In my last post, I suggested that the way power operates in the Church of England has some similarities to a system of government in an Eastern European communist regime. Two centres of power seem to exist. One is equivalent to a central politburo, a hidden cabal of power answerable only to itself. The other is a parliament-type structure which is the public face of power. Here the power that it possesses is at best merely advisory. We should be careful not to press this analogy too far, but there has recently been some evidence of conflict between a powerful central Church executive and members of Synod. This has been over a proposed amendment to a proposal in General Synod connected with a safeguarding debate due to take place tomorrow morning (Wednesday 12th).
Let us retrace our steps so we can understand better this power conflict as it is currently being played out. As things stand currently, there does seem to be a state of calm and unanimity between both sides. In preparation for the current Synod meeting in Westminster, a proposal about safeguarding was sent out to members in preparation for the debate due to take place tomorrow morning (Wednesday). The paper, officially entitled GS 2158, contains the official Church response to the recommendations of IICSA. IICSA had made five recommendations as part of its reports to the Church. The Archbishops’ Council, having studied these reports, is signifiying its intention to pursue these recommendations in full. Although GS 2158 is an important document, it does not really engage with some of the issues that survivors and their supporters are looking for from Synod. Several proposed amendments to GS 2158 were lodged by a group of Synod members with managers of Synod and these were also placed on this blog by David Lamming on February 5th . It was an attempt by the authors to move the debate on from the rather dry committeesque language of the original AC proposal to something that contained a real sense of emotional engagement with the topic and the survivors themselves. Among its ideas, it wanted the notion of lament to be expressed. It also suggested that the Church’s response might mirror the response of the Blackburn diocese to the IICSA findings. This Blackburn document, examined on this blog last year, had genuinely tried to give a real sense of the need to honour survivors and respond to them appropriately. The Lamming et al. amendment also called for concrete proposals to help survivors, while allowing Synod the power of oversight for ensuring that the task of care actually took place.
We then heard, in the middle of last week, that the members’ amendment to GS 2158 had been overruled. For a day or so it looked as if Synod was to be in direct conflict with Synod business managers for reasons that were not immediately evident. Then last Friday it was announced that the new lead Bishop for Safeguarding, Jonathan Gibbs, had ‘rescued’ the Lamming proposal and had succeeded in getting a version of it on the agenda for the debate that is to happen tomorrow on Wednesday. Jonathan Gibbs, Bishop of Huddersfield, is a fresh face in the Safeguarding world. Although he is not a Diocesan bishop, he is, by all accounts, someone whose loyalty is above all to issues of justice alongside the pastoral and practical care of survivors. He is also, as the lead safeguarding bishop, the chair of the National Safeguarding Steering Group. The amendment goes as follows: The Bishop of Huddersfield to move the following amendment– ……..(b) welcome the statement in paragraph 4.1 of the response that the National Safeguarding Steering Group (NSSG) “remains committed to ensuring that words of apology are followed by concrete actions”; (c) urge the NSSG to bring forward proposals to give effect to that commitment that follow a more fully survivor-centred approach to safeguarding, including arrangements for redress for survivors; (d) request that the NSSG keep the Synod updated on the development and implementation of responses to recommendations relating to the Church of England that are made by the Inquiry, including by submitting a report for debate by the Synod not later than July 2021.”.’
Although the original Lamming amendment has been substantially shortened, there are in this proposal some decisive changes of mood to be discerned. The NSSG as a body, hitherto beyond the direct control of Synod, is now being made accountable to them in this proposal. It will be hard for the NSSG to be able to ignore Synod when it has been ‘requested’ both to adopt a survivor-centred approach and also keep the Synod updated on the progress of the ‘concrete actions’ that are expected.
To use the analogy of the previous blog post, the parliament of the communist country is flexing its muscles and demanding power back from the old guard in the central politburo. To use another analogy, the ice is breaking and the thaw, long awaited for by survivors, has begun. That Jonathan Gibbs’ proposal has reached the agenda at all does suggest a hidden palace revolution. The NSSG represents the establishment in the Church with only senior church leaders and legal representatives as members. There are no survivors present. Now that this group is being required to put survivors at the centre, it is hard to see that they can stop the atmosphere changing decisively. The establishment point of view, which could be summed up briefly by uttering the mantra ‘preserve the assets and the institutional reputation above everything else’, has to change. If Bishop Jonathan Gibbs is successful, a revolution at the centre to serve survivors far better, has begun.
Tomorrow, General Synod is likely to pass an amendment containing the following words. Each of them will be sweet to the ears of survivors. Apology, concrete actions, a more fully survivor-centred approach to safeguarding, redress for survivors, request that the NSSG keep the Synod updated, implementation of a report for debate.
I hope that some of those who read this will be able to watch the streamed debate from Synod on Wednesday 12th February. By any measure it will be one of the most important in the hitherto tortuous history of safeguarding practice in the Church of England to date.
Whereas on the other hand, from the outside, I see a relentless sniping by Welby at users of social media.
He himself continues to use distraction, in the mainstream media, at alternative issues (of undoubted importance of course).
The attempt to silence the voices of survivors in this way, doesn’t suggest that very much has changed at the top.
As ever, I would be delighted to be wrong about this.
It was clear during this morning’s General Synod debate on the IICSA recommendations that very many people on Synod have got the message. There were powerful speeches from the heart.
During the debate Andrew Graystone in the gallery held up a sign saying ‘Lambeth Palace Library £23.5 million. Redress for survivors £0.0’. This was omitted from the live feed but picked up by two members in their speeches.
Synod has voted unanimously to accept the IICSA recommendations and the amendment, and generous redress for survivors has been promised. We have been assured the funds will be made available.
This feels like a landmark day. There will be some rowing back of course – but we’re going to hold them to this.
You write about legality, scrutiny, testing, law, proof. This is completely inappropriate for this blog. This is a meeting place for victims and not a place for you to cross examine them. For goodness sake show some sensitivity and compassion.
Do you have any conception whatever about people’s feelings and the mental and psychological damage done to them through abuse?
Just saying…….
Thanks, Hare. Chris is convinced that there are few real cases of abuse, and we aren’t going to change his mind.
That is certainly very inaccurate, and of course one does not know the mind of another.
‘Abuse’ is of course a vague word and sometimes deliberately and conveniently so. Further, ‘many ‘ and ‘few’ are utterly vague words too. How long is a piece of string? But in terms of how many cases of this nature are probably out there which would result (or have already resulted) in a conviction in a court of law, I would guess many and not few. That point has little to do with the other points I made, however. My comments have run out.
Shell. You do not seem to understand the difference between reasoned supportive discussion and comments that can be read as offensive and upsetting. Please understand that this is a place of ‘safety’. Some who visit this site are vulnerable and I make it my business to protect them from unhelpful and potentially hurtful remarks. If you cannot operate according to this principle, I shall have to take steps to close the site to your participation.
Hare, a belated thank you. After an emotional day I had been upset by Christopher’s post. I felt a response was needed but didn’t know what to say.
Christopher has yet to show us the the is capable of compassion or empathy, or regret when he hurts people. It’s interesting that he makes these comments in what he knows to be a safe space for vulnerable survivors, rather than in the more open forums of Thinking Anglicans or Archbishop Cranmer, even when they are dealing with the same topic.
Of course. But then we are operating with trifurcated definitions. ‘Victim’ may mean actual victim, proven victim, or claimed victim. These are not the same in every instance, yet they are being collapsed into one. The same applies to ‘survivor’. It is a human instinct to want to inhabit a narrative where oneself is 100% in the right and someone el is 100% in the wrong. That will sometimes be accurate. Equally, sometimes it will be selective. Wanting to surround oneself with those who share one’s own narrative or version of events (which will sometimes be 100% accurate and at other times not) is understandable but there will be times where it is not honest. Christians have more traditionally and justifiably inhabited the place where they value both truth and honesty and 360-degrees accuracy, which pays due attention to all the data in a non-selective way, including shortcomings and possible guilt within oneself, and does not portray people in a 100% wrong/right way. The danger is that if one says ‘I am right and my enemy is wrong’ and surrounds oneself only with those who affirm that (generally without knowing the facts) it is a nice place to be, but not one conducive to maturity.
Pleased that something positive sounding came from Synod and as one speaker rightly said it is the hope that kills not the despair, so after that to make a total u-turn would be a disaster.
I do not quite understand what ‘redress’ means though. The church can chuck all the money they can at me but unless they remove my abuser from the parish a few mintes down the road that they moved him too it won’t make any difference to my distress. I will still see him in the town. Redress has to be about so much more than money it has to be about bringing people to proper justice but I doubt it will be. Also I appreciate IICSA is about children but there should be a compulsion to send internal safeguarding reviews of abusers of vulnerable adults to adult services. Abusing someone with profound learning/ mental health difficulties, yet who is by law an adult, is every bit as concerning as child abuse.
To be honest, Trish, abusing anyone is wrong. There is something particularly horrifying about hurting a child. But, I know you’ll agree, hurting anyone is wrong. And, while sex abuse is worse, other forms of abuse are still awful, and can cause massive harm. Let’s hope and pray.
Totally agreed Athena, it would have been good if a commitment to properly funded clergy supervision had come out of the recommendations. This is routine practice in the Methodist church and would now be for any secular job where there is a high level of interaction with people in need, including vulnerable staff. I am trying to make sure that clergy supervision is a major recommendation from my lessons learnt review and would like to feel the diocese was compelled to send it to a secular body for scrutiny rather than just stuffing it in a drawer.
Lions and leopards.
At the risk of introducing a third metaphor, we should be careful not to let this become a Chamberlain moment.
Abuse is carried out by people who wish to control others. Vulnerability is exploited. Children are obviously more vulnerable because they are little, but we are all potentially vulnerable. If your job or calling depend on him, you are vulnerable to exploitation by him.
It took several decades formally to report some of my school abuse. This time lapse is typical I gather.
There was sexual abuse, physical abuse and emotional abuse. I was too young and naive to understand the sexual abuse. The physical assaults, rather like the descriptions given by survivors of Smyth and Fletcher, had more impact, not on me physically because I managed to avoid the most brutal assaults. No, the worst effect for me personally, was the emotional impact of witnessing others being hurt. This is was what penetrated my head.
Fear.
Fear affected the rest of my life. In particular, in late teenage and young adulthood, it affected the choices I made, my big life decisions. Fear hid behind most of these.
Curiously I was not the beneficiary of my own decisions. Odd that, looking back.
Once your eyes are opened to what was done to you, you begin to see, slowly at first, but with increasing clarity as time moves on, exactly what is being done to others. And in the name of Christ.
Who is the roaring lion we are to beware? Jesus, Himself, generally pointed out the Church leaders as to be the ones to watch out for.
Can a leopard change his spots? I don’t think so.
Those of us steeped in the Church of England from birth, will have great difficulty not wanting to see the best in her. The long tradition of tolerating, concealing and denying systemic abuse at all ages, will not disappear overnight.
Assuming the lion was tamed in the late 1930s was a critical mistake.
I believe the war against corruptive practice in our Church will eventually be won. Even when it is, keen vigilance will need to be maintained to prevent a reoccurrence.
We are nowhere near there yet.
Your post hits several nails on the head. I was at a C of E primary school in the 1940s and early 1950s where we lived literally in terror of a sadistic headmaster. There was also totally spurious ‘punishment’ by one teacher which, as an adult, I have since realised had sexual elements, but, like you, simply did not recognise or understand at the time. Then later at grammar school there was a PE master (yes, I realise these are now out of date terms) who abused nearly all of the junior school – ‘mild’ abuse – touching after showers, the excuse being that he was checking that we had dried ourselves properly. He disappeared overnight when the headmaster found out.
I have told this before on a previous thread. The PE ‘touching’ was objectionable, but now, at the age of 78, I am plagued by memories of the earlier experiences at primary school – a violent physical assault at the age of six or seven, and the later punishments for the teacher’s sexual gratification. On the earlier thread, I was told that one had to get over these things, but I’m afraid that I haven’t succeeded. Something triggered the memories, probably awareness of what had really happened. I particularly resent that it was at a Church school. There was gross injustice to young children, not just myself.
Well, I guess you do. Let me guess who told you to get over it? Anyway, you’re entitled to help and support to do so. And if you’ve had a bad memory triggered, that’s not something you’ve done to yourself. I’m not a shrink, but talking always helps. And I find, so does getting angry! Unfinished business, I call it. It doesn’t have to dominate your life to niggle. I bet there are other guys at the man cave, bridge club or walking football group you go to who remember nasty teachers from way back when. I do, too. Or jump in and go to the GP and ask for counselling! It could help a lot.
Thank you for those kind words. I agree with Steve Lewis that there has been a change for the better and I’m more optimistic for today’s young people being educated in happier and healthier school environments. Baroness Warnock is a heroine of mine for being principally responsible for abolition of corporal punishment in primary schools.
Thank you Rowland for this and I find it disturbing but somehow reassuring to hear such a similar experience.
We were taught to ignore our feelings. You can’t of course. They simply disappear only to surface in other problems later in life.
Only recently has trauma been recognised as causing lasting damage to abuse victims in the form of complex post traumatic stress disorder. For me, hyper vigilance has been an ongoing issue and flashbacks. These, and other symptoms of CPTSD originally had some survival value, but no longer obviously and now intrusive.
Three separate therapists missed this in me.
My own studies have helped understand what went wrong, the “getting stuck” in the trauma. Others here have suggested eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR) and I’ve been doing a few homemade experiments on myself before trying a professional.
Change has occurred for the better, I can report. Currently a work in progress!
As an aside, a good few years ago I had an Office Manager role with 15 bright young things notionally under my charge. There was a wide age gap between us, and what struck me powerfully was this: They had no fear.
I’m sure they have their own particular challenges, the young, but I realised then how different our schoolings probably had been. I was thankful then as I am to you for your valuable contribution.
Thanks, Steve. Now you guys are making me think! I remember always being frightened of, well, being late, say. Really frightened I mean. I have absolutely no idea what I thought was going to happen! I thought perhaps I was just terribly sensitive. But I’m now wondering about the long term effects of bullying. It was common, wasn’t it?
If the level of fear/anxiety etc in the present situation is way out of proportion, it is sometimes possible to spot a time in the past where bullying was occurring, re-experienced now in the present.
Often it takes someone else to spot this, for example a good therapist, if you can find one.
Society is “hot” on bullying now, but it was endemic when I was growing up.
I know a little about what you mean about lateness. I found myself getting stressed about being late for a deadline I had set myself and no one else even knew about!
Each of us has our own unique variations on a theme. I’m still trying to figure mine out! All the best with yours EA!
Thanks. And yours.
We also witnessed brutal punishments of other children. One of them was my closest boyhood friend. The witnesses were both boys and girls, as these things were done in public. It’s best not to dwell on what effect this had on the onlookers. Thank God, as you say, that today’s young people aren’t injured and repressed in this way.
I agree Steve, fear is debilitating it makes someone under achieve, never reach their full potential, be the person they could have been if circumstances had not been abusive but loving.
Thank you for your post, in amongst all the headlines about millions having to be spent and is this the tide changing I have felt quite down. I think that is because solutions seem one dimensional, I dont want their money I want to loose the fear that makes me only apply for jobs that are low paid and manual because I have no sense that I am worth anything more. I want to earn my own money, to be the person I know I could be if I was not consumed by fear. Years of counselling have not changed that and a hand out will reinforce my sense of worthlessness. Solutions need to be as unique and individual as every survivor is.
I am very touched by your post, Trish. I’ve experienced this fear, too. I have to say, I’d take their money like a shot! But then, I no longer have to find a job. All the best.
Trish, what a heart rending account but so exactly how this works.
Indeed, this is true, and the church will make a huge mistake if it enacts the payment of money as another expression of the power imbalance between church and individual, or if the dominant culture of the Church regrets the “waste” of money “not on mission” or the cost – the cost has already been paid by those who have been abused. It will not be enough to say “we have paid a lot of money, therefore all is well”. Apart from anything else that is also the mantra of Government at the moment – faced with inadequate funding of various social goods, the answer is “we’re spending a lot of money on it” (the indicated response is “we noticed how much you are spending, and it isn’t doing the job”).
How reparations are enacted will be a very important part of whether the next phase measures up to the quality of compassion required. In particular it will take some skill and care to ensure that those to whom compensation is paid retain agency in the processes involved.
Trish: thank you very much indeed for your remarks, which are as cogent as they are moving.
I imagine that a great many victims, like yourself, have had their confidence shattered by the abuse they have suffered. Naturally, the Church should be providing an effective pastoral response; I am not certain that it has done so; if it cannot do so, it has no business being in business. Although I am heartened to have been proven wrong about Synod this week, the grudging, piecemeal, bureaucratic, evasive, equivocal and half-hearted responses from the Church to date have raised serious questions about its ability to provide an effective pastoral response and suggest that there is a very serious principal/agent problem as between the clerisy and the people they purport to serve.
What I think the Church does owe its victims, as a key part of its pastoral response (and as evidence of its bona fides and that expressions of its tenderness to victims are not merely sweet nothings) is a decent provident fund. Many victims will have lost significant earnings they might have garnered had their personalities not been adversely affected by abuse. It is a long established principle of English (if not also pre-Conquest) law that an adverse impact upon the body should be recompensed proportionately (you can even see scales of compensation if you look at a textbook on personal injury law like Kemp & Kemp); psychological scars can be no less grievous than physical scars.
In short, what I feel victims are owed is security: that can mean financial as well as emotional security. As I see it, financial support and pastoral support are two sides of the same coin; the emotional and spiritual care you and others are owed, I feel, must be underpinned by giving you economic recompense: the latter adds meaning/value to the former.
You mention the difficulties you have had in the labour market. Judging by the depth and feeling of many of the posts filed by victims on this blog you and others are obviously (if you will forgive the impertinence) very intelligent people. It might be argued that, had you not been abused, you/they would have flourished quite differently; it might not necessarily have led to your/their having a better standard of living, but the probability is that it would have done so.
From a financial perspective what victims are owed, is a goodly reduction in the economic anxieties that have been engendered by the long shadow that the abuse they have suffered has cast over their lives. The Church ought to have arranged this some time ago as a matter of course and as evidence of its capacity to express love to its people; that it has not done so, and as it has had to be dragged into a commitment by nem con resolutions of its own Synod, indicates to me that there is a pastoral void in its bureaucratic heart; it will be moved to do the right thing by dint of embarrassment.
Please accept my apologies for putting things this way.
Sounds of cheering over here, Froghole! Thank you from the bottom of my heart. My life would have been very different if I had been treated decently. Had I had a fraction of the positive support I have seen given to some favoured ones, I’d be Archbishop of Canterbury by now! Favouritism is a form of abuse, because it is a form of bullying. Just like being the plain girl that never got the good job.
Very many thanks, English Athena! That is very (and characteristically) kind of you. I very much hope and pray you get the redress you ought to have. Very best wishes.
Thank you Froghole you have put things very well. Once I had written my post I felt bad, low paid manual workers are on the whole dignified people who work incredibly hard to make ends meet, I am not ashamed of what I do but I have done a lot of training courses, even done an OU degree, to put them to no use because of fear, because what I was told throughout my childhood, that I was useless and bad, became so deeply ingrained I cannot move past it. Redress by way of money has its place, particularly for those in later life where earning an income is not an option but if the church thinks only in those terms, if survivors think only in those terms something fundamental about human dignity will be lost.
The story of Robert wanting to sing at evensong, told at Synod really resonated with me. I was a verger, just a small time parish one, weddings, funerals and registers but with that job my confidence grew, I even took my first faltering steps to explore my female identity by wearing a dress. Clergy abuse on top of childhood abuse ended that job abruptly, ended my newly found confidence abruptly. If only the church had understood that and taken steps to help me not lose those newly found feelings I may still have found the confidence to apply for jobs which used my intelligence. It would have meant so much more to me than an offer of money.
All survivors are different, all our stories are different we must not be lumped together in an homogenous group is all I am really saying but I do understand and thank you for your comment.
I was a Cathedral verger. It’s a wonderful job, and the archetypal servanthood ministry. But always viewed as a low caste job. So sad. I’m so sorry you’ve had so many knocks, Trish. Have you considered joining the Vergers’ Guild as a retired/associate member? We make great company!
Thanks Athena, I didn’t know there was a Guild but being reminded of that time in my life is too painful to do too often. However anyone else views the role of verger it was for me everything, my route out of fear, a stepping stone to becoming the person I believed I could be, so when it was ripped away from me I also lost everything. I gave up, I resigned myself to not even trying anymore. If only the church had cared enough to find out what redress would have looked like for me at that stage of my life.
It is true, like many people that visit this blog my life has not been the easiest but it is also the nature of the blog that we share the difficult moments more than the positive ones but i have enjoyed many of those too
Just catching up with everyone’s post and so thankful for the powerful conversations that happen here. Also sad to hear about how others have suffered, I really hope that we all get the help that we need to no longer live in fear, or with whatever other devastating consequences of abuse and bullying. The fear is such a huge thing, I find fear, shame, a sense of worthlessness and lack of self-love are the most common impacts shared by many survivors.
V important point about no favourites and not a culture of ‘handouts’. Survivors need to reclaim agency as abuse took our power away. And no-one can ‘fix’ or ‘recover’ me , I have to navigate my own recovery journey, but they can lend me a boat, and charts, maybe volunteer as crew, catch my lines, take the wheel when I need a break..
I think redress is an important political battle to have won, & only when church puts money where it’s mouth is will survivors know we have been taken seriously. But agree there is a danger that they think money is enough.
My core group meets on Friday and I am writing them a letter, asking them to engage with me in a restorative justice approach. I remembered a favourite quote from A. McFayen, “guilt is the responsibility for the joy of all, before the Lord of all”. The goal has to be restoring joy. Money may be needed to do that, if I am homeless or impoverished, or for counselling or anything restorative…but so many other things are needed too. Compassion, relationship, acknowledgement, justice, safer practices, cultural change, lamenting, apology, consequences, trauma-informed practice, repentance etc etc.
Anyway I wish you all joy, from the bottom of my heart.