The Lambeth Palace Library annual review for 2016 details its new accessions and completed cataloguing, and as in previous years I pull out some highlights for the period since 1945. They include:

(i) amongst the papers of the archbishops, recently catalogued are papers from a series of meetings of the primates of the worldwide Anglican Communion, from 1981 (Washington, D.C), 1983 (Nairobi), 1986 (Toronto), Cyprus in 1989 and in Northern Ireland in 1991. There are also four meetings of the Anglican Consultative Council included in the series. Given the stresses in the Communion that have emerged into plain view in the 1990s and since, these papers will be key to understanding the pre-history of those disputes.

(ii) also catalogued are papers from the second phase of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC) beginning in 1983, as are papers for the Roman Catholic section of the Council on Foreign Relations;

(iii) the CFR papers relating to the Russian Orthodox church are now also catalogued, covering the period from 1931 to 1981;

(iii) as a biographer, also of particular interest to me is a file of correspondence between Robert Runcie and the author of a rather indiscreet biography of him, Humphrey Carpenter; the book caused a minor sensation, much to Runcie’s discomfort.

(v) scholars of Anglican evangelicalism will be very grateful to see the completed cataloguing of the papers of Michael Harper, ecumenist and leading figure in the charismatic movement. The papers extend from 1961 to 2003.

They may all be found through the Library’s archive catalogue.