“Roger Passmore,” said Baldy, nodding in affirmation of his own name. “This is my colleague Catherine and I wonder if you’ve met Cara Carrington, who works in the mission division of Church House?” Cara. Of course. From the big meeting room at Lambeth Palace. But not bustling out this time.
I could have arrived for an interview, which in a way I suppose I had.
“I don’t think we have,” said Cara, tilting her head and furrowing her brow, which I recognised as the universal pastoral signal that “I’m happy to know you – please trust me with all your secrets.”
No doing, sister – I hope to Christ I never looked at anyone like that. “We were in the same room once at Lambeth Palace,” I said. “But we weren’t introduced.” I saw a flicker of insecurity cross her face and that was satisfying.
We sat at the phony, walnut-style table, Passmore at the head, the Rev Cara by Catherine opposite, so she was on the edge of the meeting, having to lean in on her forearms to show her engagement with me.
I remember there was a sort of washing-up session at the top of the meeting. Passmore was clearly used to this kind of recruitment exercise and was nothing if not a stickler for detail. He delivered a smooth preamble on the Official Secrets Act as if barely listening to himself. He said it was generally misunderstood and that we didn’t sign it so much as be bound by it permanently, like any other law.
He made what may have been a previously successful gag about some people exercising their right to opt out of it in favour of Her Majesty’s hospitality – even Rev Cara didn’t laugh – and wound up by saying that “in any event”, he found it easy talking freely with clergy because his work “in all kinds of ways” suited the confessional.
Rev Cara smiled fit to burst at this. I mentally cast her as a circus act called Seal of Confessional, balancing a ball on her nose and slapping her short fins together.
“We just wondered if you could help us with some analysis we’re doing of the peace process in Palestine,” he said.
That’s what he actually said, I remember now.
“The difficulty we have is ensuring the safety and security of aid workers in occupied territories in Palestine, particularly Christians.”
Oh yeah? You don’t give a damn about the safety of aid workers, I thought at the time. But that’s not what I said. What I said at the time was all quietly expert and thoughtful.
“Why would you have to?” I asked. “My understanding is that aid workers are there at their own risk, with the UN supposedly providing some blanket cover.”
I knew from my own time in Palestine that we were meant to invoke the United Nations for free passage, but that it was useless in the field. It’s hard to invoke international law under mortar attack or with a muzzle in your mouth, though I’d been lucky. I’d heard stories. There are more aid workers killed out there than you ever hear about in the Western papers, mainly because so many of them aren’t European.
Rev Cara interrupted, her voice soft but firm. I bet life was tough for Mr Rev Cara.
“Much of the work we’ve done there has been facilitated by the Foreign Office. The government has a duty of care to those who work there. I’d like to think the Church does too.”
What textbook did she get that out of ?
“The Christian population there is dwindling, as I’m sure you know,” said Baldy Roger. “Most of them are Russians now, looking for an American passport. But the Christian axis continues to offer a crucial arbitration between Israel and the Palestinians.”
I didn’t need to hear all that stuff. Baldy even asked if I knew Palestinian Christians are called Living Stones. Yeah, I did actually. And Israel was trying to get blood out of them. But I didn’t say that.
It went on like this for a bit, the usual old rubbish about the Christians keeping the peace by being the via media between an Israel that occupied the entire region and a Palestine that wanted to wipe it from the map.
After a load of this, I asked the big question: “So where do I fit in?”
“Ah,” he said, taking this as encouragement that I would want to. “We want to hold a conference out there. A Christian conference, one that reaches out to the other faith communities, that provides a neutral platform for speakers from all three religions, a bridge across the conflict that both shows the importance of the Christian presence but which really sweats its unique opportunity to be the catalyst for a lasting peace in Palestine.”
I promise you he did talk about “sweating” the Christian opportunity.
“We’d love you to convene one of the three days of the conference. We’ll have the Archbishop of Jerusalem, of course – and we hope we’ll have Canterbury too – but we really thought it would be helpful to have someone who knew the region and its problems at ground level, as it were.”
“And a woman,” said Rev Cara, with a concerned face now.
“An aid worker, a Christian priest, someone who could speak authentically but wasn’t just one of the big figureheads of religious leadership,” said Baldy and Cat (as he called her) patted this profile of me into her laptop.
“Right.” I sat back and laughed at the three of them. Not unpleasantly. I was doing charming, like I did on my women’s committees. “But why are we here?”
They sat still. They didn’t surely think I was making an existential point?
“I mean, why are we sitting in intelligence services talking about this?” I’d wanted to say: why are we sitting in this hollowed-out volcano like Bond villains? But I didn’t want to offend them. Not
