clipped from www.telegraph.co.uk

Liberal churches that have abandoned traditional teachings on homosexuality are suffering from "spiritual Alzheimer's", a senior figure in the Vatican has warned the Lambeth Conference.

His outspoken comments will add to the pressure on liberal American and Canadian church leaders who have driven the worldwide Communion to the brink of schism by electing an openly gay bishop and by blessing same-sex unions, in defiance of centuries of tradition and guidelines agreed at the last Lambeth Conference.

They came just hours after the head of the church in Sudan, backed by Primates of 17 provinces in the developing world, demanded that the homosexual bishop of New Hampshire, the Rt Rev Gene Robinson, be sacked and that those who consecrated him "confess".

when we live myopically in the fleeting present, oblivious of our past heritage and apostolic traditions, we could well be suffering from spiritual Alzheimer's.