Fisher: I have come to give you some advice about my successor. Whomever you choose, under no account must it be Michael Ramsey, the Archbishop of York. Dr Ramsey is a theologian, a scholar and a man of prayer. Therefore, he is entirely unsuitable as archbishop of Canterbury. I have known him all his life. I was his headmaster at Repton.
Macmillan: Thank you, Your Grace, for your kind advice. You may have been Dr Ramsey’s headmaster, but you were not mine.
Macmillan
duly appointed Ramsey, who was a reforming archbishop, making his mark
as a supporter of the liberation of homosexuality, as a strong opponent
of apartheid and of the Smith regime in Rhodesia, and as an influential
voice opposing curbs on immigration for Kenyan Asians.
