Michele Hewitson Interview: Glynn Cardy

Some critics regard Archdeacon Glynn Cardy as a relentless self-promoter, but he refuses to hang the oil portrait of himself - a gift from Rotary - in St Matthew's. Photo / Natalie Slade

A man who had come for an organ lesson popped into the vicar's office at St Matthew-in-the-City and said, "Oh, you're in an interview. You're always in the headlines!"

The vicar, Glynn Cardy, also known to some as the troublesome priest, or that atheist priest - "nobody's ever said that to my face" - smiled, perhaps a little wanly.

He is always in the headlines, which is the reason I am sitting in his office where there is, in addition to the vicar, a giant smiling stuffed lion; a box of Girl Guide biscuits; a copy of a no doubt worthy tome called A Feminist Interpretation of the Bible; a copy of Dawkins' The God Delusion - "have you read it? It's hard going" - Joanna Trollope's The Rector's Wife and Mary Doria Russell's brilliant The Sparrow, theology posing as science fiction; and a cobweb in a corner. His office could have done with a dust. The vicar was slightly crumpled looking. He could have done with a press.

There is an oil portrait of him, a gift from a Rotary Club. He is all sharp angles; he looks a bit angst-ridden. The smiling stuffed cat is a better likeness.

There had been a suggestion he might hang his picture in the church. He might, if he was a relentless self-promoter, which somebody always in the headlines might be. He said, about hanging the portrait in the church. "No, you don't hang big pictures [of yourself] in the church while you're there. When I'm gone they might want to hang something up."

It might be a problem, for him or for the church, that he's regarded as a relentless self-promoter. He didn't look a bit put out at this description. He is never much put out. He is a very smiley, calm sort of vicar, given to giggling.

He has been in the headlines recently for two reasons. The first is for saying that atheists ought to be able to advertise a message - that there is probably no God, so stop worrying and get on with your life - on the backs of buses. I can't understand why sticking up for atheists is his concern, but he says it's an issue of fairness, and free speech and, launching into some free speech of his own: "... they put all sorts of things on buses ... alcohol ads, violent TV stuff, saying 'watch this', 'eat this and soon you'll be as slim as this'. Then why can't you put something up that says, 'Think about whether there is a God'?"

He likes billboards. He could put one up saying: "'There is a God!' Ha, ha. 'So don't worry and enjoy life'."

He is very proud of a billboard that read, "Beware of the God", for the church's annual blessing of the animals. He likes whimsy, and bad jokes. From his blog: "When I grow up I want to be a postie ... and post letters in your letterbox. Only I want to anonymously write the letters too and illustrate them ... I also want to write some letters that pull your leg and make you laugh."

He said, "I do enjoy making people laugh." He used to be on some deathly sounding committee called the Ministers' Association which, in the manner of committees, took minutes.

"There was no reason to have minutes so I took over as secretary and totally fabricated the minutes and I made them extremely humorous and everybody started reading them and enjoying them."

He's been called a comedian; this was not meant as a compliment. "Oh, I enjoy laughter." He might be taken for a clown. "I don't think so. When I talk about my faith, I don't make jokes."

There are, I say, tsking, swear words on his blog. "Oh dear." He is enjoying laughing at me. He's a Virgo. What a strange thing to know about an archdeacon.

He said, "I don't even know what that means really!" So why put it on his website? "I think when you set up the blog they ask you all these little questions and I thought, 'well, if someone knows my birthday, they know that I'm a Virgo.' So, whoopee."

He calls himself Lucky Bear on his blog, which is a bit too cutesy, really. The reference, he says, is to a children's story about a bear who "no matter what happened, put a smile on his face and got up in the morning. I just love the optimism". He has never felt depressed. "No. Sometimes I feel disappointed about things." He might feel disappointed if he's not reappointed archdeacon. He gave me a beatific smile and said, "Oh, probably. But I'll be Lucky Bear and get up and put my smile on!" I was thinking about that "whoopee", which might just have been more sarcastic than cute.

He is, of course, the vicar whose church put up a billboard at Christmas implying that Joseph and Mary had just had sex, and that God was a hard act to follow.

This was a very bad joke and caused an entirely predictable row, so you imagine that he must enjoy being provocative and causing rows. "Well, we didn't know it would go to 177 countries." He knew it would be provocative. "I thought it would cause some attention, yes."

He enraged many Christians and the sign was defaced by somebody he called a "Christian fanatic", which I'd have thought an intemperate turn of phrase from the Anglican Archdeacon of Auckland. He does regret that. "I should have said 'protester'. I mean, I've been a protester myself and I understand about protesting." He thought for a moment, then grinned and said, "one of the delightful stories you might like is that the protester who painted over the sign ... On Shrove Tuesday here we make pancakes and give them away to people out the front of the church, he came for a pancake." A hungry fanatic? "A hungry protester, yes!"

See how nice he is. He lets drunks and bums kip in his church during the day; he feeds pancakes to fanatics. He has a kind heart, which you would hope a vicar would have, but you wonder how kindly he is thought of by the Anglican hierarchy. He insists he gets on well with both the out-going bishop, John Paterson and the in-coming one, Ross Bay. And that - the other reason he has been in the headlines recently - he has not been turfed out as the Anglican Archdeacon for Auckland. When the new bishop takes over, all archdeacons resign and will, or won't, be reappointed.

Is he going to continue to be the archdeacon of Auckland? "I've been very happy being the archdeacon of Auckland." He's talking in the past tense. "No. I'm still the archdeacon." Does he want to continue being the archdeacon? "I've been very happy in it and I'm very happy to continue." The bishop will decide and "I'm very happy to abide by his decisions". Will he be crushed if he is not to be the archdeacon? "No, I won't be crushed." Won't it be publicly humiliating if he doesn't get the job? "No. Well, I don't think it'll be publicly humiliating."

Still, it is, I suggest, a bad look for the church to have such a misunderstanding publicly aired. He says it arose from a letter the bishop sent to an Anglican, which said that "Glynn Cardy will not be the archdeacon of Auckland much longer". That explanation makes matters even worse, I'd have thought. He just says, again mildly, that he has no way of knowing what the bishop was thinking.

If I was the bishop, I'd be thinking he was a damn nuisance. Imagine being his boss. He says God might be regarded as his ultimate boss and that Anglicans are allowed to disagree with their bishops.

"This diversity is nothing new; what might be new is being a bit more public about it." I bet he has had a ticking off, though - in a very Anglican sort of way.

Still, it is about now when I begin to wonder who, or where, the headline-grabbing, trouble-making showman clergyman is. Is he trying to behave himself so that he gets another go at being the archdeacon? He said, "I'm not trying deliberately to behave myself or to not behave myself."

We have no way of knowing what God thinks about his vicar. They seem to get on pretty well but then they would, because Cardy's God is that non-judgmental sort of God, a friendly smiling sort, who accepts all comers, no matter what they've done.

The worst thing the vicar's ever done is ... No. He can't think of anything. He was always good and knew he wanted to be a priest at the age of 15.

He was involved in a Christian youth group, which had strict rules about not smoking or drinking or having sex, so he never rebelled or played up. He had girlfriends. Giggle. "Yeah." Proper ones? "Compared with improper ones, do you mean?" He's never been drunk.

There is an idea about St Matthew's that it's the church where anything goes; that it is more venue for hire than the house of God. His predecessor once hired it out for a lingerie shoot. That wouldn't happen now. What's the line? A naturist convention? "No thank you." People are entitled to believe in naturism. "Yes, they are. And they can do it in some secluded beach somewhere well away from me."

He said, "I'm basically quite a conservative person." What he is not, is a person who is naturally the sort of character you'd expect him to be: that rowdy troublesome priest, that showman. He says that the vicar of St Matthew's has to be in the public eye, to encourage debate, and that might involve being provocative because that is the business of his parish.

If he's in the business of selling Christianity, he's not much of a salesman. He doesn't like the idea of converting people because it sounds like coercion.

He did manage to sell me a packet of Girl Guide biscuits and that was only because I insisted. I said, "That's one packet of biscuits and no Christian." Giggle, giggle. "Oh well, you can sign up to something else, can't you?" Which is only what you'd expect, and what you have to admire, from a vicar who will feed a starving fanatic a pancake.