The Cross of Christ and the Kingdoms of the World
The Rt. Rev. Rowan Williams gave sermons and addresses from Palm Sunday through Good Friday during Holy Week of 2017. You can listen to them all here.
Dr. Williams served as the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury from 2002 to 2012. He is currently Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge.
After a childhood in Swansea in Wales, Williams attended Christ’s College, Cambridge as an undergraduate. He received his doctorate in 1975 from Wadham College, Oxford, writing his dissertation on the Russian Orthodox theologian Vladimir Lossky. He was ordained to the diaconate in 1977 and to the priesthood in 1978, while serving at Westcott House in Cambridge, a theological college for students preparing for ministry.
After serving for six years as fellow and dean of Clare College, Cambridge, Dr. Williams was appointed Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at Oxford and residentiary canon at Christ Church Cathedral. While there he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Divinity and became a fellow of the British Academy.
In 1992, however, he left formal academic positions when he was called to be bishop of the Diocese of Monmouth in Wales, and then, in 2000, Archbishop of Wales. In 2002 it was announced that Bishop Williams would serve as the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury. In that role, Archbishop Williams acted as Primate of England and symbolic head of the Anglican Communion. He served in that capacity from 2002 to 2012, a decade that saw many difficulties within the Anglican Communion but to which he responded pastorally and prayerfully, urging unity with diversity.
As an academic theologian, Williams has written more than two dozen books, becoming widely recognized as one of the leading theologians in the English-speaking world. His most recent books of academic theology include The Tragic Imagination (2016), a collection of essays on Augustine (2016), and The Edge of Words: God and the Habits of Language (2014), his 2014 Gifford Lectures. Recent devotional and popular books include God With Us (2017), Being Disciples: Essentials of the Christian Life (2016), Meeting God in Paul: Reflections for the Season of Lent (2015), and others. His 2008 study of Dostoevsky, Dostoevsky: Language, Faith, and Fiction reflects his long-standing interest in literary criticism and religious aesthetics. He is also a noted poet and translator of poetry.
Dr. Williams is married to theologian Jane Williams and they have two children.
