It is no surprise that a north London parish is seeking a divorce from its patron. What is surprising is that patrons are rarely troubled in this way. We have Samuel Johnson’s famous letter about the perils of patronage. He relied upon patrons for the financing of his dictionary. The letter, to Lord Chesterfield, who had dragged his feet on backing Johnson’s project, included the sentence: ‘Is not a Patron, my Lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man struggling for life in the water, and, when he has reached ground, encumbers him with help?’ In general we don’t like being patronised.
Patronage is of course privilege or power going by another name. It comes in singular and plural forms. Patrons in the plural are customers or clients. They make their purchase and go on their way. The patron who backs a costly enterprise and engages professionals to bring it into being is an animal of a different stripe. Without patrons in the plural (i.e. customers) businesses would close down. Without a patron in the singular a parish or a publication, say, would not function. Artists are particularly in need of patronage; without it they would have to park their brushes and earn their living.
The Church of England has an inheritance of patronage. Like Establishment, like a national Church, nobody today would propose such a framework. A patron, whether the Crown, the Lord Chancellor, an Oxford or Cambridge college or a landowner, has the inherited right to appoint an incumbent to a parish of which he, she or it is patron. This right comes with certain limitations but it has ensured that incumbents are not appointed to fit one nationwide profile. The Crown and Lord Chancellor have patronage rights in 650 parishes. The Church Pastoral-Aid Society has nearly 700.
Embedded in this system is – or was – the parson’s freehold. Trollope made this a significant feature of his Barchester stories. The independence this bestowed upon vicars and rectors has been more or less neutered by recent developments. Common tenure has had its part in transforming independent incumbents into something like diocesan employees. The amalgamation of parishes has raised questions of credibility. Fergus Butler-Gallie’s ‘Field Guide to the English Clergy’ has laid bare the superb, deplorable and sometimes hilarious outcomes of the traditional system.
Bishops with managerial instincts would like to have appointments in their own hands. Freeholders, private patrons and trusts believe they are safeguarding the Gospel. If it is true that nobody today would invent such a system, it is also possible that it may be prudent, even at this late date, to ‘keep a-hold to Nurse for fear of finding something worse.’ The pattern of appointing vicars and rectors deserves scrutiny.
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