THE HUNDREDTH ARCHBISHOP

HIS Lordship, Arthur Michael Ramsey, who will become the 100th Archbishop of Canterbury when Dr. Geoffrey Fisher steps down on May 31, is a massive man of God. Though he is only 56, his large, white-tufted head and ponderous dignity make him look, as a fellow cleric puts it, "at least a thousand years old. When he surges majestically up the aisle of York Cathedral, you feel that all the power and authority of Christendom are concentrated in his stooping presence."

His rise in the church was scholarly and speedy. The son of a Cambridge mathematics don (a Congregationalist preacher who joined the Church of England the year before his death and was baptized by his son), Ramsey studied at Repton. His headmaster: Dr. Fisher, who still calls him "my boy." He was ordained in 1928, twelve years later became canon of Durham Cathedral and professor of divinity at Durham University. Another dozen years and he was Bishop of Durham. Five years ago, he was appointed to the No. 2 post in the Anglican Church: Archbishop of York. He has been married 18 years, has no children. A nonsmoker, he carries cigarettes as an act of charity.

Scholar & Thinker. High-church Archbishop Ramsey is a scholar and thinker rather than a mover and shaker. He has written five books, with titles such as The Gospel and the Catholic Church, The Resurrection of Christ, The Glory of God and the Transfiguration of Christ. Theologically, he stresses Christian obedience to God; it is not for man to decide things, but to make himself God's willing instrument. Like Dr. Fisher, he is "for" church unity, but where Fisher tends to do things in committee, Ramsey tends to do them on his knees. "Ecumenism," he has said, "is the word I hate most."

Unlike Dr. Fisher, Archbishop Ramsey would like to see the Church of England separated from the state. "But you mustn't campaign for disestablishment," he says. "I wish rather that the church would become worthy of it--would become so annoying to the state that it had disestablishment forced upon it." Administration does not interest him, nor does the proliferation of committees. Says he: "I would gladly let lapse much of the existing machinery, which would be no loss to the church."

Preacher & Teacher. Archbishop Ramsey also disagrees with Archbishop Fisher on the desirability of making adultery a criminal offense, and demurs from Dr. Fisher's opinion that God may well want the human race to wipe itself out. "I am not a pacifist," he told students at Oxford last year, "but it is difficult to see today how there could be a just war. If the choice came between blowing up the world and being overrun by Communism, I still don't think we have the right to blow up the world."

As Archbishop of Canterbury, he told reporters last week, his chief problem and main undertaking "would be that of bringing the Christian faith to the people of the country in every way possible--by preaching, by teaching, by writing, by radio and by television. I should say this is overwhelmingly my first interest."

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