In a surprise move, the Church of England has stepped up as a direct competitor against major payday-loans firms such as Wonga. In an interview with Total Politics magazine, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby explained that he had met with Wonga boss Errol Damelin and told him that the C of E was preparing to launch a series of low-interest credit unions as a challenge to the dominance of big-brand lenders, whose interest rates have been frequently attacked for driving borrowers into the financial abyss.

According to the publication, Welby was as forthright as a cigar-chomping tycoon in his approach to Damelin: “I said to him quite bluntly that we’re not in the business of trying to legislate you out of existence, we’re trying to compete you out of existence.”

Damelin then indicated that he relishes the coming battle for borrowers’ hearts and wallets. “On the competition point,” he told the BBC, “we always welcome fresh approaches that give people a fuller set of alternatives to solve their financial challenges. I’m all for better consumer choice.”

As Professional Manager reported in November last year, Welby rose through the Church hierarchy following a successful career in the private sector, during which time he worked for Elf Aquitaine and later served in a senior-executive capacity as treasurer of Enterprise Oil PLC. Earlier this month, the C of E announced plans to set up credit unions specifically for its clergy, hinting that Welby was drawing upon the reserves of expertise he had built up in the business world.

However, lest it be thought that the Church was only planning to look after its own, the wider clutch of credit unions will be community-centric and less aggressive than their payday-loan competitors. This follows the Archbishop’s recent broadside against the bonus culture within big banks, in which he instructed C of E fund managers – many of whom are employed at Board level in the financial services – to vote against any corporate bonus policies that pay bosses more than 100% of their salaries.

Somehow, Professional Manager can’t imagine Rowan Williams or George Carey doing or saying any of this.

Still, these signs of a Church increasingly taking a leadership role against the financial sector’s bullishness by highlighting its effects on everyday lives has done little to deter the satirists – such as this wry piece from The Daily Mash, which suggests that Welby may have skipped that bit in the Bible about Jesus getting rather angry with money lenders…

Image of city entrance to Canterbury Cathedral courtesy of Shutterstock