But the Church of England matters beyond the ranks of its practising adherents because it is the established church of this country.That is why those of other faiths and none have a stake in what Dr Williams says about homosexuality. It ought to be possible to accept further differences within a set of tolerant relationships.Ultimately, these are questions for the Church and not for observers from the outside. With its history, the Church of England ought to understand that reformation is a process, not an event.Nor is Anglicanism worldwide a unitary body. Indeed, it is already a complicated, multi-layered and illogical business.

But what of the large number of Anglicans and potential Anglicans who feel just as deeply that bigotry, homophobia and discrimination against homosexuals are contrary to the Christian message? What does Dr Williams's evasion say to the teenager confused by his or her sexuality except that homosexuality is wrong? Either gay people are treated as equals or they are not.It is not as if the Church has never changed - and found ways to accommodate a range of views within its bounds, as it has over the equally difficult question of women in the ministry. If a substantial part of the Anglican communion feels deeply that the change is wrong, they say, then it should not proceed. In church affairs, as in life, ecumenism is to be preferred to sectarianism; but it should not be an excuse for tolerating the intolerable.And, of course, the conservatives argue that the onus is on the reformers to make the case for change. Until then, are they to dictate to the rest of the Communion? Of course, unity is desirable, but it is not an end in itself. This was not because he would be a bad bishop, but because "on a major issue of this kind the Church has to make a decision together".To which the obvious rejoinder is, why should it? There is no prospect of the African churches accepting openly gay bishops in any part of the Anglican communion, and they are unlikely to change their view over any period shorter than a generation. Dr Williams went so far as to say he did not think Gene Robinson, the openly gay American canon, should become a bishop - although he is almost certain to be confirmed on 2 November.

"If the Church were ever to change its view," he said, "it would have to be because the Church as a whole owned it, not because any one person's conviction prevailed". In his interview yesterday on the Today programme, it was obvious that he was suppressing his personal liberalism for the sake of church unity. Curiously, in hindsight, his appointment reflected rather better on the Prime Minister, who had the confidence to appoint him despite such a sharp political disagreement. That confidence has not, however, been repaid. Dr Williams has allowed himself to be dragged back by institutional pressures to the besetting caricature of Anglicanism, that of temporising to try to avoid schism.Far from speaking with clarity on the issue of homosexuality, Dr Williams has lapsed into speaking like a politician, sticking to a line that he believes is in the interest of the Anglican communion as an organisation. When Rowan Williams became Archbishop of Canterbury, he was hailed as an excellent choice because he had the courage and the moral fluency to act as the conscience of the nation. It reflected well on him that he was prepared to speak out against the Iraq war, although his criticisms were muted once the tanks rolled in. People displaced by this trend will move into jobs where Britain has a global competitive advantage.

Nothing will be gained by trying to hold this process back - on the contrary, maintaining high employment in the long term depends on adjusting to it quickly.. Remember Ross Perot's warning in the 1992 US election campaign of a "giant sucking sound" as jobs were moved to Mexico? Similarly, the attempt by the Unifi trade union to scold HSBC for putting "profits before people" will go nowhere, because people understand that profits pay their wages.Unlike the 1980s, when the loss of manufacturing jobs added to record unemployment, the British economy is strong and can only benefit from the transfer of jobs to countries where they can be done more cheaply. Concern about job losses is therefore justified, and the vertiginous sense that there is nothing to stop huge numbers of jobs being transferred abroad is understandable.But attempts to stoke such fears are doomed to failure. Contrary to Norman Lamont's famous assertion that higher unemployment was "a price well worth paying", the loss of any job is a heavy price for any individual to pay. We know that videos of EastEnders or Coronation Street are flown to Bangalore so that telephonists there can banter with our less internationalist compatriots.What is significant about HSBC's announcement this week is therefore the scale of the transfer of jobs to India, China and Malaysia, not the principle.