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After facing mounting pressure, Justin Welby has resigned as the Archbishop of Canterbury over his failure to report prolific child abuser John Smyth. A damning independent review published last week found that Mr Welby and other church officers should have formally reported Smyth in 2013 to police in the UK and authorities in South Africa. Smyth was accused of attacking dozens of boys, including those he met at Christian camps, in the UK in the 1970s and 1980s. The barrister and senior member of a Christian charity then moved to Zimbabwe and later South Africa, where he abused up to 100 boys aged 13 to 17, the Makin review added.
It was not until 2017, after a Channel 4 documentary revealed details about Smyth’s abuse to the public, that police launched a full investigation. Smyth is believed to have continued his abuse in South Africa until his death in 2018.
Mr Welby had previously resisted calls to step aside over his response to the case since 2013. However, amid mounting pressure, he said in a statement on Tuesday he must take “personal and institutional responsibility”. The prime minister’s spokeswoman said Keir Starmer “respects the decision” to step down and his thoughts “first and foremost, remain with all the victims”.
The process of finding a replacement for the Archbishop of Canterbury is likely to take at least six months. A consultation, which is expected to last several months, will ask people both inside and outside the Church of England what they want from the next archbishop. While candidates cannot apply for the role, those chosen to be interviewed do not have to be from the Church of England and they do not have to be bishops. The candidates will then be interviewed by a committee, with a chair appointed by the prime minister.
Critics included Bishop of Newcastle Helen-Ann Hartley, who said Mr Welby’s resignation would “be a very clear indication that a line has been drawn, and that we must move towards independence of safeguarding”. Andrew Morse, a survivor of Smyth’s abuse, also called for Mr Welby to go, saying that he felt the archbishop’s admission that he had not done enough in response to the reports meant that both he and the Church of England had effectively been involved in a “cover-up”. The petition calling for his resignation, which accused the archbishop of “allowing abuse to continue” and said his position was “no longer tenable”, was signed by more than 14,000 people
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