PORTSMOUTH, R.I. — The archbishop of Canterbury recently broke his church’s long silence on the religious beliefs of England’s foremost playwright — William Shakespeare.

During a presentation at the Hay Festival held in May in Britain, Rowan Williams lobbed his bombshell about the Bard: “I think he probably had a Catholic background and a lot of Catholic friends and associates.”

Archbishop Williams speculated that Shakespeare the man “wasn’t a saint.”...