In an earlier essay I explored the term ‘Christian Civilization’ in Britain in 1940. This contribution, however, looks specifically at some significant facets of Christian opinion in the early years of the war: how, where and in what form it was published. It looks closely at the milieu in which views were developed, circulated and published in the early years of the war. What was happening in 1939–40 could still appear to be yet another European war: the United States was not involved, the Soviet Union had a pact with Germany, and the Sino-Japanese conflict, which had commenced in 1937, remained regional. Standing alone in 1940, no commentator could predict with any certainty the evolving alignments of the next few years. We must banish from our minds any certainty of a ‘British Victory’ or knowledge of its likely nature. If Great Britain had succumbed in 1939–41, the fate of organized, institutional Christianity in Europe would have been bleak.

So, was British Christianity understanding or even sharing in the European Christian existential crisis (if that is what was happening) or perhaps, on the contrary, standing outside it, not just because it was unoccupied, but because insular people are insular? British Christianity existed within a state whose political culture and historical experience made it sui generis. Yet British Christianity, or rather British-generated Christianity, was global. Anglicanism had world significance, if somewhat patchily. The archbishop of Canterbury was the Englishman (when not a Scot) who in some sense spoke for this worldwide ‘Anglican Communion’. Where global Anglicanism stood in relation to British Christianity, however, admitted a variety of answers, not least in the United States. The Christianity of the ‘Dominions’ remained a recognizably ‘British’ Christianity and its existence helped to sustain the fighting white empire. By the same token, however, too great an emphasis on this fact was not politic in India or elsewhere in the empire. Furthermore, British missionaries had taken their British Christianity to countries not under direct British control, notably China. Whether this extraordinary empire/commonwealth could or should survive into a post-war future was a pressing matter.

The Christian churches clearly had messages to give, but where and how to give them? All the denominations had their in-house newspapers and the Anglicans, Methodists and Catholics had more than one, reflecting different internal emphases or traditions.