I’m so furious about the Church embracing this £1bn slavery reparations nonsense

Mar 7, 2024 by Jill

by Steven Glover, Daily Mail:

…it’s keeping me awake at night.

The night before last, I awoke with a start and couldn’t go back to sleep. Had I drunk too much? Possibly, but that wasn’t the cause of my insomnia.

I was raging inwardly over the latest idiocy of the Church of England — the Church my father and several relatives have served as priests, and in which, despite all that has happened, I still worship.

An internal body described as an independent oversight group has recommended that the C of E should pay £1 billion in reparations to atone for its historic links to slavery. Previously the Church had pledged to stump up £100 million, which some thought pretty steep.

What are these historic links, you may ask? In the early 18th century, the Church of England profitably invested in the South Sea Company, which transported 34,000 slaves across the Atlantic over a 30-year period.

Cash-strapped

Slavery was an abominable evil, and one could certainly lose sleep contemplating man’s inhumanity to man, while marvelling that the Anglican Church of 300 years ago should have briefly been the beneficiary of such a wicked business. But this reflection was not what kept me awake.

I thought of the failing, cash-strapped Church of England, which has closed more than 400 churches in the past decade because it couldn’t afford to keep them open.

As I tossed and turned, I also thought of impoverished vicars, expected to survive on an average salary of around £30,000 a year, admittedly plus free accommodation — although these days that’s far more likely to be a utilitarian box than a gracious rectory.

I remembered the many poor people who, despite counting their pennies, give generously to the Church in the collection every week because that is what is asked of them.

And now it transpires that our weakened national Church, which can’t or won’t pay its priests a decent wage, and which has closed hundreds of churches, hopes miraculously to lay its hands on £1 billion to atone for the sins of people who lived three centuries ago.

Read here (£)