy. Establishment in its stronger forms gives the state certain responsibilities in relation to the church and may even confer some kind of influence or control in certain areas of church life.[1]
Any organised form of Christianity may be ‘established’: in Scotland it is the Reformed faith or Presbyterianism; in Scandinavia Lutheranism. The Roman Catholic Church is subject to establishment of a kind by virtue of Concordats between the Holy See and a number of states. The Eastern (Orthodox) Churches have historically been national churches, closely intertwined with the life and identity of the state and recognised by it. There is no reason why even churches with an Independent or Congregational polity, that in recent times have made it a point of principle to keep their distance from the state, should not be established, and indeed this is not without precedent (as for example in New England).
Anglicanism is fully established only in England, though other churches (or provinces) of the Anglican Communion have various legal and constitutional links with the state in their own countries (the Church in Wales is a particularly interesting example: see below).[2] If establishment is certainly not confined to England, it is not confined to Christianity either. Any organised religion may be established. The Jewish faith unquestionably was established in Old Testament times: church and state were intimately linked and in practice coterminous, though there was often tension between religious and political leaders, priests and kings, with prophets being sometimes associated with the cult (Ezekiel) and sometimes with the court (Isaiah). A single body of law embraced liturgical, moral and civil norms and rules. The great religious festival of the Passover commemorated God’s act of national deliverance and the ‘sacrament’ of circumcision identified Jewish males as members both of the religious congregation and of the nation of Israel.
Beyond Judaism and Christianity, the religion most likely to be established is Islam. Where Islam is protected by the state, as is the case in a number of Middle and Far Eastern and African countries, and where Islamic law is adopted into the law of the land (Sharia), Islam may be said to be established.
It is a moot point, and one which Christians might ponder, whether it is not better, from a Christian point of view, for any form of Christianity (Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Anglican or Protestant) to be established, rather than some other faith; and, by the same token, whether it is not better for any major theistic faith to be established rather than none. Perhaps a godless state, committed to a purely secular ideology and hostile to all religion, is the worst scenario that we can envisage.
Establishment need not be exclusive, so that only one church can be established in a particular state. In the United Kingdom there are two churches that are established, though in slightly different ways: the monarch is an Anglican in England and conforms to the Church of Scotland when residing north of the border. In Finland both the Lutheran majority church and the Orthodox minority church have their constitution and confession of faith laid down by the state and the clergy are state employees. In Belgium and the Czech Republic several churches and indeed faiths are established to the extent of enjoying generous financial state support. Establishment is not in principle incompatible with pluralism, tolerance and even-handedness.
Establishment is nowadays understood by many to be flexible and take several different forms. If establishment refers to formal state recognition of a church in law and in the constitution, and to the corresponding obligations, especially pastoral ones, that such recognition lays upon the church, then clearly there are various degrees of establishment - there are strong and weak forms. All churches necessarily relate to the state within whose territory and under whose laws they exist and carry on their mission. Churches, like all other institutions in civil society, are subject to and benefit from laws that protect property, employees, the administration of charitable functions and the vulnerability of minors. The state can and will intervene in the ‘internal’ life of any church if the public interest seems to require it, though many fear this principle is inimical to toleration and may be abused, for example, in some communist and Orthodox countries.
Increasingly throughout the world, states are requiring churches to register in order to be recognised as public bodies. Such registration is at the discretion of the state, which will satisfy itself that the faith and polity of the church, as submitted for its approval, are not detrimental to the public well being. On the one hand, recent trends suggest that churches which have historically been strongly established, like the Church of Sweden and the Church of England, have gained greater freedom to order their own affairs and have thus become more loosely established. On the other hand, it seems that certain churches which have never been established are being brought into a closer relation to the state. There is a levelling up and a levelling down going on simultaneously, which may lead the churches to conclude that they are ultimately very much in the same boat where church-state relations are concerned, and may encourage them to speak and act together wherever possible.
[1] Paul Avis, Church, State and Establishment (London: SPCK, 2001), 74-91. [2] See Norman Doe, Canon Law in the Anglican Communion: A Worldwide Perspective (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998).
