Is Archbishop Rowan Williams credible? Or even truthful?

Shouldn't all abuse be condemned?

The Catechism of the Catholic, 2468, reminds us that: "Truth as uprightness in human action and speech is called truthfulness, sincerity, or candor. Truth or truthfulness is the virtue which consists in showing oneself true in deeds and truthful in words, and in guarding against duplicity, dissimulation, and hypocrisy."

Archbishop Rowan Williams should reflect very carefully on those words. For the Archbishop of Canterbury is now asserting that the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland has lost "all credibility" over the way it has handled cases involving the sexual abuse of minors. See here. This accusation is most ironic since it comes from an individual who has attempted to make a case for active same-sex relationships (see here) and who has argued that homosexual relationships are comparable to marriage (see here).

In its Instruction entitled "Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons," the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith teaches clearly that, "There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God's plan for marriage and family. Marriage is holy, while homosexual acts go against the natural moral law. Homosexual acts 'close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.' Sacred Scripture condemns homosexual acts 'as a serious depravity....This judgment of Scripture does not of course permit us to conclude that all those who suffer from this anomaly are personally responsible for it, but it does attest to the fact that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.'" (No. 4).

As the greatest of the Church Fathers of the West, and a great Doctor of the Church, Saint Augustine condemns homosexuality: "Those offences which be contrary to nature are everywhere and at all times to be held in detestation and punished; such were those of the Sodomites, which should all nations commit, they should all be held guilty of the same crime by the divine law, which hath not so made men that they should in that way abuse one another. For even that fellowship which should be between God and us is violated, when that same nature of which He is author is polluted by the perversity of lust." (Confessions, Book III, Chapter 8, no. 15; see here).

Here Saint Augustine clearly teaches that same-sex activity also constitutes abuse. How then can Archbishop Williams castigate the Catholic Church in Ireland for the way in which it dealt with the sexual abuse of minors when he condones another form of abuse: homosexual activity? Truthfulness is the virtue which guards against hypocrisy. If only Dr. Williams could remember that. Perhaps then his own moral authority would be more credible.

Related reading here.