Visit of Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury

The new “archbishop” of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, enthroned in February 2003, has paid his first visit to Pope John Paul II. His predecessor, George Carey, visited the Vatican six times. Wishing to mark this first visit with a sign of deference, he knelt before the Pope and kissed his ring. It was then that John Paul II, keeping the hand of Rowan Williams in his, kissed his ring in return. (This, moreover, is the ring given by Paul VI to Michael Ramsay, one of Williams’ predecessors). Naturally, this act was praised by all manner of ecumenists who are rampant today.

It is, however, a grave act if we look closely, in the same way as kissing the Koran. Rowan Williams is nothing more than a layman, at the head of a church in rebellion against the authority of Our Lord Jesus Christ, a successor of Henry VIII, having a particularly degraded theology, partisan, amongst other things, in the promotion of homosexuals in the hierarchy, even if he realizes that he must not be too hasty if he does not want to provoke a schism in the Anglican communion (which, moreover, is happening, because of the consecration of an openly homosexual bishop of the Anglican Church in the United States). Kissing his ring is implicitly recognizing his authority over the faithful who follow him, and implies the validity of his priesthood, forgetting the letter of Pope Leo XIII, Apostolicae curae. These “little gestures” of the pope have done more for the promotion of false ecumenism and relativisation of the faith, than any great speeches.