Today a Pastoral Letter is being read in churches across the country. Here is a reply to the letter from one of those who have been affected by the recent hearings. It is presented here as a guest post and perhaps some of my readers will be able to identify with the sentiments. The opinions expressed belong to the author

Dear Brothers in Christ,

I’m writing in response to your ‘Pastoral Letter’. And, since Archbishop Justin has called for an end to clericalism and deference, I’m going to call you Justin and John. I know you’ll be happy with that.

So, Justin and John, I thought you might want to know how I, as a survivor, feel about your letter. And I know you’ll pay careful attention, because you’ve said you want to listen to survivors.

But first, let me talk a bit about the IICSA hearings. In the last three weeks I’ve been on an eventful personal journey. The first week I was emotionally chewed up: the evidence recalled to me many of the awful experiences I’ve had over my nearly 40 years in the Church of England. The second week I began to realise that at last powerful people were being called to account and some of the rottenness was being exposed. Frankly, John and Justin, I enjoyed seeing those bishops wriggle under questioning from two women who were much younger than them. The tables were turned and it did me a power of good.

During the third week I felt empowered. By then I was getting things in perspective. You see, being a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, and also one of the first women to be ordained, has been really tough. So often the treatment I’ve had from the Church has replayed those old scripts. And often I’d felt bad because somehow I didn’t seem able to pick up the rules of the game, didn’t have the formula for being taken seriously by the hierarchy. What was wrong with me? Now I know it wasn’t me who was wrong, it was the dreadful system and so many of the people at the top. (Not all of them, thank God, but too often the good were outweighed by the bad.) Now I’m glad I never learned those rules. They were, and are, rotten rules to play by. As Justin said last week, we need to learn from what has happened and make massive changes. I was quite encouraged. I actually had some hope, Justin, that you meant it.

And now,, John and Justin, to your letter. Oh dear. I’m afraid you could hardly have got it more wrong. So let me give you some friendly advice. Let’s start with topping and tailing. If you’re going to address us all as ‘Sisters and Brothers in Christ’, don’t finish with ‘The Most Revd and Rt Hon’. Its just not brotherly. It looks like showing off. It certainly doesn’t look like the shame Justin said he felt. If you really wanted an end to deference and clericalism you’d have signed off ‘Justin and John’. We know who you are.

Next, if you want to send out something called a pastoral letter, make it pastoral. Asking for prayer for all those involved in the IICSA hearings and in safeguarding isn’t enough. You can’t just pass on to what good work is being done without saying what you are actually going to do for those affected by the hearings. What practical steps have you taken to help survivors, for instance? In case you can’t think of anything you could and should do now, here are some suggestions.
1) When someone writes to you personally with an allegation of abuse or harassment, as I did last November, answer them. Your chaplain or secretary can draft the letter, but sign it yourself. At least make sure they actually get a reply. I haven’t had one, and it’s 133 days now. Not that I’m counting.
2) Announce that you are setting aside funds for counselling for those who have made allegations of abuse. All I was offered, in a phone call from a member of the safeguarding team, was a meeting with a female priest. I’m a woman priest, I know dozens of woman priests. It takes a skilful and trained counsellor to help a survivor of abuse. Invest some money into putting things right.
3) We’ve all heard accounts of abuse taking place in church settings, as part of worship and prayer. You speak of all the services of Holy Week as if everything will go on as usual. If it does, you will rob us of that glimmer of hope we had when Justin seemed to struggle with tears about the abuse people have suffered in our church. So, announce that you are stepping back from your role in all the Holy Week observations and ceremonies. Tell us you will instead spend the week visiting survivors and listening to our stories. You could ask ordained survivors to take your place in some of those services. That would demonstrate your respect for them, your admiration of their courage and honesty. Give them some of the outward show of dignity you would usually enjoy.

Another point: if you’re going to start a pastoral letter with a biblical quotation, make it an appropriate one. The passage which came to my mind when I read your letter was another saying of Jesus:

So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift. (Mt. 5:23-24)

We have just spent three weeks finding out how much is justly held against the leaders of our Church. The debt is huge, but you can at least make a start. John, you need to work on being reconciled with Matt Ineson before you next attend church. Justin, what about making amends to Gilo for those 17 unanswered letters? But only if you take Jesus seriously, of course.

Finally I’d like to say, in my most pastoral manner, that neither of you seems good at responding appropriately to people who’ve been on the receiving end of the bad stuff that happens in religious organisations. So here’s another suggestion. When you need to write a letter like the one we’ve just had, or to make a statement, run it past a survivor first. Most of us don’t want you to look uncaring and incompetent, we really don’t. We can help you to write sensitively, to respond appropriately, to offer assistance that will actually make a difference. Many of us have years of experience working with other survivors; researching; struggling with the theological and spiritual implications of being abused. Some of us can even contribute liturgical material you might find useful. We survivors offer a resource for the Church that you need badly. Don’t continue to despise it.

Well, as far as I’m concerned this has cleared the air nicely. I do hope you’ve found my suggestions helpful; there are plenty more I can think of but I reckon the is enough for now. Feel free to ask my advice any time. It’s funny what a difference it makes, being able to call you Justin and John. Almost as if I really were your equal in Christ.

Yours sincerely

Janet Fife

For those of us who have been following the Independent Inquiry over the last three weeks, today, the final day, has come as something of a relief. The lawyers who worked so hard presenting the extensive material related to the Diocese of Chichester will, no doubt, be going away for a well-earned rest. I will personally be quite relieved not to be having to listen to the hours of testimony each day before making personalised comments on the proceedings. But, much to my surprise my comments have been appreciated. For the first time in four years the viewing figures for the blog have reached over three figures. So, I owe it to my new readers to make some final comment as the Inquiry (as far as the Chichester Diocese is concerned) comes to an end.

Today the proceedings were addressed by two lawyers acting for survivors, Richard Scorer and David Greenwood. It was their task to respond to the days of evidence and summarise what they have heard as well as reflect the views of the survivors that they represent. Both Richard and David asked the Inquiry to consider recommending a compulsory oversight of the Church’s management of safeguarding practice. Both of them also know from what their clients have told them of the way that the church has often obstructed survivors of sexual abuse in their attempts to be heard. The spoken evidence of the individuals from this group has been impressive. The overall impression from listening to these testimonies is that few are seeking large pay-outs from the church, even though in many cases lives, careers and potential relationships have been ruined. What many of them have sought is simply some way that they can be heard. The Church in its dependence on lawyers and insurance companies has appeared to have pulled up the drawbridge, making communication very difficult. Who can forget the 17 letters sent by Gilo to Lambeth Palace and the limp response to just one?

David Greenwood summed up the problem of one part of this church culture when he talked about it being a ‘defensive culture’. He said, no doubt speaking for a considerable number of survivors: ‘none of our complainant witnesses have described having been welcomed and assisted at any point by church officials. Indeed, there were attempts at all levels to minimise the seriousness and volume of cases.’ I have written on several occasions in this blog about the importance of welcome in church life. If we think about it, a true welcome into a living community without making conditions over status or position is one of the most precious things that a church can offer. Welcome does not need words. It speaks of acceptance, tolerance and love. So many Christians think that to be a Christian is the ability to recite a formula of correct words. They forget that the most powerful and attractive words in the New Testament are those spoken by the Son of Man returning in glory. He invites the righteous ‘to take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.’ To be a Christian is to respond to this invitation to participate in a full transcendent life.

A church which is defensive, is operating in a way that is completely counter to a vision of welcome and openness to all. The church is or should be a place of forgiving and healing brokenness. There is something very strange if it wants to shut out a particular category of the broken – the survivors of church abuse. Of course, there are many problems as regards resources and adequate expertise to fulfil this task, one that is difficult and challenging. But what has been revealed in the past three weeks is the way that the Church in many places has placed actual obstacles in the way of those simply want to be heard and acknowledged. Many have been so hurt by this response that they have given up on the Church altogether. Who can blame them? But I also find it hard to believe that a rejected Christian who has been abused and hurt by members of the Church will ever be rejected by God.

The words ‘change of culture’ are of course becoming a bit of a cliché in church survivor circles. One way in which the Church could begin to change is by rediscovering the ministry of welcome. Learning to welcome people better, not put up defensive fences against them, is the first stage of creating a healing church. Some abused victims of the Church will have specialised needs, but I suspect that many of them can be helped by genuine loving and reconciling welcome. This will go a long way in helping them to rediscover what they were looking for when they first entered a church. The dysfunctional power dynamics which created their abuse in the first place need to be completely taken apart. It may require that the whole Church has to enter a period of complete brokenness before it can be rebuilt. The clergy will have to be taught how to resist the subtle temptations of narcissistic power games and abusive behaviour. Whether there are appropriate personality tests which could weed out in advance the exploiters of power in the church, I don’t know. But soon everyone who sets themselves up to be a member of the clergy must be seen to be a person of humility, openness and welcome. If the person at the centre is a follower of Jesus the servant, the washer of feet, then sexual abuse or any kind of power abuse would be impossible. The cultures of deference, hierarchy and social status will also have to be put away. It may take 20 years or even 50 years to see such ideas in place. Somehow it is a possible vision and the Inquiry has opened the eyes of many church people to see the utter ugliness of abuse, power games and control within our congregations. These will be identified and gradually expelled as people come to recognise the importance of safety and true welcome within the Body of Christ.

This morning, on the last full day of witness hearings at IICSA, I was with a group of other permission to officiate clergy doing my compulsory safeguarding training. I thus did not hear the morning questioning by the lawyers of Archbishop Welby. I did however, catch his closing reflections after lunch. He was asked to reflect on the impact that encountering victims of church sexual abuse had made on him. His answer came only after a long pause. The words that he used were striking. First, he spoke of a deep sense of shame. He was ashamed of his church. His posture and body language suggested that he was articulating a deeply held feeling. I have no reason to think that this was anything other than a genuine expression of emotion. Even though we are critical of the leadership of the church in this area of caring for the vulnerable, it seems that we need to accept that some of our church leaders have been deeply affected by what they have heard at the hearings.

A second word came out of Welby’s reflections at the end of the questions by Fiona Scolding. This was the word ‘tribalism’. The Archbishop wanted to make the point that when groups or factions within the church band together to protect themselves and their privileges, that creates an atmosphere highly hostile to good and transparent safeguarding. Although he used the word tribalism in the context of protecting vulnerable people in the church, it was clear that this word also sums up many of the problems being faced by the Church of England in other areas. Tribalism seems to be rife in the whole Anglican Communion and is the cause of many of its intractable divisions.

Those of us listening to his words realise that, for the Archbishop, church tribalism is a source of deep frustration. The problem is that everyone feels stronger when they band together with others to accomplish a particular task. Some tribalism is of course healthy. The church rightly encourages people to gather together the purposes of study, prayer and worship. Feeling support from others as we grow together in community is something that enriches our lives. But community or communion can become something dark when it descends into tribalism. This negative side of community is manifested when the individual surrenders their thinking and feeling to a group mind. In political terms this is seen in mass movements whether on the Right or on the Left. Anyone who attends a fascist rally does not have to think for themselves. He or she is part of something great and of enormous power. The Movement, the Cause has replaced the individual isolated functioning which belongs to a single person. Within the mass gathering there is power; outside the rally there is only insignificance and a sense of personal weakness.

A readiness to surrender our individual weakness in exchange for tribal power is perhaps not as far away from each of us as we would like to think. Membership of a tribe promises us many things; we are freed from the struggle to understand and make sense of the world. We have instant purpose, direction and significance once we have surrendered to the large group. In church political terms there are many people who have opted to belong to a group which does all necessary thinking on their behalf. This is particularly true of those who occupy a position at one of the extremes of churchmanship. At the charismatic end of things, we can see how the large group fills the individual with sound and music so that thinking is no longer required. The fact that lots of other people are there with us helps to dampen any rational questioning that might try to erupt. I vividly remember the single occasion when I attended a professional football match. The wall of sound that filled the stadium removed any individual sense of identity. I did not want to repeat the experience. The thinking, reasoning and feeling parts of me were too important to be destroyed in this kind of event.

When Archbishop Welby spoke about tribalism he was talking, I believe, about this tendency for people to want to be swept up into a large group who does their thinking and decision making for them. People who think as part of a large group and find their identities there, are not the kind of people who would be sensitive and alert to the needs of abused individuals. The individual is never important in tribes or mass movements. We only support others when they belong to our tribe. If they do not they are to be scorned and pushed to one side. That is not a good atmosphere for safeguarding the weak and the vulnerable. Effective safeguarding can only be done by people who are prepared to stand outside this tribal mindset. We need to be above a crude morality that places all the good in our tribe and sees everything else as distorted or evil. We need to have an independence of thought and behaviour which will be able to do the loving and intelligent caring that is required of true safeguarding work.

My comments which support Archbishop Welby in his horror of tribal thinking have to end on a slightly critical note. The tribalisms of churchmanship that we see in the Church of England are paralleled by other inbred groups that we find within professional bodies. Tribalism is such a universal phenomenon that we find it in safeguarding networks, social work groups and even in the House of Bishops. In all of these, the same dynamics of letting the group to do some of your thinking for you is evident. A lot of the unanimity of thinking that we observe among bishops may itself be an example of the very tribalism that the Archbishop wants to banish. We need to spend a great of time in finding out what ‘disagreeing well’ really means. This is not just about encouraging conservatives to speak to liberals in the Church. It also means allowing the flourishing and fostering the independent exploration of morality and faith within the church. The opposite of tribalism is something very untidy. Perhaps it is precisely that fierce independence of thought, faith and morality that is what we should be seeking in the church and thus furthering the cause of good care and safeguarding..

Today I listened to a long account by Graham Tilby, the National Safeguarding Officer who was addressing the IICSA hearing. Much of his testimony was frankly boring. It concerned his work of bringing safeguarding practices in England up-to-date and closer to current professional standards. While I was listening to this I was asking myself a question. Why would this seem so alien to the dozens of individuals known to me who have been through an experience of abuse at the hands of church leaders? It was only when the hearing finished for the day at around 4.30 pm that I realised one simple truth. The professionals, the experts in this area of safeguarding and the survivors are speaking from totally different perspectives. It is an old story familiar to academia. An object of study will reveal quite different facets according to which discipline is being used to examine it. The glasses we wear will colour and define what we see with our eyes.

Although I am not an abuse survivor, my position as a student of church abuse of all kinds has put me far more alongside the survivors rather than as a defender of the church institution. We learn to expect that people within an institution like the church will normally see most things from the perspective of that body. Apart from learning to talk in a special coded language, they will normally have absorbed a distinction between the insider and the outsider – ‘us’ versus ‘them’. This seems to be the perspective of an employee like Graham Tilby. Arguably it also helps us to understand the apparent ‘groupthink’ of the entire House of Bishops. Their position at the heart of the church institution makes it difficult for them to imagine what it is like to be outside the group. If an outsider is challenging in any way to the institution that gives church leaders their sense of security as well as status, then that person will be a special foe. Almost everything that was said by Graham Tilby seemed to echo this perspective. Although he made various remarks about survivors there was no real identification with their plight and what they have suffered. He spoke about pastoral care being something to be offered locally – in other words outside his remit or interest. He was much more interested in the various ways professional safeguarding standards have been upgraded since he was appointed. He made reference to an external monitoring process by an organisation hitherto unknown to me, the SCIE. When I looked this up it turned out to be an independent organisation which evaluates organisations and their effectiveness -the Social Care Institute for Excellence. In other words, the main focus for pride among Safeguarding Officers is to deliver teaching and effective monitoring services rather than care for the raw pain of abuse survivors.

It was also revealing when Graham revealed what he considered the necessary set of skills required to be a Safeguarding Officer. He mentioned those skills possessed by police, social workers and probation officers. No mention was made of the skills that would be sensitive to the dysfunctional structures in which perpetrators flourish. I am thinking of course of social psychologists, psychotherapists and other mental health workers. To summarise, safeguarding has been handed over to one set of professional skills. What is required is the ability to manage, monitor training and organise structures. Little energy will be left for the care of survivors with their many and varied therapeutic needs.

From the perspective of the survivor, whose mental world I have tried to enter, all this heavy-handed professionalism feels alienating and oppressive. It feels as though stable doors are being firmly slammed after the horse has bolted. There is no affirmation of all the pain and suffering that has been caused by deviant individuals and the dysfunctional church structures which have protected them.

There is one category of professional which has grasped the reality of the chasm which separates survivors and those who want to protect the institution. These are the consultants who have written reports to critique the Church’s failure to understand what is going on in the safeguarding world. In 2015 Graham Tilby, who was speaking at the Inquiry today, commissioned a safeguarding review to see what lessons could be learned from the case of Gilo. We have referred to his story of abuse several times on this blog. The review was entrusted to Ian Elliott, an expert independent safeguarding expert. His report was completed in March 2016. The report was never published in full but was shared with the House of Bishops at their meeting that Spring. Sarah Mullally, now Bishop of London, was given the task of implementing the recommendations. The key thrust of the report was twofold. It recommended a more consistent approach to safeguarding across the country. In the second place it stressed the importance of placing the needs of a survivor at a much more central place. Elliott noted several failures from the past and, in particular, he was scathing about the poor record keeping of some bishops. The fact that bishops had not always acted in the best interests of survivors meant, he felt, that they should not left to make safeguarding decisions on their own. One sentence stands out: ‘behind every disclosure that is received lies human pain and suffering that can be so intense as to be life threatening’. This kind of awareness of the human reality of abuse seem to be totally absent in the rather laid-back and self-congratulatory presentation by Graham Tilby today.

Elliott’s review, although received well at the time, seems to have become buried in the intervening two years. Elliott built a bridge to cross the chasm between complacent church structures and the needs of suffering survivors. Somehow that bridge has become fractured. We have to hope that the IICSA will recognise the importance of Elliott’s work and recommend that the needs of survivors must once more be placed at the centre. We are not just talking about financial needs but sometimes simply a recognition of what they have been through. This blog post is the plea of just one individual who asks that the church rebuild the bridge that should exist between the church institution and the needs of survivors. This post represents a real longing and hope that the new Bishop of London, tasked with the taking forward of the Elliott report, will continue to work to keep it alive. It is vital from the perspective of this commentator that the needs of survivors must always be kept in mind as the church tries to go forward. As well as protecting potential victims in the future, it will always need to have care for those who have been damaged in the past.

I have given more time than perhaps is healthy to listen to the hearings of the Independent Inquiry this week. It will all be over by the end of next week, but the Church of England will be mulling over its implications for a long time to come. Some of the witnesses have been helpful in showing how much there is in the way of dysfunction and extraordinary dynamics within our Church structures. It is hard to see, after these hearings, how the pattern of Church life, especially around bishops and senior clergy, will ever be the same again. Some of the inner workings of decision-making at the highest levels of the church have been laid bare. Child protection policies over the past decades have been seen to be inadequate.

The current Safeguarding Officer from the Diocese of Chichester, Colin Perkins, has been eloquent today in support of current practice within his diocese. Other witnesses have tried to indicate that lessons ‘have been learnt’ and we can expect enormous improvements in the Church’s safeguarding in the future. The repeated promise to help survivors and victims has also included the expression ‘change the culture’. This was first mentioned by Archbishop Welby in 2013. I want to reflect what this, perhaps now rather tired, cliché might mean in practice. As my readers know I have often tried to emphasise that child sexual abuse is one among various problems of power abuse in our national Church. A dysfunctional exercise of power in the Church is, of course, found in other denominations as well. I want in this post to think further about what this expression ‘a change of culture’ might involve. At the very least it requires a new understanding of the way power operates within churches. At present we have in common with most other churches a hierarchical church which is modelled on a pyramid structure. The Church of Rome exemplifies this pyramid model more obviously than the Church of England. At the apex of the church pyramids are Popes, Archbishops and bishops. These dignitaries delegate their authority to those below them. These might be archdeacons, Area Deans or parish priests. Each parish also organises itself in a similar way. The minister in charge is at the top of his own small pyramid, able to set the tone of the parish and exercise some power over his congregation.

The problem for the church is that when power is exercised within these structures, quite often it is an invisible or unacknowledged power. When such power is in fact recognised and identified, it is probably less dangerous. The institution can operate for much of the time in a reasonably healthy way. The problem arises when, for reasons of psychology or institutional dysfunction, the one at the top of the pyramid has no insight about the power at their disposal. He/she may be feeding an inner narcissistic need to be important while at the same time behaving in an arbitrary way. Because feeling good comes to be for some the most important reason for exercising power, the person at the top will have no insight as to how those at the bottom feel. Leader and led often may become locked in an unhealthy dynamic. This, at worst, quickly descends into a culture of a coercive controlling tyranny.

The exercise of power within the Church thus often involves delusional thinking. Nobody within the pyramid is prepared to tell those at the top how they impact negatively on the marginalised and weak at the bottom. In the present hearings of the Inquiry we sense a crippling inability by many of those at the top to hear the needs of survivors. This is probably not deliberate on the part of bishops and archbishops. Somehow the structure and the culture of the pyramid have made it almost impossible for the lines of communication to work properly. Something is wrong, but no one knows how to turn the pyramid upside down to create the necessary ‘change of culture’.

It would be easy to say that the solution to our problem is to turn the pyramid upside down. The practical implications of doing this would be fairly drastic whether within a parish or at national level. But we can at least try to imagine how relationships within a structure would change if the person in charge started genuinely to think about the experience of the people with the least power. On this blog Chris has often reminded us of the needs of the poor and the disenfranchised. The ministry of the churches to such people has often been condescending and ineffective. I have mentioned that the experience of the very poor in their relationship to the Church is sometimes like the experience of being offered candy floss rather than proper food. The Church is good at providing entertainment rather than true welcome and integration into a life-giving community.

What do we find in Scripture? We do find the upended pyramid model when we note that Jesus who is Lord and Master wants to be the one who washes feet. In practical terms that means the ability of leaders to be alongside someone and listen. The greatest challenge for those who have been defending the institution from survivors of historic abuse is to start to listen to them. If the Church is ever to get right the enormous wrong that has been perpetrated against these survivors, it has to put in hand a long process of reconciliation. This would involve financial and pastoral recompense together with other forms of support, spiritual and practical. Somewhere towards the end of this lengthy process (say after five years) there might be room for a massive service of contrition at St Paul’s Cathedral. Bishops and archbishops would be asked to wash the feet of representative survivors. Such a massive symbolic act would demonstrate beyond all doubt that the Church is genuinely moving into the stage of wanting to serve those who have been wounded and damaged by its some of its leaders.

The change of culture that we are looking for would be a radical change from defensiveness to openness. We need to embark on a process which will show that the Church is really listening to victims and survivors. The alternative to a radical new beginning for the Church is a slow decline in influence and power. The Church by its failures stands to lose the status and power which has been used for centuries to serve the people of this country. The IICSA hearings may galvanise it to put it house in order. But to do that, the Church will need to do the difficult task of sorting out the structures of power within its life. The pyramid needs somehow to be turned upside down. That will be costly in terms of money and status. Somehow, I sense that this is the path closest to what Jesus would suggest.

Yesterday I watched snippets of Bishop Wallace Benn’s testimony at the IICSA hearing. Subsequently I was able to consult the summaries so helpfully published at the end of the day by the Inquiry itself. Others who have commented on the day’s proceedings have said, with some justification, that Bishop Benn showed a notable dependence on the ‘rule-book’. He appeared to want to fend off all accusations about his conduct by telling the Inquiry that it was someone else’s responsibility. He simply shrugged off the attempts to show him that his leadership and behaviour in this area were indicative, at best, of indifference and, at worst, abject incompetence.

Since yesterday I have tried to come up with a word or expression to signify the minimum that we might expect of church leaders, like Bishop Benn, in dealing with individuals suffering as the result of sexual abuse. I have failed to come up with a single word but meanwhile I have settled on the expression ‘harm awareness’. This term might describe the ability to respond to any realisation that people around you are being hurt. It suggests that any Christian, or indeed any citizen, who suspects harm is being caused to another person will do everything in their power to stop that harm. It is the impulse that draws in a total stranger to help when an old lady falls in the street. It is the natural response of any human being to help another who is facing abuse or harm. It is quite clear that in the Chichester diocese there was a cluster of sexually abusive clergy. It would be the most natural thing in the world for those in positions of power to work together to root out this infection. What do we find out from Bishop Benn’s testimony? We find that the application of rules and procedures seemed to be more important than seeking out and supporting actual suffering victims as well as responding to perpetrators. It is unclear from the evidence of Bishop Benn whether these rules were even followed in the best way possible. Did the church leaders in Chichester have ‘harm awareness’ to any degree?

The evidence that there were power ‘struggles’ between the wings of the church in Chichester Diocese had clearly complicated its smooth functioning. As we noted in last week’s post, the High Church and the conservative evangelical parishes were not communicating well. The same lack of mutual trust was evident in the difficult working relationship between the Diocesan bishop and his suffragans. The appointment of Bishop Benn in 1995 was not merely an appointment to represent the conservative wing within the Diocese. Rather he was there to represent the ultra-conservative wing of the entire Church of England. It has been suggested that Bishop Benn was not really up to the challenge of ministering to any clergy or parishes who did not follow his conservative theology. Some would claim that he was appointed simply to pacify and keep his conservative faction within the church. It is hard to see how the diocese could ever be united when it carried the legacy of ‘political’ appointments of this kind.

It is well-known that sexual abuse by adults of young people and children can have catastrophic lifelong consequences. My own limited exposure to this group leads me to suppose that it is far more serious than almost any physical damage. Because the result of the abuse is carried by the brain and the nervous system, it can be crippling in ways that are far worse that the loss of a limb. It may involve such difficulties as making relationships, holding down employment and sometimes resulting in physical illness. If clergy and other Christian leaders were ever to remove the limbs of young people, there would be uproar in society. Instant imprisonment would be meted out to the perpetrators and the everyone would be outraged. The fact that the effects of sexual abuse are not visible does in no way makes it less damaging. And yet it seems that large numbers of church leaders and others do not recognise the full extent of such damage. If they did so they would be overwhelmed with the same horror that they would feel on behalf of the physically maimed.

Today (Tuesday) has seen some powerful and informative material given to the Inquiry. In the morning I listened to Dr Rupert Bursell. He has been Chancellor (chief legal officer) of Chichester as well as other Dioceses. He had a clear and cogent understanding of some of the legal processes and, in contrast with the vague witness of Bishop Benn, this was a breath of fresh air. I was particularly delighted that he was able for a short period to speak about the wider issues of ‘spiritual abuse’. He appeared to refer to my letter to the Church Times as part of his testimony. (Perhaps it was the one written by Janet Fife?) The issue of abuse through exorcism was given a brief airing.

In the afternoon we listened to Professor Julie Mcfarlane who had endured abuse at the hands of a clergyman over 40 years ago. She, in conjunction with the lawyer, David Greenwood, had some trenchant criticisms of the way that the system has treated survivors. The response to survivors has involved an adversarial tone. The victim has to endure questions by lawyers who apparently are not above suggesting that a victim may have provoked or initiated the abuse. Also, the survivor has in the past had to undergo a two-hour examination by a psychiatrist. Such treatment is, according to Professor Mcfarlane, as abusive as the original crime. It is hard to see how insurers and lawyers will continue to define the treatment of survivors in the future after this telling critique. As an academic lawyer she also questioned the way the church has limply hid behind the excuse that the solicitors set conditions for possible action. In law, according to her argument, the client instructs the lawyer, not the other way round. She spoke very powerfully of the way that the abuse she had suffered had affected her personal life.

I end this report with a repeat of my expression ‘harm awareness’, the quality that many church leaders seem to lack. The way that individuals have been robbed of their wholeness through sexual abuse is shocking. When church people, from leaders downwards, ‘get it’, i.e. understand the harm that abuse causes, the incidence surely must go down. When, on the other hand, it is seen as a nuisance which disturbs the equanimity of the institution, it will continue. It is evil and must be banished with speed and thoroughness.

I have been able to listen to some of the proceedings at the IICSA hearing in London this morning (Thursday). The first witness was Archdeacon Philip Jones from the Chichester Diocese who was continuing his testimony from yesterday. It is not my intention or purpose to set out any of the detail of the Inquiry as those interested can follow it from the published transcripts. There was also this morning a robust presentation from a former leading member of MACSAS, Anne Lawrence. This is an organisation that seeks to support and act as an advocate for victims of clerical sexual abuse from all denominations. Unlike some of other testimonies, the one made by Anne had a punchy and fluent style which made one think that one was watching a television drama. Her performance did her organisation a great deal of credit. She demonstrated MACSAS’s clarity of purpose in supporting survivors and she showed a robust understanding of all the issues. This contrasted with the somewhat vague approach taken by the church authorities on occasion.

I want to return to one comment by Archdeacon Philip. He mentioned the problems of working in a diocese where the two theological extremes of Anglicanism are well represented. The Diocese of Chichester has had for its suffragan the Bishop of Lewes, Wallace Benn. He was also the lead bishop nationally for the conservative organisation Reform. True to this radically evangelical tradition Benn follows a very conservative line both on biblical interpretation and on Protestant theology. Among other points, Reform takes a negative view over women in ministry. There were a number of parishes in Chichester that also followed this tradition and looked to the Bishop Benn for leadership. The Chichester diocese is also well-known for several clusters of Anglo-Catholic parishes. These all also find it impossible to accept the ministry of women. Among these parishes there has also grown up what might be described as a ‘gay friendly’ culture. Archdeacon Philip spoke of one theological issue that was raised when these two extremes had to face up to abuse issues. The issue was forgiveness and the way it should be applied in dealing with sexual abuse cases. The two groups dealt with this question quite differently. Bishop Wallace Benn and the conservative group who looked to him for leadership and support read the Bible in a distinct way. As far as they are concerned biblical forgiveness is always unconditional. When sin is confessed it is completely washed away through the atoning death of Christ. In practical terms the sin is left behind and can be forgotten. The high church group would also promote a theology of forgiveness following Confession. By contrast they would not wish to suggest that sin had no consequences. An act of abuse, even after sacramental forgiveness, would require that the perpetrator would need to face justice and sanctions.

Bishop Wallace Benn was known to identify with the ‘biblical’ notions around forgiveness. In other words, he was known to follow a ‘soft’ approach to his clergy even when they were suspected on appalling crimes. Criticisms of his behaviour in failing to discipline offending clergy have been brought up in the Inquiry. In 2012 a complaint was made under the Clerical Disciplinary Measure (CDM). He was accused on not acting to protect young people and children in the face of known predators. One of these offenders, who was eventually imprisoned, Roy Cotton, was said by Archdeacon Philip to hold firmly to the position that whatever he had done in the past he had been forgiven by God. He no longer needed to think about it or face any sanctions. His theology (and that of Bishop Benn) was here taking precedence over justice and safeguarding.

I want us to reflect a moment on the implications of this kind of theological reasoning. What is being said that ‘I have sinned, but Jesus has forgiven me through the Cross. Now that I am forgiven there are nothing more that needs to be done. God has given me a new beginning and I can leave the past behind.’ The implications of this kind of theology are frankly horrendous. It allows behaviour to go unpunished and a situation to arise which involves extreme danger towards children and young people. We could say that here the Bible is effectively being used as a way of avoiding the consequences of criminal behaviour. More seriously it has become a tool of abuse

The independent lawyers questioning senior church people about their attitudes to sexual abuse must be frankly appalled by this use of Scripture and the way poorly thought out theologies can have such serious consequences. The problem for the Archdeacon Philip, and indeed any church leader, is to deal with an idea which, when backed up by a biblical quotation, is somehow regarded as beyond criticism. That is how abuse happens in churches. Individuals have learnt to justify doubtful behaviour by referring to favourite passages from Scripture.

I want briefly to list from the top of my head some of the ideas that are thought in some conservative parts of the church to be scriptural but are also often abusive in practice.
1. Violence against women is condoned or tolerated since the man of the family needs to behave as the head of the family and household. This is the Scriptural model.
2. Violence against children using beating and other methods is scriptural. Once again this is supported by suitable quotations from Proverbs and elsewhere.
3. The silencing and shaming of congregational members takes place by appealing to passages which suggest that only the leader speaks in the name of God and thus must be obeyed.
4. The condoning of appalling behaviour by political leaders (as currently in America!) on the grounds that their words convey support for particular favoured ‘Christian’ policies. These are often the ones that discriminate against the gay community and other minority groups.
5. The refusal by ‘scriptural’ Christians to enter into dialogue with any differing perspectives on theology or politics. The appalling legacy of binary right/wrong thinking is one that condemns other groups to hell or association with Satan. In short, some Christian belief systems demonise and exclude all other belief systems beyond their own.

As my reader can tell the IICSA revelations are for me extremely disturbing and painful to hear. Once again, we are facing the capacity of Christian institutions and the thinking within it to cause real harm to the vulnerable. This capacity to harm is a blot on our church. It is a matter of shame and it has taken a non-church Inquiry to expose how appallingly Christians sometimes treat one another.

As the IICSA continues its work we are hearing more and more about the way that church authorities have historically protected the institution above individual members. In a previous post I spoke about a special ‘gene’ which I speculated infected some bishops who could only think in this institution protective way. I have been thinking further about this apparent retreat away from pastoral instinct into institutional groupthink. This is what seems to possess a cohort of senior church leaders at this time.

A few years ago, I wrote an article on the question as to whether clergy are likely to be affected by narcissistic behaviour. I was responding to another article that had been written a few years earlier which resisted this notion. The earlier researcher had studied a cohort of theological students in the States and had concluded, buttressed by statistical analysis, that they were no more liable to this trait than other non-church contemporaries. I realised that there was a flaw in this argument. The weakness was in the fact that the author assumed narcissism is always a disorder that begins in childhood. Others dispute this and suggest that the disorder may develop during the course of a career. An American writer, Robert Millman around 2000, came up with the splendid expression ‘Acquired Situational Narcissism’ (ASN). This describes how certain callings like show business or politics lead some individuals into the kind of self-promoting behaviour that we associate with narcissism. As a theory, it has not received acceptance among experts in this field, but it does seem to make a lot of sense. It could account for the way that a shy, even humble, clergyman could grow to exhibit grandiosity and power-seeking behaviour over a period of time. It is not difficult to imagine how standing in a pulpit week by week telling people what to think and what to do could change someone. The job we do, the role we adopt through our career, can deeply affect the kind of people we become.

We need to be reminded at this point of the main characteristics of narcissistic behaviour as they might apply to clergy. It is interesting that some of the words that describe this behaviour have an almost religious feel. Words like grandiosity, messianic and being special appear in the descriptions of what it means to be a sufferer of this disorder. My own summary description of narcissistic behaviour is self-inflation. The other side of the disorder concerns the failure to deal with others well as the result of these larger than life egos. The typical narcissist, because he believes himself to be an exalted being, becomes detached and uncaring for the concerns of ordinary people – his perceived inferiors.

The historic behaviour on the part of several of the bishops in the Church of England towards survivors does seem to have many of the characteristics of narcissistic behaviour. It might be argued that some at least of these bishops have acquired a measure of narcissism precisely because their preferment has resulted in their feeling superior and all-powerful. In other words, some have succumbed to ASN. Their role as ‘princes of the Church’ has come to define their personality in an arguably unhealthy way. In suggesting this, I am reminded of a phenomenon which took place when I was at school. From time to time boys would become prefects. The moment this change of status took place, there would be a sudden change in their relationships and in their general demeanour. Some of this might have been necessary to function in their new status; part was taking on the trappings of new role which did nothing for the preservation of their old core personalities. I am wondering whether new bishops go through a similar process. The new role which is hedged about by ecclesiastical and institutional expectations starts to define them and their personality in an narrowing way. The situation in which they find themselves draws them into a new persona, a role which may be cramping and stifling because it buries their true personality. Some bishops no doubt will fight such a restriction of their style. But others, for reasons of narcissistic gratification, will revel in the power they have and the status that their role gives them. In short, some bishops become clones of the institution. They start to act and behave in accordance with a model that is defined by the institution and not according to their individual idiosyncrasies in interpreting the episcopal function.

As I write this I can think of several bishops I have known who have completely avoided narcissistic grandiosity and detachment from ordinary people. Equally I have met other bishops who seem to revel in the importance thrust upon them together with the titles and honours that they enjoy. The question that I keep asking is whether the insensitive treatment afforded to survivors by some of our bishops is the result of what we have referred to as Acquired Situational Narcissism. If this analysis is in any way correct, the way that narcissism creeps into church life needs to be understood far better. When it is in evidence, especially among the bishops, it has the potential for wreaking havoc to relationships within the church.

Looking at the Church of England as a whole I can see that both ends of the church are affected by the phenomenon we have called ASN. The ‘high church’ group are very keen to enhance the role of the ordained clergy for theological reasons. The conservative evangelical group also want the minister, as the preacher and teacher of the Word of God, to be similarly exalted. Both theologies push the church towards putting the clergy (and the bishops) on to a pedestal. Thus narcissism becomes very easily embedded in large areas of the church. Clergy from a variety of traditions then begin to exhibit narcissistic traits and behaviour. This for theological reasons often goes unchallenged.

As I have said many times before in this blog, we need to have a serious debate about power and how it is used within the church. We need a new sensitivity to oppressive systems. These often privilege strong personalities with authority over weaker individuals, especially women and children. Bishops, clergy and people are all being shown in this present Inquiry to be complicit in some thoroughly unhealthy power dynamics in every part of the church. We need to talk about the way these dynamics operate. We need to have a language with which to describe them. Narcissism in all its manifestations involves a manifestation of power dysfunction and the church needs to rid itself of this. Perhaps IICSA may help in its banishment, the expulsion of unhealthy and destructive power relationships from our national church.

In the past few days, I have been having a Twitter conversation with Gilo and a few others about the forthcoming hearings of IICSA which begin tomorrow (Monday). This is the Independent Inquiry into the Anglican Church and its failures over child protection, particularly in the Diocese of Chichester. The Bishop with oversight of Safeguarding for the Church, the Bishop of Bath and Wells, has already indicated in Synod that he believes the next two years will be a fairly torrid time for the Church of England. This is because he anticipates how many historic failures in this area will become public knowledge, some for the first time. Two things in summary have to be faced by the Church. The first is the fact that some of its employees have been complicit in acts of child sexual abuse. The second is the way that church authorities, including bishops, have floundered in their attempts to deal with this issue. Incidents of criminal activity have been in some cases hushed up in a desperate attempt to avoid scandal. On some occasions the perpetrators were quietly disciplined and their offence buried in filing cabinets in diocesan offices. On other occasions victims were listened to but subsequently all the records of the conversations disappeared. In short, children suffered but the Church seemed unwilling to face up to the horror of what was happening. From the point of view of some victims, justice was for decades denied, apparently to preserve the reputation of the national Church.

My own published study of power abuse which is now nearly 20 years old never touched on the topic of harmful behaviour towards children. Such activity would obviously be criminal and I was not in the business of researching illegal behaviour. The stories that I did in fact record were in some cases just as bad in different ways. Exploitation of vulnerable people, whether sexually, emotionally or spiritually is always a serious matter. I only recorded one criminal act, a rape, but this had already been investigated by the police. No prosecution had followed. What my studies did sensitise me to is the way that it was extremely easy for the power exercised by church leaders and ministers to do serious harm. Many people who find their way to church are on a journey from vulnerability but hoping to find healing. A narcissistic church pastor or leader may well exercise his power in inappropriate ways. It is this imbalance and subsequent abuse of power which was a constant theme in my book.

My current conversation with Gilo touches on the power that Anglican bishops possess to sort out or aggravate the abuse cases that come to their attention. I have never interviewed a bishop on this topic. I did however receive letters from women when my book was published who had approached Anglican bishops to complain about clergy who had had ‘affairs’ with them. Several of them expressed their frustration at the way the bishop concerned refused to engage with the priest who had crossed professional boundaries. My impression is that some bishops were unwilling to get too involved in such cases, if no open scandal had emerged. I wonder whether these conversations with a bishop were ever recorded and put into a file. The existence of or not of good records of clergy malfeasance may well be revealed by the Independent Inquiry in the coming weeks.

My response to a comment by Gilo was that an Anglican bishop would probably be the person in the Church most likely to identify with and protect the institution. Although I did not say this I am wondering whether the powers that be choose bishops by seeking out those clergy who are by nature and temperament most institution friendly. Another way of putting this would be to ask whether many bishops carry a ‘gene’ that tends to put loyalty to the institution first. The general public is likely to notice if it is shown that bishops and authority figures in the Church have behaved less than honourably in order to preserve a status-quo of privilege and power. That is evidently how the Catholic Church has behaved and clearly it has rebounded badly on them. The charge that the institution and its reputation has been placed above of the needs and rights of suffering individuals is a serious one. A similar crisis is overtaking overseas charities and we see what has happened to their standing in a very short space of time. Almost overnight they have slipped badly in the public’s estimation. Until a few days ago they were the honourable providers of food and medical care to the world’s poor. Today in many eyes they have become exploitative post-colonialists who prey on the vulnerable women and children they are supposed to be helping. Gilo and others have done much to warn the church of the way that its reputation will be severely affected if they adopt the damage limitation policy that appears to be the advice coming from insurers. The Church has a great deal of work to do to show that it is genuinely on the side of justice, truth and love.

As we noted in the comment by the Bishop of Bath and Wells, things are going to be extremely difficult for the Church of England in the near future. Institutional attitudes that have been taken for granted for decades are going to examined and criticised by many people. The court of public opinion is unlikely to be impressed by what will be revealed. What might come out of this situation which is positive? My hope is that the bishops as well as the wider Church may learn something new about power. I am hoping that the power and influence that the Church still exercises will be seen to be able to respond far better to vulnerability than in the past. I am here not just thinking of survivors but every manifestation of wounded humanity. I look for a power in the Church that that can respond to brokenness in all its forms. Every Christian is somewhere on a journey from weakness to strength. Sometimes the weakness is connected with pain, grief or suffering. At other times the journey is from sin to forgiveness. Every minister should be alongside Christian followers on these journeys. The Church is or should be a place of healing. Everything the Church does should be about wholeness and its implementation in some form. Were that vision to be alive in every congregation, then every citizen looking in from the outside would be able to see, not scandal, introversion and privilege but service and support for all. We would be able to recapture William Temple’s vision of the Church as organised primarily for those who are not its members. Also, we would be closer to rediscovering what Jesus meant when he said ‘I am among you as your servant’. ‘Whoever would be the greatest among you must be the servant of all.’

Sally continues her story from the point where realised that something was amiss at her church.
We might describe the main aspects of the spiritual abuse recorded as having two parts. In the first place there is the hounding of a mentally fragile individual. This is followed up by the utterly inhuman sanction of disfellowshipping or ostracism.

It was around this time that I noticed that a friend, H, to whom I was close, wasn’t coming to the various SCC meetings. I enquired of the leaders about her and was told she was in rebellion and had left the church. Several members, always glancing over their shoulders to make sure no-one else was listening, then told me, sotto voce, that H had merely questioned some of the teachings and practices of the church, and for that, she had been severely and harshly disciplined.

I wanted to see H, so I called at her home. She wasn’t there; imagine my shock when her next-door neighbour, who had seen me standing on H’s doorstep, called over the fence to tell me that H was in the local psychiatric clinic, and what was more, she’d been sectioned there. “She was acting very strangely; she was suffering from delusions of persecution,” H’s neighbour told me.

I went to the psychiatric clinic, where I found poor H in a dreadful state. However, she was lucid, and when she saw me, burst into tears.

The staff, thinking I’d upset her, asked me to leave, but H told them she wanted me to stay. “I’m upset because of what’s happened to me,” she told them, “not because of Sally.” We went outside into the quiet wooded grounds to talk, and then the whole horrifying tale came pouring out.

H had become concerned about the interference of SCC in every area of her life. She raised this with her shepherd; H’s shepherd then went to her shepherd, and that shepherd went to CT, the Pastor’s wife. Subsequently, all three came and confronted H in her home. (H deliberately used the word “confronted”; she didn’t say they met with her).

They told H that they were merely concerned for her spiritual well-being and wanted to make sure she did not make any wrong decisions or choices. H told them that she was not allowed to make decisions and choices without consulting them. “You make my decisions and choices for me!” she told them, “I can’t make my own anymore!”

“We know what’s best for you,” they told her.

When H questioned this, she was told she was in rebellion. However, she stood her ground. The leaders told her they were very unhappy with her attitude and were going to pray she would be brought to repentance. They then left.

Shortly after this, H was summoned – word deliberately used – to a meeting convened by K and CT. When she arrived, she found not only K and CT, but also her shepherd, her shepherd’s shepherd, and other leaders waiting for her. They were all sitting in a line of chairs with an empty chair facing them on which H, on entering the room, was told to sit.

KT took the lead and told H they were very unhappy with her attitude. He went on to say that they were only concerned for her well-being, and that included making the right choices and decisions. H was then asked if she had anything she wanted to say.

H told them that surely these choices were for her to make, and not for the leadership of SCC. CT told her that they advised her of her choices because they knew what was best for her. H questioned this. Big mistake!

“Are you not prepared to listen to us and to do as we suggest?” she was asked.

“I don’t think I can anymore,” she told them. “My life’s no longer my own.”

K and CT then told her she was in rebellion, and that unless she repented and agreed to be put under discipline, she would have to leave the church.

“But I’ve done nothing wrong!” she told them.

“You’re rebelling against God!” she was told. “You’re rebelling against His established orders, and His leaders!”

H told them she did not agree. She was told to leave the church; she had been disfellowshipped.

In by now a thoroughly wretched state, H got up from her chair and stumbled out of the room, tears blinding her eyes. Not an ounce of compassion was shown her. As she shut the door behind her, the words “You’re in rebellion!” were ringing in her ears.

She was completely and utterly beside herself, cast adrift without an anchor. Where could she turn? She did not feel she could go back to the church she had left, nor could she return to her friends, because she. like me, had turned her back on them and cut them out of her life. In any case, she struggled to believe that her church was a true church anyway, as she believed what she had been told by SCC, that they had been brought into being to fulfill God’s true purposes; more traditional churches had not “caught the vision”, and so could play no part.

H began to question her very existence, and to believe she had lost her salvation and was destined for hell. She became more and more confused, bewildered, desperate and distressed, and was finding it more and more difficult to function.

After having a psychiatric examination and evaluation, H was sectioned for a month.

After having heard H’s horrifying tale, I told her that while I did not doubt what she said, I could not believe that SCC members would follow her, as when one was disfellowshipped one was treated as if one was dead, and completely cut off and ignored. I was putting into words what we all knew, but hardly dare admit. H nodded in agreement. We clung to one another and wept.

At the next meeting of SCC I attended, I couldn’t get H out of my mind. I decided I must speak to F, my shepherd, about her. Having done so, F told me it wasn’t my business, and why was I visiting H anyway? She had been disfellowshipped!

My answer to F to both of her questions was that H was a friend, and therefore it was my business. “She’s in a dreadful state!” I told F.

Shortly after that, I received my own summons.

I walked into the room, and the same scenario that had confronted H now confronted me. There was the same line of chairs, with one facing them for me to sit on. In the line of chairs sat F, my shepherd, her shepherd, C and KT, and other leaders.

They came straight to the point. I was told I was in rebellion, and that they had been observing my rebellious attitude and ways for some time. They demanded I repent and be put under discipline.

I told them that I had not done anything wrong, and that I therefore did not need to repent. This made them very angry, and, they told me, proved their point. I was in rebellion.

Again, they demanded I repent. I refused.

“You are no longer a member of this church!” KT told me. “You’re disfellowshipped! Go!”

I did so, shutting the door behind me.

Sometime after this, I went to the city centre with T, my unsaved friend from school. T and I were walking down the road opposite the cathedral when I saw A, a close friend from SCC, walking towards us. He hadn’t seen me. Breaking away from T, I ran towards him, calling his name. A looked up and saw me. The next thing I knew, he had ran across the road, bringing the traffic screeching to a halt as drivers slammed on their brakes to avoid him. They shouted and swore; taking advantage while the traffic was at a standstill, I flew across the road in pursuit of him. I soon caught him up, because, no disrespect intended, he was rather rotund and not very fast on his feet. Barring his way, I stood in front of him.

“A,” I said. “Why are you ignoring me? What have I done?”

“You’re dead to me!” A retorted. “Dead! I don’t want anything to do with you! Go away!” Turning on his heel, he walked off.

T, having witnessed this whole incident, came over to me. “We’re going home!” she told me, and leading me back across the road, we got on a bus.

Arriving at T’s home, she sat me down in her cosy living kitchen and made tea. Just as she was pouring it out, L, T’s much older half-brother came in. After having poured him a mug of tea, T told L what had happened. L was incensed.

“And they call themselves Christians!” he declared angrily. “That’s not a church; it’s a cult!”

Further sections of Sally’s story will be shared at a later date.