THE Archbishop of York has marked the 50th anniversary of the partial decriminalisation of homosexual acts in the UK.

Doctor John Sentamu yesterday released a joint statement with the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, to commemorate the 1967 act of Parliament which improved life for thousands of people in the country.

The 1967 act was opposed by then Archbishop Ramsey, who supported the Sexual Offences Act on behalf of the Church of England, but the modern church said times had changed.

In the statement, Dr Sentamu said: "In January 2016 the majority of the leading Archbishops of the whole global Anglican Communion - almost 80 million people in 165 countries - confirmed the longstanding view of the Communion that diminishing and criminalising homosexual people is wrong.

"The Church, not just the Church of England, but all those who follow Jesus Christ and whose lives are committed to his worship and service, has very often been defined by what it is against. It has condemned many things, and continues to do so, very often correctly, for example when they involve the abuse of the poor, or the weak, or the marginalised."

The Archbishops called for the Church to be recognised for what it loves, "not merely by what it condemns", and said"many homosexual people follow Christ, drawn to him by his love and his outstretched arms welcoming all those who turn to him".

They said: "Every single one of us needs to lay our burdens on Jesus. For every single one of us, the burden that is most onerous, most difficult to bear, is the burden of what the Bible calls our sin, our failure to live as we ought, our continued falling short of the mark. It is the universal characteristic of being human that we are sinners.

"Sin is not a characteristic of a particular group of people Sin is the same for all of us. And the challenge to take onto ourselves the obligation to be yoked with Christ, to bear the load he gives us, is the same for all of us. This day of anniversary of the 1967 Act is one when the Church in this land should be conscious of the need to turn away from condemnation of people as its first response. When we rightly celebrate what happened 50 years ago today, we do so best by turning to him and saying, "Yes, we take your yoke on our shoulders with you"."