The Telegraph blogs vary in quality. Urmee Khan’s, linked in Esmerelda’s post here, is abysmal – she is a taqiyya-toting Muslimah who can’t write. At the top end, there is Holy Smoke, the blog of Damian Thompson, Telegraph leader-writer and editor-in-chief of the Catholic Herald.

Thompson might be expected to be critical of the Anglican Church. He does play for the opposition, after all. But his criticisms are justified. Three stories show that the Archbishop of Canterbury has got his priorities wrong.

Here is the first:

In their "Reflections" on the Lambeth Conference, the 650 Anglican bishops attending have expressed solidarity with the plight of Australian Aborigines but made no direct mention of the current vicious persecution of Christians by Muslims.

[...]

No doubt the bishops would explain that they might make things worse for Christians being daily beaten up, imprisoned and forcibly converted in Islamic countries if they were to draw attention to the fact. I think that's baloney. If the bishops of Nigeria were present, I bet the "Reflections" would mention the fact that Christians are treated like dirt in Islamic provinces of the country. I also suspect that the Pakistani-born Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali of Rochester might have had something to say if he weren't boycotting the conference.

Anyone would think that the Anglican Communion was headed by a man who actually favoured the extension of Sharia law in Britain. Oh, hang on, it is. 

And the second:

The revelation that Rowan Williams thinks gay relationships are "comparable to marriage" will have devastating consequences for his attempts to hold together the Anglican Communion. American Episcopalians will seize on his leaked letters as the perfect excuse to ignore the ban on same-sex blessings that Dr Williams supported at Lambeth.

Whatever Williams’ private views on gays and gay marriage, should this be a priority at the moment, when Christians are being persecuted all over the Islamic world? Anyone who cares about gay rights – not to mention Christianity - should be speaking out against Islam. As for the Australian Aborigines, isn’t some of their “plight”, like the “plight” of the “Palestinians”, self-inflicted?