Tony Blair Reaches the Crossroads: Prime Minister Ready to Take Final Step As He Meets Pope Before H

Jun 23, 06:37 AM

Current Headlines: By Stephen McGinty

WHEN Tony Blair strides into the Vatican library this morning, he will take a few steps closer to his spiritual home.

Beneath the leather-bound volumes, religious portraits and heavy wooden cross, the Prime Minister will meet Pope Benedict XVI, with whom he is expected to discuss his plans to convert to Catholicism.

Part of the reason for Mr Blair's change of heart - he has been an Anglican - is his family. His wife Cherie and daughter Kathryn will join him at the papal audience. As Catholics, the family attend mass each week, but Mr Blair must sit out communion, which is denied to non-Catholics.

As Britain has never had a Catholic prime minister, Mr Blair decided not to convert prior to taking, or while in, office.

Alastair Campbell, then his press spokesman, may have famously declared: "We don't do God", but the prime minister of Great Britain, at times, has little choice, for instance when he appoints the Archbishop of Canterbury, leader of the Anglican Church.

Some lawyers believe the 1829 Emancipation Act, which granted civil rights to Roman Catholics, may still prevent a Catholic from becoming prime minister, as it says no Catholic adviser to the monarch can hold civil or military office.

Dr Bob Davis, head of religious education at Glasgow University, said yesterday: "The highest positions of state have not exactly been hospitable to Catholics and I think they have to be fine-tuned before a Catholic could comfortably take the position of prime minister.

"The act of conversion, in which he [Mr Blair] abandons his Anglican allegiance would have made the situation even more complicated. There is also the fact that his most conspicuous achievement has been the peace process in Northern Ireland and his conversion would have made it infinitely more difficult. There is still the spectre that a Catholic in a high position has dual allegiance, to a foreign power. It is a myth, but a potent myth."

It was not until he married that Mr Blair began attending Catholic mass. The Blairs brought up their four children in the faith and sent them to Church schools, and the Labour leader has steadily increased his contacts with the Church. Soon after he was elected to parliament in 1983, Mr Blair came into contact with Father John Caden, priest at St John Fisher RC Church in Sedgefield.

Fr Caden became a powerful influence in the Blairs' lives, baptising their children and playing tennis with the PM. Fr Caden, who was awarded an MBE a year after Labour won power in 1997, often told friends that Mr Blair was "a Catholic in his heart".

When he became Prime Minister, Mr Blair regularly received communion at Westminster Cathedral, while attending mass with his family. Cardinal Basil Hume, however, wrote to him that such behaviour was not permitted. The Prime Minister agreed to desist, writing the cardinal a note saying: "I wonder what Jesus would think."

In the past decade, the Prime Minister has grown close to a couple of priests. First there was Father Michael Seed, who shepherded a number of high-profile former Anglicans, such as Ann Widdecombe, into the Catholic fold. Four years ago, Mr Blair turned to a more discreet figure. It was reported he has been prepared for his conversion by Father John Walsh, an RAF chaplain, who says mass at Chequers each weekend.

After today's appointment with the Pope, Mr Blair will go to a lunch hosted by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor at the Venerable English College in Rome. He will be the first serving premier to set foot in the college, which centuries ago trained priests for a clandestine return to Protestant England.

(c) 2007 Scotsman, The. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.