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Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, has resigned after intense stress over his position within the Church of England’s failure to halt years of sexual and bodily assaults carried out by a baby abuser related to the establishment.
“Having sought the gracious permission of His Majesty the King, I’ve determined to resign as Archbishop of Canterbury,” Welby mentioned on Tuesday.
Welby mentioned that when he was knowledgeable in 2013 in regards to the “heinous abuses” carried out by John Smyth, a Christian barrister, he was advised that the police had been notified and he believed “wrongly that an applicable decision would observe”.
He added {that a} evaluate into the church’s dealing with of the allegations about Smyth by Keith Makin, launched final week, had uncovered a “long-maintained conspiracy of silence”.
“It is extremely clear that I have to take private and institutional duty for the lengthy and retraumatising interval between 2013 and 2024,” Welby mentioned.
Earlier on Tuesday, Sir Keir Starmer referred to as the revelations in Makin’s report “horrific”.
Talking in COP29 in Baku, the prime minister mentioned: “Let me be clear: of what I do know of the allegations, they’re clearly horrific . . . each of their scale and their content material. My ideas . . . are with the victims right here who’ve clearly been failed very, very badly.”
He added any resolution was “a matter, in the long run, for the church”.
