Predictably enough, the serving bishops in the Church of England, led by Archbishop John Sentamu of York, are resisting moves to remove them from the House of Lords. In the main, their motives are selfless. They believe they have intervened effectively in the political process for decades, centuries indeed, representing other faiths, educators and our country's soldiers abroad, to mention just a few of the causes dear to their episcopal hearts. But in today's world, I believe, their presence there is sadly a regrettable anachronism.

When I defended establishment, this wasn't only, if at all, because Colin Buchanan was its most vocal opponent. Besides all the well-rehearsed arguments in its favour, I believed that having an established church in every parish in the land, with everything from its liturgies down endorsed by Parliament, was an important bulwark against extremism. We could never have a Waco here, because establishment militated against crazy fanaticism.

But the world, as we all know, has changed. The extremism has come alright, although not in a Christian form. It can now be argued that establishment actually cripples and compromises the Church at a time when she needs to be stronger than ever. 'Set all Free' is the slogan for the celebration of the abolition of the slave trade in the UK. The Church is backing this without understanding her own enslavement. It is understood that some slaves, in the more enlightened upper class establishments, didn't have such a bad time of it. 'Owners' knew that if they made their slavery comfortable, with nice robes to wear and other perks denoting wealth and status, they would be less likely to rebel. So it is with the Church.

Some might fear that if the Church is unloosed from her ties to the dock, she might sink, that she is a ship fatally holed by the present debate over gays, by lack of fidelity to the Gospel. And as I think I read somewhere, the present Archbishop of Canterbury is among those prelates who cannot swim. But despite these fears, I don't believe that the Church would sink, like the Titanic, or that she would take the leaders of the Global South with her into waters infested by liberal sharks.

My view is that of Lord Carey's, that disestablishment is needed to reinvigorate the Church of England and to restore her badly damaged credibility. True, her bishops would no longer have such influence over the legslative process. But this would then enable her to be even truer to the Gospel and properly to 'render unto Caesar'. It would also mean the Act of Settlement, with its inbuilt and outdated discrimination against Roman Catholicism, could be abolished. If the next King but one decided to marry a Catholic, it wouldn't matter one whit (or one whig) if he was no longer destined to be Supreme Governor of the Church of England.

One reason disestablishment has never been addressed is because successive Governments have believed it would only be possible if the Church herself wanted it. Even then, it could take up extraordinary amounts of Parliamentary time. But if done piece-by-piece, with the backing of the Church, it becomes a feasible proposition. And Lord Carey's support indicates the mood might be changing.

He told me: "If the Government go for a wholly elected second chamber it will present the chruch and nation with a major crisis. Why should the church submit to the Prime Minister's intervention in the appointment of bishops if they have no place in Parliament? If the church has any sense of pride it will push for disestablishment if the 100 per cent option wins the day. If other options prevail the Church should accept without complaining a drop from 26 bishops to say 16. After all, the presence of bishops is rarely more than 4 or 5. If bishops are excluded from the second chamber it seems to me that the next target will be the monarchy."

By this, he means outright abolition, although I think the Belgian model of a bicycling monarchy more likely, a vestigial House of Windsor sitting alongside a democracy rather than being usurped by a republic. That seems more the British way to me.

The Church has always had a problem with understanding how it is perceived by the world outside. In this she is no different from her Roman Catholic mother, where a failure to address the exponentially-widening credibility gap between teaching and practice could have even more serious long-term consequences, more serious because of her greater weight and thus importance on the international field. A loss of credibility over one generation can be borne. Over two or three, and people begin to ask, 'why bother', as declining attendances in the Church of England bear witness.

One of the less pleasant responsibilities of my job as a religion correspondent is to report church matters from the perspective of the wider, secular world. In other words, to tell it how it is. I don't like the fallout that often follows, and am not expecting an invitation to tea at Lambeth any time soon. But if the Government is successful in its reform of the Lords, the Church, as Lord Carey says, is going to have to face a few, hard facts about its own future in Britain. Otherwise it might indeed find itself with the holiest of holes in its bow, sinking to the bottom of the ocean. Carey speaks of a potential crisis and Anglicans here do indeed have reason to be worried. But I'll bet all those Episcopolians can swim. And I'll bet the marine scientist at the head of them is the strongest swimmer of all.

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