From: Anglican Futures.
This is the second of four blogs related to the speech given by the Most Revd Rt Hon Justin Welby GCVO at the Cambridge Union on the 12th May 2025.
The first -“Welby – “I was being thick” – explored his comments about marriage and sexuality and can be found here. Look out for the next blog, which will explore the ‘truth’ of Makin.
When the former Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Revd Rt Hon Justin Welby GCVO, addressed the Cambridge Union last month he chose to speak about ‘truth’. An appropriate subject some might think for the home of the oldest debating society in the world – a place where the truth or falsehood of statements and policies are deliberated and decided.
During his address, and in the questions afterwards, he kept returning to the concept of truth; the challenges of speaking the truth; the need for“.. truth that leads us to care for human dignity, which is protected only by truth”; and the benefit of being part of communities that “love truthfully and seek your good truthfully and which care for each other.” He even spoke of Jesus as “the way, the truth and the life” and the role of bishops in the House of Lords to march, “to the tune that comes from God who calls for an eternal viewpoint of truth and service to the poor not of power relations.”
Truth matters to Justin Welby – but like may others, not least Pontius Pilate – he does not have a good answer to the question, “What is truth?”
Justin Welby told those gathered in Cambridge that, “…the test of truth for all of us is whether we are prepared to pay the price of defending it. I wanted to start there because a truth that buckles under pressure is simply not made for the job of life.”
‘Truth’ in Justin Welby’s mind, therefore, is what any individual is prepared to pay the price to defend.
He shared that his own truth is found in the person of Jesus Christ (not dogma or concepts) and gave an example of defending truth when he challenged the then government’s ‘Rwanda-scheme’. He explained that his father-in-law’s ‘truth’ led to him fighting Hitler. Presumably those who fought for Hitler held a different but equally unbuckling ‘truth’ all together.
This blog has noted before the problems of Justin Welby’s attachment to ‘plural truth’ but in this latest statement, the concept of truth is detached from any need to be in accord with fact or reality. ‘Truth’ becomes any construct, dogma or concept that an individual is prepared to defend.
It is no wonder the Church of England became bogged down in interminable debate while under Welby’s leadership. If the only test of the ‘truthfulness’ of any ‘truth’ is how hard and how long any one individual, or group, is prepared to defend their position, becoming entrenched is inevitable Nothing illustrates this better than the trench warfare that has surrounded discussions around human sexuality.