Justin Welby has failed in his constitutional duty to provide moral leadership over the John Smyth abuse scandal. He must resign, says James Price
Benjamin Franklin once joked that the only difference between Anglicanism and Catholicism was that: “the Church of Rome is infallible, whilst the Church of England is never in the wrong”. Revelations in recent decades have proven both of these to be untrue. Worse still for organisations that claim moral leadership in society, as well as in the hearts of men, the depths of their failings have included the very worst crimes one can imagine: the abuse of children.
Now a new report has concluded that the Archbishop of Canterbury, the senior primate, primus inter pares, His Grace, The Most Reverend and Right Honourable Justin Welby, knew about the worst child abuse scandal in the Church of England’s history, but didn’t report it.
In his own words: “The report is clear that I personally failed to ensure that after disclosure in 2013 the awful tragedy was energetically........