Members of a gay and lesbian activist group disrupted a photo session at Lambeth Palace, the residence of the Archbishop of Canterbury, on April 20.

Anglican Communion News Service reported about 10 persons scaled the walls and entered the gardens while the archbishop, the Most Rev. George Carey, was escorting dozens of bishops and other church leaders from various parts of the Anglican Communion around the grounds.

The dignitaries were present for St. Augustine's Seminar, the preparatory meeting for the 1998 Lambeth Conference, and photos were being taken when the intruders arrived.

The news report said the extremists ran in front of the cameras, pushing, shouting and waving placards in front of the archbishop, and making negative comments about Anglicans' relationship with the gay community.

Archbishop Carey asked the intruders to leave, but they persisted "for at least 10 minutes in their shouting."

"The archbishop's view is that this sort of illegal and disruptive behavior is unacceptable and does not make a significant contribution to this or any other debate," a spokesman for Lambeth Palace said.

The incident occurred on the same day that a final segment of a TV series called "Archbishop " was shown on British television. In the series, Archbishop Carey expressed the Church of England's position on sexuality and the clergy. The Most Rev. David Hope, Archbishop of York, also appeared in the series, discussing how Outrage attempted to intimidate him regarding his personal life in 1995 when he was Bishop of London.