Rowan Williams wants a softer Christianity – but the Gospel isn’t a metaphor
- Charles Perez
- Jun 17
- 4 min read

By John Mac Ghlionn,
Catholic Herald
June 2025
(photo: Wikimedia Creative Commons)
Rowan Williams wants to make Christianity safe for modern ears. That’s the real story behind his long, meandering interviews, such as the recent extensive interview he did with the New York Times, and poetic turns of phrase.
He tells us that suffering doesn’t need an answer. That faith is elusive, mysterious, like a cloud of incense swirling around a flame we’ll never quite touch. But in trying to make Christianity palatable to doubters, Williams strips it of its essence. In place of the Gospel, we’re left with a mood.
He means well, of course. The former Archbishop of Canterbury is no fool. Williams has read the mystics, the philosophers, the poets. He’s good at riddles and metaphors. But Christianity is not a metaphor. It’s not a feeling or a sensibility or a literary style. It’s a faith rooted in the Incarnation – God made flesh. Not God as fog. Not God as idea. But a man who walked, bled, died and rose again. Jesus Christ not as a metaphor for love, but as love with a pulse and a name.
Williams says the New Atheists attack a God he doesn’t believe in either. But that’s a dodge – a clever one, dressed in academic humility. Because the New Atheists aren’t swinging at vague deities or cartoonish caricatures. They’re aiming directly at the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob – the one who split seas, raised the dead, and etched moral law into stone.
The God who commands, convicts, forgives and reigns. Not a therapist in the sky. A sovereign. A judge. And yes, I know, that makes some people uncomfortable. But that’s the point. Christianity doesn’t need to soften that truth. It needs to speak it – clearly, unapologetically and without flinching.
Moreover, while honest, Williams’ picture of suffering is theologically thin. He leans heavily on Dostoyevsky, letting his character Ivan Karamazov set the emotional tone, but shrinks back from the full power of the Cross. He invites us to sit with the sorrow, to feel the weight of existence and the silence of God. And that’s real – but it’s not the whole story. Christianity doesn’t leave you staring into the abyss. It doesn’t end in Ivan’s tortured syllogisms or spiritual stalemates. It ends with an empty tomb, a pierced side and a rolled-away stone.
Christianity doesn’t run from suffering – it confronts it. Yes, we ask why children are born with illnesses no doctor can cure. The question isn’t new, and the ache doesn’t go away. But the Church never pretended to have neat answers. It never tried to talk the agony away. Instead, it pointed to a God who didn’t stay above it all. Who didn’t send down advice or distant comfort, but came in person – right into the mess. Beaten, mocked and nailed to a cross. Not as a symbol, but as a sacrifice. Not to explain the pain – but to carry it. Every last drop.
There is something deeply modern in Williams’ reluctance to assert. He circles truths. He performs reverence without clarity. His God is oceanic, not authoritative. He’s generous but not jealous. He’s present but never personal enough to interfere. That may sound spiritual. It may even feel humane. But it isn’t Christian.
Because the God of Christianity is not a gentle whisper lost in the static of doubt. He is the Lion of Judah. The Alpha and the Omega. He speaks in commandments and covenants. He calls sinners to repent. He casts out demons. He separates light from darkness and truth from lies.
Williams may think that’s all too stark, too literal, too…unsophisticated. But the Gospel wasn’t written for elites. It was preached to fishermen, outcasts, Roman soldiers and tax collectors. It didn’t come wrapped in literary theory. It came with wounds.
Faith is not guesswork. It’s not tiptoeing in the dark hoping to bump into God. It’s confidence in what we firmly believe. Williams prefers to sidestep all that. He warns us not to make God “manageable”. Fair enough. But in doing so, he makes Him unrecognisable. And in trying to rescue God from crude misunderstandings, he risks erasing Him entirely.
Christianity is not about being endlessly “open to something”. It’s about being reshaped, rewritten, remade by Someone. It’s not about keeping your options open. It’s about commitment. Williams offers a gentle Christianity, but not a true Christianity.
The early martyrs didn’t die for a perspective that “enlarges”. They died for Christ the King, for the Logos who became flesh, for the Judge who will come again in glory. That’s the faith that endures. That’s the faith the world still needs.
Photo: Nick Cave and Rowan Williams arrive at Westminster Abbey ahead of the Coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla on May 06, 2023 in London, England. (Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)
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