The false will then be challenged and rejected but what is true will be recognised and fulfilled. It has ever been so and must continue to be so. 

For the Church to be effective in embassy and hospitality, it must be visible in the society in which it finds itself. For some, like Philip Larkin, iconic buildings are enough, as they breathe an atmosphere of transcendence. For others, it is the people of a community gathering for worship in a place that has been used, perhaps for centuries, by their forebears. We must not neglect such traditional understandings of visibility but there has to be more. 

One feature of the Church most appreciated by ordinary people is the sight of clergy "on the beat": walking the streets, visiting homes and shops and chaplains at the workplace. Processions on important days like Good Friday, Palm Sunday and Easter, worship outdoors, especially at holiday times, evangelistic and prayer rallies and accessibility to worship in ancient buildings all contribute to that sense of visibility among the population. The papal visit to Britain in September 2010, and the coming Billy Graham Evangelistic Association-led mission, Crossing London, can reveal how Christianity can contribute to a deepening of people's spiritual lives and enable them to address everyday moral questions. 

Too often debate about the future of the Church and of the Christian faith has been adversarial and polarised: tradition is set against innovation, authority against democracy and community-mindedness against "congregationalism". Such polarisation is not always helpful and needlessly forces people into exclusive and excluding models of the Church's life. We should be promoting a "both-and" rather than an "either-or" view of the Church so that tradition and renewal, order and spontaneity, leadership and consent, mission and maintenance can be creatively held together.