Tough Love

If anything can rival the intellectual dynamism of the Anglican Church, that thing must surely be its moral authority, whose latest manifestation is an outcry over the Archbishop of Canterbury's excessively Christian behaviour towards a now deceased barrister with some convenient ready cash and a penchant for turned cheeks. By allowing the abuser to continue his little hobby, and by subsequently refusing to resign, the Archbishop has of course shown strict adherence to the teachings of Christ, which specify that within the Church the onus is upon victims to forgive their persecutors even unto the seventy-times-seventh dereliction, and that a single grovelling apology is worth more than a lifetime of righteousness. As a result, one bishop has expressed the fear that the Church may lose that staunch moral voice which has done so much for the life of the nation with its eternal displays of spiritual strength over the status of women and non-heterosexuals, and suchlike second-order human beings.