Archbishop Asked to Recant Views on Sex

A band of prominent evangelicals in the Church of England has demanded that Archbishop Rowan Williams either recant his liberal views on homosexuality or resign as the next archbishop of Canterbury even before he takes the post.

Williams, the archbishop of Wales who is scheduled to succeed George Carey in the Canterbury archbishopric, is in hot water with church conservatives over his perceived support for gays, including his admission that he has ordained a practicing homosexual.

Reform, a 1,500-strong conservative evangelical network, issued a statement saying Williams should either affirm publicly the Anglican Church’s traditional teaching that all sex outside marriage is sinful, or step back from the Canterbury post.

The Rev. Richard Kirker, general secretary of Britain’s Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement, denounced Reform’s action: “The presumptuous, self-righteous tone ... will, I suspect, make them even more isolated than they already are in the Anglican Church.”