Justin Welby is the Alpha male to save the Church of England I never did become an evangelical or join CICU. But I did notice that the caricature, though not always wrong, was basically unfair. The people who fed me buns were good people. They felt that Jesus was changing their lives, and they wanted to spread His good news. They did it honestly, conscientiously and kindly. They took seriously Jesus's famous "Great Commission" - "Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature." They helped many, even cynical young me. Move forward to today. One of those hospitable Nickys, the Rev Nicky Gumbel, is the vicar of Holy Trinity, Brompton - "HTB," the most famous evangelical church in Britain. In 1990, he took over a modest course of Christian instruction called Alpha, and changed it. Instead of it being for existing believers, he and his colleagues aimed it at people outside the Church. Today, the Alpha course has been taken by 19.6 million people, in 66,000 churches, taught in 112 languages, and followed in virtually every country in the world. It is present high and low - in 85 per cent of British prisons, and in Yale and Harvard. Alpha involves no obligation - no money, no follow-up courses, no membership, no assent. Its only worldly inducement is free food eaten together (those buns again). It gives orthodox Christian answers to questions such as "Who is Jesus?" "Why did he die?" and "What is faith?" It is obvious that a movement on this scale makes quite a difference to the world - a difference for the good, I would say. Less obviously, perhaps, it has made a difference to the people who preach it. Evangelicals of this kind have moved out of the ghetto and no longer mix only with one another. The denominational boundaries of old are now completely out of date. The Alpha course has been so designed that it is exactly the same for Catholics as for Protestants. In the Vatican itself, Padre Raniero Cantalamessa, the Franciscan Capuchin priest who is the Preacher to the Papal Household, is one of Alpha's leading advocates. Even Eastern Orthodox churches and Copts do Alpha. The ecumenical movement is sometimes represented as a liberal thing. In the good sense of that word - being open and generous to the thought of others - it is. But it turns out that its greatest strength is not in encouraging ultra-modernism, but in forging a unity within traditional Christianity unknown since the Reformation. This new unity is now the biggest Christian force in the world. The new Archbishop of Canterbury is the epitome of what I am talking about. Dr Welby was a lay pastor at Holy Trinity, Brompton, and trained as a priest at the same time that Alpha was going global. He was what the satirists call "HTB-positive." But neither his worldly, ecclesiastical or intellectual career has been narrow. Oilman, Francophile (he was France's honorary consul in Liverpool when he was Dean there), peacemaker in Nigeria, admirer of the Benedictine order, he has never worn the straitjacket of a sect. When he was at Liverpool, his slogan was that the cathedral was "a safe place to do risky things in Christ's service." Faith as risk, rather than as bogus certainty, would seem the right idiom for the modern Church of England. Just now, hopes are high. I have talked to Church people who actively dislike evangelicals, but even they express complete trust in Dr Welby's openness. No one expects a war between High and Low, Anglo-Catholics and Bible-bashers. They expect an archbishop who will speak bravely to England, and the wider world, in clear English, about the claims that Jesus makes on the life of society and on each human being. Obviously some of these hopes will be dashed. Churches are probably the most disputatious organisations in the world. The Anglican Communion, at whose head Dr Welby will find himself, is ungovernable. If he does not recognise this at once, and find a way of stepping aside from executive responsibility over it, he will be dragged down by its squabbles, just like poor Dr Rowan Williams. People sometimes imagine that the Archbishop is like the Pope, able to issue commands to the faithful. In reality, he can barely sack a curate in Carshalton. His authority, if it exists at all, is moral. That can be quickly squandered by indecision on the one hand or high-handedness on the other. It is most encouraging to hear that one of Dr Welby's greatest skills is handling people who disagree: he will encounter little else. As I say, evangelicals of Dr Welby's kind are not narrow or bigoted. But I do have one fear about them. Historically, at least, they have not been very interested in the idea of the Church. They have seen it as an organisational vehicle, rather than an institution with its own subtle character. No institution is more subtle, not to say downright odd, than the Church of England. I do hope Dr Welby sees this. I hope he understands how much its future lies in its past - its parish structure, its architecture, its links with all the English, regardless of faith, and with Parliament and Crown, and, above all, its incomparable liturgy. It is like a chaotic old publishing house, now producing substandard material, but with the best backlist in the world. It will not respond to managerialist logic. It needs tough love.