Archbishop of Canterbury Finally Speaks Up On Uganda’s Kill the Gays Bill

12/13/09-by Paula Brooks 300px-Rowan_Williams_-_by_Brian
In an interview with Britain’s Daily Telegraph, The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, has condemned (sort of) Uganda’s proposed, “Kill the Gays Bill”.

In the Telegraph interview Williams said…

“Overall, the proposed legislation is of shocking severity and I can’t see how it could be supported by any Anglican who is committed to what the Communion has said in recent decades,” says Dr Williams. “Apart from invoking the death penalty, it makes pastoral care impossible – it seeks to turn pastors into informers.” He adds that the Anglican Church in Uganda opposes the death penalty but, tellingly, he notes that its archbishop, Henry Orombi, who boycotted the Lambeth Conference last year, “has not taken a position on this bill”.

via Dr Rowan Williams: taking a break from Canterbury travails – Telegraph.

Williams came under fire last week from progressive members of the Anglican Church for “failing to exercise moral leadership to protect gays and lesbians in Uganda,” while instead expressing concern over the election of the churches second openly gay bishop, Reverend Mary Glasspool, by the diocese of Los Angeles.

This past Wednesday, a Facebook group was set up by Susan Russell, former president of Anglican gay group Integrity, which called Williams to task about his statement on Glasspool and the fact he has been slow to condemn the proposed anti-gay legislation in Uganda. That Face Book group currently has over 4,000 members.

Last week President Barack Obama, The US State Department, and the Governments of France and the UK all officially expressed concern over the bill that could have sentenced gay Ugandans to execution, or life in prison, and people who ‘aid or abet’ them to 7 years imprisonment, prompting the Ugandan legislature to drop executions and life imprisonment from the anti-homosexuality bill.