Rowan Williams (born 1950) is the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury, a theologian, poet and lecturer.

Rowan Williams was born in Swansea, Wales, into a Welsh-speaking family. He has taught theology at the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge, where he was Dean of Clare College.

In 1991 he was elected Bishop of Monmouth, and in 1999 he was made Archbishop of Wales. In 2002 he was announced as the successor to George Leonard Carey as Archbishop of Canterbury in the Church of England and, therefore, leader of the Anglican Communion. He was enthroned on February 27, 2003.

Williams's selection as Archbishop was controversial; some evangelical Anglicans regard his opinions on the ordination of women as bishops and on homosexuality as excessively liberal. For the most part, however, his theology is generally considered to be orthodox.

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