On Tuesday, the Church of England issued an apology for its previous involvement with slavery on behalf of a linked financial organization that is currently working to make up with harmed communities.
“I am deeply sorry,” responded Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, the spiritual leader of the Anglican Church. “The time has come to take action in response to this shameful past.”
Following revelations that “the Church Commissioners’ endowment has historical ties” to the transatlantic slave trade in June 2022, a report was made public on Tuesday.
A donation from a fund created by Queen Anne in 1704 to aid the neediest clergy helped launch the Church Commissioners of England in 1948.
According to the investigation, this fund made “substantial” investments in the South Sea Company, which dealt in the trade of African slaves. Additionally, those connected to the slave trade and the plantation economy gave money to the organization.
“The Church Commissioners are deeply sorry for their predecessors’ ties to the transatlantic slave trade,” the organization said in a statement.
For “a better and fairer future for all,” the group has pledged a fund of 100 million pounds (113.1 million euros) over the following nine years.
Particularly “groups that have been touched by slavery” will receive this money. The money will be used in part to conduct additional study on the connections between the Church and slavery.
Bishop David Walker of Manchester, the Church Commissioners’ deputy chairman, stated that the group now aspires to leave a “lasting beneficial legacy that will help communities touched by slavery.”
To assist church and clergy activities, the Church Commissioners oversee a £10.1 billion (€11.4 billion) investment fund.
“Nothing we do, hundreds of years later, will restore the lives of enslaved people,” the Commissioners wrote in the introduction to their report.
“But we can and will acknowledge the horror and shame of the Church’s role in the slave trade, and through responses, we will seek to begin to address the injustices committed.”
As Britain deals with the fallout from its colonial past, the Church of England has already expressed regret for its historical affiliation with slavery.
It was deemed a “disgrace” by the church in 2020 that some of its members had “actively profited” from slavery.
