THE Archbishop of Canterbury has called on rich and poor alike to share in the hardships brought on by the financial crisis and cuts in public spending.
In his Christmas sermon, Dr. Rowan Williams urged people not to give in to the temptation of abandoning others to suffering, while they secure their own safety.
“How eager are we to find some spot where we feel safe from the pressures that are crippling and terrifying others. As has more than once been said, we can and we will as a society bear hardship if we are confident that it is being fairly shared,” he said.
Williams urged people to remember persecuted Christians around the world, particularly those in Zimbabwe who were suffering illegal arrests and lockouts from their churches by the authorities, Iraqi Christians facing extreme violence from fanatics and Asia Bibi, the first Christian woman in Pakistan to be sentenced to death for alleged ‘blasphemy’.
Urging people to join in letter-writing campaigns to ‘prisoners of conscience’, he said: “We may feel powerless to help; yet we should also know that people in such circumstances are strengthened simply by knowing they have not been forgotten.”
