Canon Giles Fraser
It’s been a good week for the Church of England and I don’t say that very often. First we had the bumbling and unworldly Archbishop of Canterbury daring to walk into the lion’s den in Zimbabwe when he said it as he meant it to the very horrible Robert Mugabe and condemned the atrocities against Anglican priests in that troubled country to the president’s face and now we have Canon Giles Fraser of St Paul’s Cathedral telling the Occupy London protestors that, in spite of the Metropolitan Police’s efforts to remove them from outside the cathedral, they were welcome to stay and he even invited them in for the Sunday services. Canon Fraser did more than that, he defended the protestors right to demonstrate and asked the police, in the nicest possible way, to leave.
Occupy London protestors
So, outside St Paul’s at least, there will be no more police “kettling” and the good humoured but deadly serious demonstration against the tyranny of international financial corporations can carry on in the spirit of debate that has been the inspiring characteristic of this and the original occupation in America on Wall Street. Well done Canon Fraser – God Bless you!
If only the Church had kept it up! This week has seen the rise of the inactive verb: Foxey Foxey felt "the ministerial code had been flouted" not that he had done so: now, they Church has to close for the first time since the war. Why? Anyway, all power to the protesters – in effect, what we are seeing is people telling the politicians to do the work that they should have been doing all along.
It is disappointing that the clergy have had to close the cathedral – I am not sure that they do have to either. It is an exciting moment and if the occupiers make sure that access is not endangered then visitors should enter the spirit of this peaceful event. Now that they have closed it though there is a loss of income problem which is of course ironic in the situation. The cathedral though does need money for upkeep like any old national monument. Money always confuses the issue! Donations, I guess, to the dean would help.