Looking back, looking forward: a few highlights

The end of the year is always a good moment to take stock, and that holds no less for embassies as for individuals. A few of our 2014 highlights:

• The large number of high level bilateral visits to the Vatican, topped of course by that of Her Majesty The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh in April to see Pope Francis. Such visits show that the UK places great importance on the relationship with the Holy See, and range from the symbolic – such as senior Royal visits including the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester for the double Papal canonisation in April, or the Earl of Wessex in October – to the policy driven substantial, like the Home Secretary to talk about human trafficking in April, or Baroness Anelay focusing on freedom of religion and belief in December. Our long list of visitors in 2014 includes members of parliament, senior officials, ministers, and figures from civil society, who help to keep us focused and drive forward our bilateral relations.
• The event on 3 December commemorating the Centenary of re-established diplomatic relations, including a Mass celebrated by Cardinal Parolin and a reception in the medieval cloister of St Paul’s outside the Walls. It was wonderful to see the level of participation from the Catholic hierarchies of England & Wales, Scotland and Ireland, the Roman Curia, other Christian representatives, and the British Holy See community here in Rome. The step taken in 1914 was an historic one, and it was right to mark it this year.
• The growth in attention and understanding of UK government to the role of the Holy See internationally. As an embassy, we believe we played our part, for example through making the linkages between the Holy See and British networks on issues as important as sexual violence in conflict, on which Pope Francis tweeted, migration and modern slavery, freedom of religion and other basic issues of human rights issues, international development, climate change, and global conflict and security issues. Pope Francis’s energy only reinforces the Holy See’s relevance for governments around the world, and we need to respond in kind.
• The British 2014 chairmanship of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, and our quiet work to bring the Holy See and IHRA closer together. And the now annual visit of the Cambridge Muslim College to the Holy See, reinforcing the links and increasing understanding between British Islam and the centre of global Catholicism.
• An increase in public and government awareness for the difficulties faced by Christians in the Middle East. Middle East Minister Hugh Robertson came to the Holy See in March to hear views at first hand before subsequent travel in the region. The Prince of Wales was a standard bearer in his highlighting of the issue. As an embassy, we tried to do our part both in the background and in public.
• The prominence of British faces at the business end of Holy See work, from parliamentarians like Lord Patten and Baroness Hollins, leading members respectively on the Papal Commission looking at Holy See communications at the Commission for the Protection of Minors, to the appointment this year of a new British Cardinal, His Eminence Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster. We look forward to Archbishop Paul Gallagher taking up the reins as Secretary for Relations with States in the new year.

As I say, these are just highlights. The duck’s legs continue to pound relentlessly under the surface, and there is so much more I could flag up.

What is clear is that 2014 was an unprecedentedly busy year for this embassy; and that 2015 promises more of the same. I should like to thank my small team and all our collaborators for their hard work over the year, and wish them and all our readers the very best of wishes for Christmas and the New Year.

Thank you for your interest in our work, and we look forward to hearing your views on what we’ve done this year, and what more we should be doing next.