The Anglican Church in 2008

'MS [Mark Steyn]: Well, the only person who has the power to fire him is the Queen. There’s no separation of Church and state in Britain. And one of the reasons I’m in favor of separation of Church and state is because the Church, or Christianity, has thrived in a free market in the United States. The established Church in England, in part because it’s fallen into the hands of buffoons like Rowan Williams, who is basically this sort of weird, Welsh druid who’s been promoted way beyond his abilities, that the established Church in the United Kingdom and in Continental Europe has fallen, because there is no free market in Churches. And I think if there is going to be a future for Christianity in Britain at all, it will come, it will not come from an established Church like this.'

http://hughhewitt.townhall.com/talkradio/transcripts/Transcript.aspx?ContentGuid=c3da016e-0628-4e0e-81c9-d14cdfb115b1

I love Mark Steyn; in fact, he's like a father to me. But I don't agree with him in his analysis of the Church of England and why Christianity has declined in Britain. There is a 'free market' for religion in Britain. Every denomination that exists in America exists in Britain if it wants to. In fact, evangelical Christian churches are booming in Britain. The creeping death taking hold of the Anglican church in England and Wales has nothing to do with its competitors or lack thereof. It has to do with the dominance of socialists and communists in that institution which dates back to the first 25 years of the 20th century. Even when I was a child, the Anglican bishop who didn't believe in the literal Christ, the resurrection and the transfiguration were already stock figures of fun. What kind of ordinary, faithful Christian wants to belong to a church whose leaders are ironic secular intellectuals who despise the common folk and hate the popular manifestations of Christianity like Christmas?

The dynamic, cheeful and faithful long ago left the Anglican church for its more bouyant rivals. Thats not much of a problem unless you still value the Anglican churhc as an institution. As an Englishman, I do. I am hardheaded enough though to know when sickness has taken hold to the point where death is inevitable. Twenty years ago, the 'liberal' (read communist) strain of Anglicanism was still counterweighted by the 'conservative' (read Christian) strain, but that is no longer the case. The Anglican church is no longer one thing- it will soon break up into a number of constituent parts. Poor St Augustine.