Lord Carey’s banning

SIR – Charles Moore (Comment, July 8) discusses the way in which the case of Lord Carey of Clifton, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, has been handled. I believe the case raised another question. What guidelines should be set out for a Church of England bishop or archbishop taking disciplinary action in such a case?

What precisely does asking a bishop or other cleric to step down include? Ordinations, confirmations, marriages, funerals, celebrating Holy Communion, saying a prayer or reading a lesson in a church, being the patron of a Christian charity?

What process should a bishop follow in reaching such a decision? Does such a decision apply for a limited period? What rights of reply and challenge does the person who is being asked to step down have?

In the light of the Church’s determined efforts to tackle child abuse in its own back yard, problems with the way decisions have been made regarding Lord Carey, and previously regarding a former Bishop of Gloucester and former Archbishop of York, not to mention Bishop Bell, suggest that this whole area needs to be seriously re-examined.

It is surely not right that an archbishop should be judge and jury in such a decision and the defendant seemingly given no right of reply. Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach London SW3