Archbishop of Canterbury's Presidential Address to General Synod, February 2007

[...] we should have done more on what it means to be a Catholic church; we should have done more on the use of Scripture. And, mindful of the full text of Lambeth 1.10, we should have done more about offering safe space to homosexual people – including those who have in costly ways lived in entire faithfulness to the traditional biblical ethic – to talk about what it is like to be endlessly discussed and dissected in their absence, patronised or demonised. Again and again we have used the language of respect for their human dignity; again and again we have failed to show it effectively, convertingly and convertedly. This is not just about our fear or prejudice. It is also because we live in an environment that knows nothing of proper reticence in the public exposure and discussion of certain vulnerable places in our humanity. And what then happens is that every attempt to ‘listen to the experience of homosexual people’ is easily seen as political, an exercise in winning battles rather than winning understanding. Remember that in different ways this is an issue for our engagement with any and every minority group – how to secure patience and privacy and the space to be honest without foreclosing the outcomes of discussion. [...]

I am commending the Primates’ communiqué, for all its inevitable imperfections, as representing a serious attempt to go beyond the surface problems and to give us some space to look at the underlying and neglected theological factors. I’m well aware of the way in which the imminence of the Lambeth Conference focuses some of the risks and choices. But I’m also aware of the continuing obstinate will to make the Communion work, and to work as some sort of properly Catholic and Reformed unity. Read more