Why Paul Williamson Protested
After my previous article on the protest made at the service ratifying the election of Sarah Mullally to become Archbishop of Canterbury, the Reverend Paul Williamson, the protester who interrupted the service, wrote to me to explain why it was so important to him that the protest should be made.
I thought the perspective he brought to the event was important enough to warrant a further article reflecting his concerns. He explained his position further at length in an interview with Dan Wooton, which can be found here.
“Heckled then pushed down stairs!” New Archbishop of Canterbury Sarah Mullally’s confirmation drama
He pointed out that his frustration was based firstly on the fact that the Church made it extremely difficult for anyone wanting to lodge a serious protest to do so. The rules governing when and how a protest would be approved, whether it would be made admissible or public, were opaque, and every attempt he made to bring his documented concerns to the attention of the Church of England authorities was frustrated by them.
There is an arcane law stating that no objection will be countenanced if it takes place after the King has rubber-stamped the appointment. But no indication is given of the date when that is going to take place, and all Mr Williamson was told was that his attempt to lodge the protest was simply out of time and therefore inadmissible.
The Church of England gives the impression with serious admonitions in the liturgy, both at weddings and at ordinations, that if people protest because there is something wrong in what is taking place, it will be listened to. Mr Williamson makes the point that it is entirely unfair and institutionally improper to have different rules for the consecration of bishops and archbishops, particularly in circumstances where there is no openness about what those rules are, or at least no publicity.
The Safeguarding Failure at the Heart of the Protest
But the main source of his distress, and the reason for his objection, concerns a safeguarding failure that led to the suicide of a priest in the Diocese of London.
The facts behind this deeply tragic and lamentable death are as follows. A retired safeguarding officer compiled an informal set of notes as part of handing over his safeguarding material on clergy. This document became known as the “Two Cities” document because it related to the Diocese of London and the Diocese in Europe, between which there was some administrative overlap.
This document contained a wide variety of material describing a large number of clergy, with no attempt to distinguish rumour and gossip from fact. The writing was informal and unverified, and it contained a great deal of sensitive personal information. In this case, for example, it alleged that the Rev’d Alan Griffin had AIDS, used rent boys, and had unsuccessfully attempted suicide on two occasions.
The coroner ruled that there was no evidence to support any of the allegations against the Rev’d Alan Griffin, and that his subsequent suicide was rooted in the stress and distress caused by the gossip about him contained in the report, and the way in which it was circulated and mishandled.
The coroner described the case as a catastrophic safeguarding failure by the Diocese of London, which at the time was under the leadership of Bishop Sarah Mullally.
Bishop Mullally denied having read the report and claimed that she had passed it on to other officials.
Her critics claim that a diocesan bishop receiving a document of that gravity would be expected, by ordinary standards of leadership responsibility, at least to read an executive summary, to ascertain the nature and severity of its contents, and immediately to halt its circulation if it was unreliable. To say that it was received but not read led to the accusation that such a response was incongruous with episcopal duty, regardless of the merits of her claim that she was entitled to delegate the reading to others.
It was confirmed by the coroner that the document was full of inaccurate and harmful information. The fact that such a document, containing so many mistakes and misrepresentations, was retained and circulated within safeguarding systems is seen as constituting a serious misjudgement by the diocese primarily, but also, by implication, by the bishop in charge of the diocese.
Critics of Bishop Mullally have expressed scepticism about her claim that she did not read the “Two Cities” document. They argue that a document of such gravity would ordinarily require scrutiny, and that simply passing it on and delegating it to others represents an abrogation of responsibility.
The Coroner’s Findings
The findings of the coroner at the inquest identified three categories of failure:
- the creation and retention of unverified, inaccurate information;
- the inappropriate circulation of that information;
- the failure to safeguard the well-being of any individual named in the report (there were forty-two of them).
Those who want Bishop Mullally held accountable point out that the retention, circulation, and mishandling of false safeguarding information occurred under her episcopal authority and oversight. They complain bitterly, in light of the tragic suicide of the Rev’d Alan Griffin, in response to the accusations made against him, that it is seriously morally wrong for there to have been no meaningful accountability within the diocese, and that such responsibility ultimately rests with the diocesan bishop.
Paul Williamson’s justification for protesting at the moment he did is presented by him as a demand for that accountability, which he believes was otherwise entirely absent within the practice of the Church of England in general, and the Diocese of London in particular. He wanted justice for his dead colleague.
Questions of Competence and Authority
Sarah Mullally’s first career led to her rising to the top of the administrative branch of her nursing profession, and it was widely assumed that she must therefore have been a highly competent administrator.
The lamentable failures that led to the death of the Rev’d Alan Griffin in the case of the “Two Cities” document, combined with the complaints referred to in yesterday’s article by the victim of chemical sexual abuse, suggest that her reputation for the highest standards of administration was misplaced.
At the very least, critics point out that she presided over a safeguarding culture that was crippled by managerialism, risk avoidance, and procedural insulation.
These two scandalous safeguarding failures will persuade many that the Church has got it wrong in attempting to promote Sarah Mullally to the highest office within the Church of England.
Additionally, there is concern that she is so deeply committed to progressive values and ideology — values that many conservatives and traditionalists believe to be seriously at variance with Christian teaching and theology.
The Scope of Mullally’s Progressive Commitments
If we look at nine areas of progressive ideology — each of which causes conservative or traditional Christians serious concern — we can begin to grasp the scope and depth of Bishop Sarah Mullally’s progressive ideology, and the degree to which her episcopal ministry has been shaped by what is now commonly described as wokeness.
First: Abortion
On this issue Mullally’s position is explicit and unambiguous. She has consistently supported the liberalisation of abortion law in the United Kingdom, publicly welcoming the decriminalisation of abortion in Northern Ireland and endorsing the extension of abortion access under the rubric of “healthcare.” Her framing of abortion has been predominantly in terms of women’s rights rather than moral tragedy. For critics, this represents a decisive break with historic Anglican moral teaching, replacing a Christian theological anthropology — in which the unborn child is a moral subject — with the liberal prioritisation of individual autonomy.
Second: Same-Sex Marriage and LGBT Affirmation
This is the most central and controversial plank of Mullally’s progressive profile. She has been among the most prominent episcopal supporters of LGBT inclusion, strongly backing same-sex blessings in church and publicly affirming same-sex relationships as morally valid. Her support for the trajectory that culminated in Living in Love and Faith was clear, as was her criticism of opponents, whom she has described as pastorally harmful. Critics argue that here sexual ethics are treated as culturally contingent rather than doctrinally grounded, and that traditionalists are marginalised not through theological argument but through institutional pressure.
Third: Transgender Ideology and Gender Identity
Mullally has supported trans-affirming positions both within the Church and in public discourse. She has endorsed gender self-identification frameworks, supported the inclusion of trans clergy and laity without sustained theological interrogation of gender theory, and resisted rhetoric that questions contemporary trans ideology on the grounds that it may cause harm. For her critics, this signals a rejection of created sexual difference and a replacement of Christian anthropology with contested social theory.
Fourth: Slave Reparations
She has been a vocal supporter of institutional repentance and reparative justice, backing the Church of England’s reparations fund and endorsing language of institutional guilt for historic slavery, including support for wealth transfer framed explicitly in racial terms. Critics object that this approach treats moral responsibility as hereditary and racialised, replaces Christian repentance with identity-based collectivism, and flattens historical complexity — including the involvement of African elites in the slave trade itself.
Fifth: Feminism and Women’s Leadership Theology
As the first woman Bishop of London, Mullally has openly embraced feminist categories. She frequently frames opposition to women’s ordination as structural injustice and tends to interpret resistance through power analysis rather than sacramental theology. She has also shown little patience for sustained theological dissent on women bishops. Critics argue that this collapses theology into politics, treating doctrinal objections as prejudice rather than as serious theological claims.
Sixth: Safeguarding Maximalism
Mullally has strongly supported an expansive safeguarding regime within the Church. This includes prioritising risk aversion over evidential clarity, treating allegation as safeguarding fact pending review, and accepting systems that blur the distinction between accusation and guilt. Increasingly, critics argue that procedural justice has replaced moral justice, with clergy treated less as moral agents and more as institutional liabilities.
Seventh: Critical-Race-Adjacent Language
Although careful in her phrasing, Mullally has endorsed concepts closely associated with Critical Race Theory, including the language of “institutional racism,” diversity training grounded in systemic guilt, and alignment with secular racial-justice discourse. Critics argue that this imports secular ideological frameworks into ecclesial life rather than grounding justice in Christian moral teaching rooted in sin, repentance, and redemption.
Eighth: Climate Activism
She has supported strong climate advocacy, including Church divestment strategies, the use of “climate emergency” language, and framing ecological issues in morally urgent, quasi-political terms. Critics do not deny the legitimacy of environmental concern but argue that this reflects activism rather than theology, and risks instrumentalising the Church for political causes.
Finally: Synodality and Managerial Governance
Mullally consistently supports synod-led moral change, managerial oversight of doctrine, and process-driven authority rather than magisterial teaching. For critics, this amounts to a form of bureaucratic Protestantism: authority without truth, process without doctrine — governance substituting for teaching, and procedure replacing moral clarity.
Taken together, these nine areas do not represent isolated prudential disagreements. They form a coherent ideological pattern. What troubles her critics most is not merely that Mullally holds progressive views, but that those views consistently displace theological reasoning with political, managerial, or therapeutic categories — leaving the Church increasingly governed by consensus, compliance, and risk management rather than doctrine, sacrament, and moral truth.
Taken together, the issues outlined above raise a grave question about the wisdom of promoting Sarah Mullally to the highest office in the Church of England at precisely the moment when public trust in institutions — ecclesial, moral, and administrative — is at its weakest.
Is this an adequate profile for a leading Christian voice in a community?
Is this a remotely credible candidate for an Archbishop of Canterbury?
Conclusion
The problem is not simply that Bishop Mullally holds progressive views. The Church of England has always contained a range of theological and political instincts. The deeper difficulty is that her record exemplifies a pattern of leadership in which managerial process repeatedly displaces moral judgement, ideological alignment substitutes for theological reasoning, and procedural insulation replaces personal accountability. Nowhere has this been more painfully exposed than in safeguarding, where failures were not merely technical but human, and where the consequences were irreversible.
The Church of England is already struggling to persuade the nation that it can be trusted to speak in a way that is consistent with the faith if professes, to exercise genuine Christian moral authority, and to care for the vulnerable without ideological fear or dogmatic favour. In such circumstances to promote of a figure so closely associated with unresolved safeguarding failures and progressive ideological capture risks reinforces the public suspicion that institutional self-protection matters more than justice, truth, repentance or fidelity wo what has always, until the last few years, been understood to be Christianity.
This is not just a matter of sensible and responsible Church governance. There is a strong suspicion that the C of E, beginning with its appointments system, has fallen into the hands of ideological managerial fundamentalists whose judgements are deeply flawed.
The Archbishop of Canterbury is not simply a denominational figurehead. He (or she?) functions — however imperfectly — as a moral symbol to the nation. To elevate a leader whose tenure is marked by contested accountability, opaque governance, and a consistent alignment with elite progressive secular ideologies, is to widen the already dangerous gap between the Church and the people it claims to serve.
At a time when the country is looking for moral seriousness, transparency, and courage, the appointment risks signalling the opposite: despite its repeated inane rhetoric that after every crisis and every failure “lessons have been learnt” that the Church has learned little; and that it remains more comfortable marginalising orthodox dissent than confronting its own failures.
The cost of that choice will not be borne by the increasingly distrusted hierarchy alone, but by the credibility of the Church’s witness in a society that appears already to have drifted rapidly beyond its reach.
There are deeper implications for Catholics beyond lament that a Christian tradition has been captured and spiritually neutered. It constitutes a warning that the siren calls of feminism, wokery and progressivism lead into a spiritual cul de sac. Our progressives are trying the same repetoire of wokery, beginning with the incessant demands for women deacons. If we ever doubted, this is what the end of the process looks like. But it also constitutes a call to Catholics to resume they place in English society they held for over 1200 years, the conscience and care of the soul of this nation. There is a spiritual vacuum that needs to be filled.