Reparations, £100m and the Church of England
Alton Bell argues that the Church of England must ignore demands to redirect its £100 million fund aimed at addressing the damage caused by its role in the Slave Trade
Recent calls for the Church of England (CofE) to withdraw or redirect the £100 million fund – designated to address its historic complicity in the trans-Atlantic slave trade – raise profound moral, theological and ecclesial concerns. Such proposals are often framed as prudential, pragmatic, or pastoral and do not withstand ethical scrutiny. More seriously, they risk undermining the Church’s own confession, repentance and moral credibility.
There is no moral, theological or ecclesiological justification for redirecting the £100 million away from the descendants of those harmed by slavery. Although final decisions regarding the fund’s distribution remain pending, any retreat from its reparative purpose would constitute a reversal of repentance, a distortion of biblical justice, and a betrayal of the Church’s publicly declared commitments. Indeed, it would risk repeating history by allowing those who historically benefited from slavery to remain its continuing beneficiaries.
To understand why, a brief historical overview is necessary.
Historical Foundations of Ecclesial Complicity
In the 1450s, Pope Nicholas V issued the papal bulls Dum Diversas (1452) and Romanus Pontifex (1454), granting Portugal authority to conquer non-Christian lands and reduce peoples to perpetual servitude. These decrees provided religious-legal sanction for early European expansion and African enslavement.
The Protestant Reformation began in 1517 with Martin Luther. Although it weakened papal authority, it did not fundamentally challenge the legitimacy of slavery. In 1534, Henry VIII broke from Rome, establishing the English monarch as Supreme Head of the Church of England, thereby aligning ecclesial and state power.
By the 1560s, John Hawkins had initiated England’s involvement in the trans-Atlantic slave trade with the support of Elizabeth I. These ventures were commercial and imperial, yet they operated within a Christian monarchy where Church and state interests were deeply intertwined. Protestantism rejected papal supremacy, but it did not reject the racialised economic logic of slavery. Instead, slavery continued under new national and theological frameworks.
The CofE has publicly acknowledged that it invested in and profited from slavery-linked enterprises, benefited materially from an economy structured by racialised chattel slavery, and failed to oppose the institution with sufficient clarity or urgency. This acknowledgment constitutes an admission of institutional wrongdoing – not merely a symbolic gesture.
Institutional Sin and Inherited Responsibility
Moral accountability does not expire with time, particularly where injustice generated accumulated, inherited and institutionalised wealth.
The Church of England continues to exist as a legal, financial and moral body. It retains assets derived – directly or indirectly – from an economy sustained by enslaved labour. If benefit is inherited, responsibility is likewise inherited. Arguments that present generations bear no responsibility misunderstand the nature of institutional continuity. Institutions persist across generations; so, too, does moral liability attached to their corporate identity.
To redirect the fund would be to acknowledge wrongdoing while refusing the cost of repair. Such a move would not represent prudence but moral evasion.
Queen Anne’s Bounty and Imperial Capital
In 1704, under Queen Anne, Parliament established Queen Anne’s Bounty to supplement the incomes of poorer Anglican clergy. While pastorally framed, its funding mechanisms reveal deep entanglement with imperial and commercial power.
The Bounty was capitalised through revenues from First Fruits and Tenths – ecclesiastical taxes previously appropriated by the Crown – and through investments in government securities and commercial ventures connected to imperial expansion. Among these were financial instruments tied to the South Sea Company, whose asiento contract authorised Britain to supply enslaved Africans to Spanish colonies.
The Company’s profits were inseparable from the commodification of African lives. Anglican capital was not morally insulated; it circulated within and benefited from Britain’s slave-based economy. Queen Anne’s Bounty functioned as an active financial body whose growth depended upon imperial structures sustained by enslaved labour.
Through subsequent financial restructurings, the modern CofE remains a beneficiary of this accumulated capital.
The Codrington Bequest and Ecclesial Ownership of Slavery
The Codrington bequest makes ecclesial complicity even more explicit.
In 1710, Christopher Codrington, a Barbadian plantation owner, bequeathed his estates – including more than 300 enslaved Africans – to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (SPG). His will deliberately transferred enslaved persons as assets to the Church’s missionary arm to finance Anglican evangelism.
The SPG owned and operated the Codrington plantations for over a century. Enslaved Africans were branded with the word “SOCIETY” to mark ecclesial ownership. This was not passive inheritance but active participation in slavery as a profit-generating enterprise.
When emancipation occurred in 1833, compensation was paid not to the enslaved but to slave owners. The SPG received £8,823 8s 7d for the loss of 411 enslaved persons. Thus, the Church was compensated for the abolition of its own human property, further embedding slavery-derived wealth within Anglican institutional structures.
Codrington College and Institutional Continuity
The legacy of this wealth continues.
Codrington College in Barbados – funded by plantation profits – remains an Anglican theological institution within the global Communion. Its land, endowment and institutional foundations are inseparable from the coerced labour of enslaved Africans.
This continuity demonstrates that slavery was not a peripheral episode but a foundational contributor to Anglican global infrastructure. The issue at stake is therefore not merely historical memory but present ecclesial identity.
Biblical Repentance and Reparative Justice
Biblical theology is clear: repentance requires restitution.
In Luke 19:8–9, Zacchaeus restores fourfold what he has unjustly taken; only then does Jesus declare salvation. Leviticus 6:1–7 mandates repayment plus compensation for economic wrongdoing. The prophets repeatedly reject repentance divorced from justice (Isaiah 1:16–17; Micah 6:8).
The £100 million commitment is therefore not an act of charity but of reparative justice. Charity gives from surplus; repair returns what was wrongfully taken. Repentance without restitution becomes performative rather than transformative.
Ecclesial Integrity and Moral Witness
The Church of England has framed its reparative commitment as a theological act grounded in truth-telling, corporate repentance and relational repair. To redirect the fund would signal that repentance is negotiable and justice conditional.
Such a retreat would significantly damage the Church’s moral authority – not only in racial justice but in its proclamation of reconciliation. A Church unwilling to bear the cost of its own repentance cannot credibly preach the cross, which is itself the costly repair of broken covenant.
Conclusion
The £100 million reparative commitment is imperfect but necessary.
There is no moral justification for redirection, because the harm was real and the benefit ongoing.
There is no theological justification, because repentance demands repair.
There is no ecclesial justification, because the wounded belong to the same body.
The question before the Church of England is not whether it can afford to honour this commitment, but whether it can afford not to. To retreat now would not be prudence but betrayal – of history, of theology, and of the Gospel the Church proclaims.
Alton Bell
Chair, Movement for Justice and Reconciliation
Visit www.mjr-uk.com
