LONDON – Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, the head Church of England and spiritual leader of the global Anglican Communion, resigned on Tuesday after an investigation found that he did not tell police about the serial physical and sexual abuse of a Christian summer camp volunteer as soon as he learned of it.

Pressure on Welby has mounted since Thursday, when the publication of the inquiry’s findings fueled anger about a lack of accountability at the highest levels of the church.

“It is very clear that I must take personal and institutional responsibility for the long and traumatic period between 2013 and 2024,” Welby said in a statement announcing his resignation. “I believe that stepping aside is in the best interests of the Church of England, which I love dearly and which I have been honored to serve.”

Helen-Ann Hartley, the Bishop of Newcastle, said on Monday Welby’s position was “untenable” after some members of the church’s national assembly started a petition calling for him to step down because he had “lost the confidence of his clergy”. .

But the loudest outcry had come from victims of the late John Smyth, a prominent lawyer who abused boys and young teenagers at Christian summer camps in Britain, Zimbabwe and South Africa for five decades. Andrew Morse, who was repeatedly beaten by Smyth over a five-year period, said the resignation was a chance for Welby to start repairing the damage caused by the church’s handling of historical abuse cases more generally.

“I think now is an opportunity for him to step down,” Morse told the BBC before Welby resigned. “I say an opportunity in the sense that this would be an opportunity for him to stand with the Smyth abuse victims and all the victims who have not been dealt with properly by the Church of England in their own cases of abuse.”

Welby’s resignation comes against a backdrop of widespread historic sex abuse in the Church of England. A 2022 report by the Independent Inquiry Into Child Sexual Abuse found that deference to the authority of priests, taboos around discussing sexuality and a culture that offered more support to alleged perpetrators than their victims helped make the Church of England “a place where abusers could hide.”

Welby’s supporters have argued that he has been instrumental in changing the culture of the church since becoming Archbishop of Canterbury in 2013.

But it was an investigation into the murders that began long before that date that ultimately led to his downfall.

The church on Thursday published the results of an independent investigation into Smyth, who sexually, psychologically and physically abused around 30 boys and young men in the UK and 85 in Africa since the 1970s.

The 251-page report of that investigation, known as the Makin Review, concluded that Welby did not report Smyth to the authorities when he was told about the abuse in August 2013, shortly after he became archbishop.

Welby last week took responsibility for not ensuring the allegations were pursued as “vigorously” as they should have been after learning of the abuse, but said he had decided not to resign.

On Monday, Welby’s office issued a statement reiterating that position and expressing its “horror at the scale of John Smyth’s flagrant abuse”.

Church officials were first made aware of the abuse in 1982 when they received the results of an internal investigation into Smyth. The recipients of that report “participated in an active cover-up” to prevent its findings from coming to light, the Makin Review found.

Smyth moved to Zimbabwe in 1984 and later moved to South Africa. He continued to abuse boys and young men in Zimbabwe and there is evidence that the abuse continued in South Africa until his death in August 2018.

Smyth’s abuse was not made public until a 2017 investigation by British television station Channel 4, which prompted Hampshire police to launch an investigation. Police were planning to question Smyth at the time of his death and were preparing to extradite him.

Stephen Cherry, dean of chapel at King’s College Cambridge, said Welby could no longer represent the people.

“There are circumstances where something happens where a person in a prominent leadership position essentially loses the confidence and the ability to do that really wonderful thing that someone like an archbishop does, who represents everybody at at one point publicly,” Cherry told the BBC before Welby resigned.

“And the pain in the victim community and the history of not listening to people and not responding to people who are deeply hurt by those in positions of power means that this is no longer a person who can fulfill the representative role of that office.”

Kirka writes for the Associated Press.