Among the rather too many outdated and discriminatory quirks of the British system of government is that we have a nationalised state church and that British Prime Ministers have a leading role in shortlisting and appointing Church of England bishops and archbishops.
We were all rather hoping in 1997 that Labour would move away from this Henry VIII inspired charade, but strangely Tony Blair embraced the whole process and even vetoed candidates for the post of bishop of Liverpool.
But there seems to be some reasonably well informed speculation from Christopher Morgan of The Sunday Times writing for Religious Intelligence that Brown "has told senior colleagues that he intends to give the church control over its own senior appointments."
It's a small first step, but with Christianity in substantial and prolonged decline in this country, surely not the last step towards a modern secular democracy.
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