When I began my interest in the world of cultic studies some twelve years ago, I had all the misconceptions about cults that most people in our society possess.  The main failure of understanding on the part of ordinary people, when looking at cults, is the difficulty of appreciating how deeply these harmful groups may have burrowed inside their acolytes, emotionally, spiritually and intellectually.   The task of escaping from a cult ideology or world view is, in fact, very hard.  Surely, we naively think, exiting a cultic group is just a matter of sitting down with a well-informed and sensible person and having the errors of our thinking pointed out in a conversation of an hour or two.  The reality is of course very different.  Most cultic groups are skilled in the task of taking the identity of an ordinary person and utterly transforming it.  The individual member has effectively become, in a negative sense, a new person.  Although the idea of becoming a new person has biblical echoes, the cultic version has little to do with anything set out in the New Testament. The cultic new person possesses a created identity which imitates the model designed by an exploitative leader.  Such a leader is typically motivated with a malign desire to exercise power.  The cultic identity of the acolyte is one ripe for exploitation, financially, sexually or emotionally.

The field of cultic studies is not without its contested areas and arenas of deep division.  One group of academics study and describe what we have outlined above – the profound personality changes wrought by various controlling groups.  Another group of academics want to sit lightly on the idea that belonging to a religious or political group can ever be of lasting significance to the individual concerned.  They seem unwilling to consider seriously the risk of massive harm that exists in such groups.  They also seem not to have noticed the hollowed-out identities that belong to many of these dedicated cult members.  The assumption of our legal system is also, not unreasonably, that any political or religious decision made by an adult has to be respected.  Moral choice is assumed to belong to everyone and a functioning conscience and intellect exists for all unless compromised by mental incapacity,  Everybody can make the choice to surrender property and self-determination to a small coercive group.   That is a sacred right even if, in the process, it takes that individual to a place of extreme harm.

During my time as a member of the International Cultic Studies Association (ICSA) I have got to know a distinguished British therapist, Dr Gillie Jenkinson, who is active in the field of helping cult survivors.  She has recently published a book Walking Free from the Trauma of Coercive, Cultic and Spiritual Abuse.  It is a workbook for individuals who are seeking to recover from cult membership and any abuse encountered through such an involvement.  My motive for buying the book was not personally to undo the effect of a malign group, but to understand better the way cults are understood by therapists who take the whole topic seriously.  Gillie’s approach to the impact of cults can be summed up in the expression, the pseudo-identity. This is the identity given to the acolyte by the cult and it overlays the core identity with which one was born.  The traditional way of speaking about cults was to describe some kind of indoctrination as is implied by the word brainwashing.  The new model is to conceive of an identity which is being built up layer by layer with emotional and intellectual material from a cult leader.  This way of describing the process is to think of an onion.  At the heart of each individual is a core identity which pre-exists cult membership.  Over time, the membership of a cult has built up an accretion of layers like an onion, to cover and bury that original authentic identity or self.  What is presented to the outside world and internally experienced is the cult self, or cult identity.  This notion of a cult member having a core/authentic identity overlaid by one created by a group leader for the members, seems to be a illuminating way of speaking. It is also the one that it has largely superseded the old brainwashing language of the past.

Gillie’s book shows us clearly the way that this model is helpful for thinking about and mentally grasping the complex phenomenon of cult membership.  The book Walking Free, is to a considerable extent a description of these onion layers and the way each has to be in turn stripped away in order to reach the core pre-cult identity.  Here is found freedom and the ability to choose and make decisions for oneself.  I have not yet finished the book, but I want to speak about two of the onion layers of cult membership which must be dealt with along the journey of recovery.  I choose them in part because we may see, in considering them, how it is not just hard-core Scientologists or Moonies who have external things wrapped round and obstructing the authentic identity.  These restricting layers may be encountered in places where so-called ‘orthodox’ church life is practised in Britain today.

One of the sure signs of an unhealthy political or religious group is the way that doubt is handled.  We find that a coercive group will typically refuse to allow members to question leaders or challenge their decrees or their teaching.  Members of closed groups are, at the same time, restrained by the need to remain in good standing with this leadership.  A rebellious confrontation risks expulsion.  When such action is taken against a member, that individual may believe that his/her assurance of salvation is instantly taken away.  The dynamic of cultic groups is well versed in such tactics of inducing fear.  Needless to say, when ordinary questioning is supressed, the human intellect can hardly be described as functioning well. Can it ever be described as healthy to encourage the notion that there is only a single answer to a problem?  We have spoken about the limitations of binary thinking before.  Whenever doubt is discouraged in any area of human thought, we find what we can only describe as a vacuity in the human soul.

Gillie describes in detail how other facets of the cultic identity have to be dismantled one by one in the journey to release the authentic version long buried by cult membership.   Some, like doubt, are to do with the thinking intellectual side of the individual and others are to do with emotional and personal functioning.  One fascinating notion, which introduces for me a brand-new word, is contained in the section where Gillie speaks about ‘confluence’.  Confluence is a word to describe the way that we all have the capacity to flow or merge into other people and they into us.  This of course is appropriate when we speak of mother and child, but it is less welcome when a similar process happens as part of the functioning of a coercive group.  Too much confluence can involve the partial or complete dissolution of the individual human personality.   Although Christian love might seem to some to require a partial merging into another person, any excessive loss of boundaries or personal space would appear to be too high a price to pay.  Even the marriage partnership does not demand we relinquish our separateness in the name of unity.   From the outside it is not difficult to see that confluence in a cultic setting is potentially toxic, benefitting only those who have power and control over the group.

Forbidding doubt and encouraging confluence and fuzzy edges in a cultic context are just a sample of the onion layers described in Gillie’s book which have to be peeled away in the journey towards wholeness.   Gillie’s other metaphor is to describe the journey to wholeness as a pilgrimage with a heavy bag. Cultic membership may have required the acquisition of ideologies and burdensome ideas which have be let go as we seek to make our way through life.  To assist this process of unpacking and abandoning the things that are not required for the task of abundant living, the book introduces us to some valuable and up-to-date psychological insights.  These help us to understand how human beings can learn to function better and thus to find healing and true human flourishing in a world beyond coercion and control.

Walking Free is not overtly a Christian book. But, as the author spent twenty-five years in a Christian cult, she does understand and describe implicitly how the Church itself can become involved in cultic dynamics. My final comment is to hope that this wise book will reach the hands of many Christian leaders, especially those who minister to those fleeing from abusive and coercive situations.  We need such a clear guide to protect us from the ravages of cultic dynamics that seem in some places even to plague our churches.

by Martin Sewell & Richard Scorer

This week, the Lucy Letby case has brutally exposed the lack of regulation and accountability of NHS managers (link to Lucy Letby: NHS managers must be held to account, doctor says – BBC News). Whereas clinicians are subject to professional scrutiny and accountability by independent regulators, NHS managers are not, even when (as in the Letby case) they may have prioritised the reputation of a hospital over patient safety.  This is a feature they share with those in leadership and managerial roles in religious organisations. Both NHS managers and Bishops are amongst the dwindling band of professionals still not subject to independent regulation. This urgently needs to change, and as far as religious bodies are concerned, Professor Jay’s taskforce on independent regulation of safeguarding in the Church of England has an opportunity to set this change in motion.    

A brief recap of where we are. In response to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA), the Archbishops Council of the Church of England set up what purported to be an “Independent Safeguarding Board” (ISB) to provide independent oversight of CofE safeguarding. In June its two remaining members, Steve Reeves and Jasvinder Sanghera, were summarily dismissed. Meg Munn, whom the Archbishops Council had tried to impose as chair, also resigned. The ISB project in its existing form thereby effectively collapsed.   

There are some in the CofE safeguarding who seem relatively relaxed about this. Colin Perkins, a leading figure in CofE safeguarding whose work in Chichester one of us commended at IICSA, tweeted in response to the ISB fiasco that “there is some crisis in the centre, yes, but please don’t confuse what happens there with what happens on the ground, where, on the whole, good people quietly get on with it and do a very good job”.  Our experience is that safeguarding responses across the Church of England vary: there are some good people and responses, but some poor ones too, and far too much staff churn.  But events in Soul Survivor, where it seems likely that safeguarding concerns were deliberately brushed under the carpet for years, even as the CofE was telling IICSA that everything had changed, should strike down any complacency. If a cover up can still happen during IICSA, how effective is the CofE’s safeguarding system in reality?

Professor Alexis Jay, the former chair of IICSA, has now been effectively tasked with completing what was designated as “ Phase Two” of the old ISB, by which we mean the conceptualization of “shape” of the replacement iteration of the body to oversee the Safeguarding of the CofE. That work seems to have stopped with the suspension of the first Chair Maggie Atkinson; bluntly, it was the responsibility of the Archbishops’ Council to fill that gap and they signally failed to do so; worse still, the Council sought to frame the independent ISB members, gaming them for that stalling when they were never tasked with that remit.

No member of the Council has taken the honorable path of resignation over this or the lack of any proper planning for survivors in terms of securing data protection, pastoral support, suitable future advocacy recommendation, or delivering on the only completed review to date – that of Peter Spindler in the case of Survivor Mr X.  

At the point at which “Phase Two” stalled, there had been a winnowing of options which were presented to Synod members for feedback. The options were fourfold: a regulator, an Ombudsman an “ACAS” or a hybrid.  Realistically, it should take less than four and a half minutes to see that the idea of the Regulator is “the only show in town”.

The ISB as created by the Secretariat and endorsed by the Archbishops’ Council was a largely secret hybrid in that it was both named and sold as “independent” but it was never intended to function independently. As Steve Reeves told Synod, when the Church says “ independent” it means “semi-detached”. It was closed down as soon as it demonstrated worrying signs of non-compliance. When it attempted to advocate the safeguarding of its only review subject Mr X, by following the recommendations of the Spindler Report, the ISB members were ignored and ultimately sacked.

Add to this toxic history the way in which the original attempts at  examination of the ISB project was cynically shut down by a shabby procedural motion at Synod to move “next business”, and readers will understand that trusting the Church of England again with devising a novel structure would be like trusting teenagers with the whiskey and the car keys the day after they have written off the Volvo.

That issue of trust effectively removes the other two options from the table. Both Ombudsman and ACAS models are predicated upon that one simple and necessary commodity. If you are going to sit down with another party within either structure, there has to be a presumption of mutual respect and good faith, and there has to be an agreed sense of direction of travel. This has no chance of existing in the current circumstances. None of the Church leadership is trusted by the survivor community or their supporters. The responsibility for this tragic state of affairs is so obvious that you have to be a member of Archbishops’ Council or the Secretariat to even consider contesting it.

Like the failed managers of the NHS trusts, the buck stops plainly with the CofE leadership;  although it has constructed a confusing historical structure so that Archbishops Diocesan Bishops. Secretary General, Lead Bishops for Safeguarding, NST Directors and Archbishops Council Members all claim “plausible deniablity”, surely no secular investigator such as Prof Jay need spend too much time excluding these two options.

The CofE has had too many chances to rectify the situation and IICSA was its last chance saloon. Worse, it has consistently shown that it is not even willing to afford its supposedly legislative/ oversight body, The General Synod, time to comprehensively consider and debate these complex matters. A recent 75 page proposal drawn before all these latest crises arose to complicate matters was debated at York. The “debate” was afforded only 10 minutes of time with speech limits of 2 mins. This is what passes for scrutiny in the Church of England.

Of course the House of Bishops had separately considered it so all was well from their point of view, and therein lies another can of worms. As things stand, secular activity such as safeguarding is having to be recast within the mindset of medieval Ecclesiastical Law. The role and authority of the Prince Bishop within his/her Diocese is not to be interfered with. Secular Safeguarding law and culture has no problem with Human Rights Act compliance, there is a strong move towards greater transparency in explaining decision making, Freedom of Information principles and data protection  laws are upheld, there is a culture of collaborative problem solving and most important of all, secular lawyers know what a conflict of interest looks like, they are required to have clear and transparent policies and are held accountable for failure. Bishops are not.

The only credible option left on the table is that of Regulator.  Everyone knows what a regulator is; we trust them in many areas of life especially within the professions. A Regulator is not there to make the rules but to impartially administer and enforce them. Their bona fides and competence is overseen by a Trustee Board and it is important that the Solicitors Regulation Authority, the Bar Standards Board, the General Medical Council and the Nursing & Midwifery Council, all have majority lay Trustees overseeing the development and enforcement of professional standards.

The first question for Prof Jay to ask the CofE is surely this. “What precisely is the reason for the Church of England resisting the establishing of an independent Regulator overseen by competent and professional Trustees in the area of safeguarding?” 

We doubt any resistance will long withstand scrutiny by Parliament which may become necessary given the inadequacies of Synodical processes which are controlled by the forces of conservatism both within House of Bishops and Secretariat alike.

The Regulator would need to liaise with the Church to ensure that its decisions will be directly enforced via the Clergy Discipline measure. A substantial breach of Episcopal or Clergy Standards would need to be actionable by the Regulator as of right and provision duly made within the new Clergy Disciplinary Measure currently being drafted. This will of course offend and upset some sectors of the Church not least those who have been missing in action whilst Bishops have covered up abuse on multiple occasions. There may be a small amount of room for negotiation. It may be that just as the constitutional monarch formally assents to legislation, so a similar nod to Episcopal amour propre could be permitted – but only if there is wholesale surrender of power.

It is not actually much of an ask. No Diocesan Bishop wanted the job of lead Bishop for Safeguarding. None has shown much aptitude or inclination for the task. The newly appointed incumbent has declared a heart for the work but with appropriate modesty acknowledged she has no background. It will take three years to get up to speed by which time she will, on past form, be burnt out and moved on. It is time to stop this absurd merry go round of serial incompetence and appoint a proper Regulator for the CofE with proper skills and resources to do the job properly.

So this is what Jay needs to do: recommend a truly independent Regulator, and recommend that parliament intervenes to create it. And that in respect of safeguarding at least, the CofE becomes subject to the Human Rights Act, freedom of information laws and the Nolan principles– the mechanisms which underpin accountability and transparency in other public bodies, The authors of this article disagree on whether we should have an established church, but as long as we have one, so far as safeguarding is concerned the Church of England surely cannot continue to evade the legal protections which govern the rest of the public sector. The Archbishop of Canterbury, so keen to criticize human rights violations elsewhere, must surely agree that the church ought to be subject to codified human rights standards too?     

Although the above relates directly to the CofE, there is, of course no reason why the costs and activity of such a Regulator should not be spread beyond the CofE. A successful piloting of the scheme could in due course be applied to other Churches and faiths. It is not the task of the Regulator to do other than ensure that the vulnerable are kept safe and that people can gather in worship contexts confident that any issues of concerns will be addressed with professionalism, competence and impartiality. 

The Office of the Faith Safeguarding Regulator is surely something all people of goodwill can surely welcome.

Richard Scorer is Head of Abuse Law and Public Inquiries at Slater & Gordon Lawyers. Martin Sewell is a retired child protection lawyer and General Synod member

I think I was twelve or thirteen when another boy countered what I thought to be a factual statement I had made with the riposte – it is a matter of opinion.  I was faced at that moment with the notion that what I believed to be a true fact could be understood in more than one way.  Truth and falsehood were thus not always the neat categories I had always thought they were.  As life went on, I discovered that debate might be a good way of moving towards what is true and bringing clarity to whatever was being talked about.  But even lengthy discussions did not always uncover an authoritative truth which all could agree on.  Inside one’s own head they were beliefs and personal opinions, but I understood that other people could hold very different notions, even when using the same words. Thinking and feeling alike, to paraphrase Philippians 2.2, was never a simple straightforward matter.  Finding out what one really believes and thinks in areas like religion and politics is, for most of us, a work in progress   Thanks to the slippery, even provisional nature of language, many of us are somewhat reticent in the way we communicate our deeper beliefs and convictions.

As small children, most of us were alert to the expressed opinions of parents and respected teachers.  The opinions that were expressed on the things we could understand, had enormous influence on us as we negotiated our way to learn about the world in all its complexity.  Eventually we had to decide for ourselves which ideas and convictions truly belonged to us and were not just the pale reflection of a parental opinion.  The teenage years are a traditional time of questioning and creating personal value systems.   For those of us who attended university, there was an additional allocated space for questioning life and discovering personal identity and conviction.  The majority embrace these new arenas of thinking and working things out with excitement and relish.  Others shrink from the pain which comes as the result of having the safe patterns of childhood thinking undermined.  Some find their way into membership of ideologies or groups where thinking and coming to an opinion is done for them by a figure with charismatic authority.   I am always struck how cultic groups have much appeal for those confused and disoriented by the difficult task of growing up.

 For Christians and others involved in a spiritual quest, the task of finding a place of spiritual and intellectual coherence is an issue always being worked upon.  If we have, in fact, a position of faith able to be put into words, it is likely to be a combination of what we have experienced, what we have been taught and the use of our reasoning and linguistic abilities.  However enthusiastic we are for speaking about this personal spiritual journey, we are probably aware of limitations in what we say and how we communicate it.  One limitation is the fact that language, as we have suggested, is a slippery construct.  What I mean when I use a particular word is not necessarily how another person hears and understands it. This flakiness of everyday language, if we may describe it as such, results in some Christians taking refuge in the belief that the words and text of the Bible have a supreme privileged status.  A quote from the Bible is thought to be a clinching argument against which there can be no counterstatement. This propositional way of understanding Scripture is one I personally find hard to deal with.  This approach side-steps so many difficult issues in discovering the best way of understanding Scripture, that I avoid this kind of discussion.  The Jehovah’s Witness on the doorstep or the fundamentalist preacher expects me to agree with their approach and their dogmatic understanding of the text.  When I do not, there is little purpose in debate or even attempts at communication on the issue.  Consensus or anything resembling agreement is a long way away.

The parading of texts of Scripture in our current debates about sexuality and the place of women in the church seems to be, from my perspective, an unrewarding, even futile task.  There is a chasm which exists between those who argue with a defensive use of bible quotes against others who seek to apply other insights from human thinking and reflection over the centuries. The issue is not primarily about one side being right and the other wrong.  It is that the starting places of the two sides makes logical coherent debate impossible.  Any attempt, for example, to pit a believer against a non-believer in the ‘young earth’ theory is clearly an unhelpful exercise. To have any kind of debate on a topic, there have to be a number of agreed ground rules.  Both sides have to be ‘singing from the same hymn sheet’ as the expression goes. In many contemporary debates this is not the case.  The classic notion of debate, typified by those which take place at the Oxford Union, has as its aim the presentation of arguments that can change minds and beliefs.  In church debates we often seem to encounter the parties concerned behaving like two deaf individuals shouting at one another.  The supporters of the complementarian point of view cannot really expect to change minds by endlessly repeating the same overworked texts from Paul’s epistles.  As a student of the Bible, I found, for example, the scholarly hypotheses about the structure of the book of Genesis to be far more convincing than a theory of a single author.  I have no intention of expending energy arguing for the existence of these source documents, respectively known as J, E and P.  For me, the settled convictions of much biblical scholarship, the non-Pauline authorship of the so-called Pastoral Epistles and the primacy of Mark’s gospel make sense and have stood the test of time.  There will of course be refinements and revisions to such theories, but the fundamental claims have held sway for a long time.  No attempt by conservative evangelical Christians to persuade me or one of my college contemporaries, to turn our backs on the broad outlines of these positions, is likely to succeed. 

In our crazy contemporary world of political and religious differences, we sometimes arrive a place where it is clear to see that two opposing positions are never going to be reconciled.  No amount of discussion is going to make chalk into cheese or a lie into truth.  If one party in a dispute persists on maintaining a totally implausible theory, (as in Trump-world), then the other side may choose simply to withdraw from the field.  This is not because they have been defeated, though it may look like that.  It is because the truth speaker recognises the futility of pretending that the dispute merits the description of being called a debate.  A proper debate is, to repeat, an honourable and worthwhile activity and it has the possible outcome of changing minds.  In contrast, the endless repetition of propaganda or ideology does not deserve such a description. 

There is one interesting current example of what seem to be two opposing opinions or minds being unable to meet.  This is in the sanctioning of Lord Sentamu by the Bishop of Newcastle, Dr Helen-Ann Hartley.  The removal of the PTO from a former Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, has been applauded by many as an example of firm management.  While my strong sympathies and support are with Bishop Hartley in this case, the question of who is right and who wrong, is not the most striking feature of this event.  What is important is to note to the way that Bishop Hartley, in issuing this sanction, clearly saw that the time for dialogue or debate was over.  The strongly held beliefs about a past safeguarding case held by Sentamu had to be overruled and declared to be completely out of order.  A peer of the realm and, for a couple of decades, a bishop of the Church of England was being told decisively by another bishop, you are wrong, and I cannot allow this discussion to continue.

 The sanctioning of a senior retired archbishop and a member of the House of Lords sends a chill through the entire Church.  We fear for the institution, not because the decision was wrong, but because the clash of such opposing irreconcilable positions should never theoretically have been allowed to happen in public.  Our belief in leadership always depends on our trust that those in charge will always make the correct decisions.  Even if we do not agree with them, we trust that senior figures in the Church (like Lord Sentamu) will have the experience and the advisors to protect them from serious errors of judgement.  If they do make mistakes, we trust that these mistakes are never serious in nature.  If a senior church figure is declared officially to have made a serious mistaken judgement, something in the structure of the institution is weakened.  We desperately want our leaders, political and religious, to make sound decisions and for those decisions to stand the test of time.  In this case that assumption no longer holds.  For the rest of us it is disturbing and deeply uncomfortable to witness the failure of debate together with non-communication among our leaders.

Non-communication and a complete failure to agree, has always been a feature of political life. We may always have wanted to believe that Christians were somehow always eventually able to reconcile their differences and come to a common mind.  The situation of General Synod at its recent session is perhaps demonstrating to us that there are situations where two or more parties in a dispute can never agree, because objectively their arguments and perspectives are rooted in places where communication does not take place.  American politics has given us another dramatic example of human non-communication.  The gulf that has opened up between the parties can no longer be resolved by an appeal to truth.  For some reason, which is deeper than psychology, personality or education, individuals take a stand on issues which are, to the opposing party, incomprehensible. Understanding the inner workings of a MAGA mind, or a believer in the young earth theory, involves penetrating a level of irrationality which is impossible to do without some risk to our own sanity.  Some current differences in the Church also are going way beyond the apparent rules of useful debate.  The two positions are starting from such different places that we cannot reasonably even speak about ‘gracious disagreement’.  Some discussion about this current crisis of non-communication is urgently needed.  Admitting that we sometimes start from places at total variance to another may be necessary.  Only then can a process be set up to explore where the bonds of a common humanity can perhaps be rediscovered.  Human communication in some situations is something that needs to be learnt all over again.

Dear Professor Jay,

No doubt you will have received many representations from different people who are concerned about the safeguarding crisis in the Church of England.  You will have heard from survivors and victims as well as safeguarding professionals at various levels.  Some will have experience from outside the Church, while others will have observed the safeguarding system from within the institution.  The Church, or more precisely the Archbishops’ Council and the Lead Bishop, have chosen you to look at the confusion that at present exists in the system and try to make some sense of the tangled threads of safeguarding.  Clearly you face a herculean task. You also realise that whatever recommendations you make will not satisfy everyone.

I am writing to you neither as a survivor nor as an expert.  My only claim for having something useful to say is that I have been reflecting on the problem of institutional power in the Church for some thirty years.   Before that I was, as a child, a direct witness to the power politics being played out in the precincts at Canterbury Cathedral in the 1950s.  Churches and parishes, in my experience, have always been somewhat dangerous places.  Sexual violence is only one of the potential hazards that lurks within the institution of the Church.  Far more common are simple everyday power games that can cause so much misery and unhappiness to those who are the targets.  They suffer because of individuals whose personalities make them natural bullies and control freaks.  Such personalities are, sadly, frequently encountered in the Church.

My blog Surviving Church has, for almost ten years, been reflecting on this issue of inappropriate use of power in the Church.  The comments of those who read these reflections have enriched what I have had to offer based on my experience and reading over several decades.  What follows in this open letter is not offered as advice or suggestions.  It is, rather, a series of observations on your difficult task.  These are rooted in my considerable experience of living within and working for the Church of England.  Like you I have listened to the group we refer to as survivors.  We both know how the personalities of vulnerable people subject to bullying or violent acts are damaged, sometimes very seriously.  For some in this group the damage is permanent and they are true victims, worthy of our deepest compassion and our tears.

The context of your appointment is the dissolution of the Independent Safeguarding Board, a church initiative which existed for only a couple of years. It does not take an expert to recognise that the sinews of support that have been created at a personal level between survivors and members of the Board are precious as well as delicate.  The task of bringing appropriate healing to individuals who suffer from trauma is different for every case.  There appears to be ample evidence that Jasvinder and Steve have been contributing to the slow building up of personal trust between some survivors and potential sources of help.   Survivors were beginning to feel that the Church that had often let them down was maybe allowing (and paying for) a process that might eventually allow them stand on their own feet.

Disbanding the ISB in such a sudden and brutal way has been an act of violence with, potentially, terrifying consequences.   The two images that come to mind are both medical in flavour.  The first one is a plaster covering a large unhealed wound.  For some reason the doctor in charge decides to rip off the plaster early.  This interrupts the healing process and makes the wound liable to become re-infected.  The second image is an intensive care ward in a hospital.  Here are several patients wired up to machines which keep them alive.  Closing the ISB was, for the survivors who were engaged with the Board, like having a plaster ripped off or having the electricity supplying life-support machines turned off suddenly and without notice.    One particular ‘patient’, Mr X, for whom the ISB had commissioned a report, is in imminent danger of financial ruin.  The Report, known as the Spindler Review https://houseofsurvivors.org/2023/03/28/isb-spindler-review/  recommended immediate practical support to protect him from financial disaster, especially as a financial institution is set to call in debt on Friday 28^th July.  His situation and the account of institutional harm caused to him have been known for a long time.  There is no excuse for this lapse of justice and failure in the restitution process.  It reveals a devastating institutional inertia on the part of the church authorities.

Mr X is one individual who is seeing that the hoped for institutional support is being swept away like a child’s sandcastle on a beach.  Many others, who had begun to feel bonds of trust being created by the two active members of the now dissolved ISB, had dared to hope.  Hope for something better after the experiences of devastating abuse at the hands of institutions or individuals involved with the Church is something fragile and precious. It is this collapse of hope that represents the true cost to the abused in the Church of England.  Few if any of the victims/survivors would put cash at the top of their list of needs in the aftermath of their original abuse event.   It is the regaining of a sense of justice, the removal of deep shame and trauma that the survivors seek.  The sudden closing down of one avenue to receive these things has the potential to traumatise and set back the welfare of hundreds, even thousands, of survivors.

Much of what has happened in the Church over recent decades has led to a serious state of anxiety in many survivors.  It is best summed up in the single word trauma.  As someone who has attempted, in a very small way, to respond to the trauma of the survivors who contact me, I recognise how the care of even one traumatised individual can be a demanding undertaking.  One problem that has bedevilled the work of advocates, therapists and those who, like me, offer friendship to those who have met abuse, is that these survivors do not normally find in those who have authority in the church any trauma-informed response to their plight.  In other words, the response is seldom ‘how are you’ but rather a display of body language which is both defensive and embarrassed.   The preservation and protection of the church institution seems to be at the top of the agenda.  No doubt this stance is encouraged by lawyers and public relations experts who regard it as their task to protect the institution at all costs. 

 As an outsider in your relations with the Church of England, Professor Jay, you have one enormous advantage.  You are in a position to look carefully at what seems to be going wrong in the church’s safeguarding efforts without having the burdens of any institutional loyalty.  The wounded and traumatised army of survivors want you to help them to find truth, integrity and justice for their situation.  They have been let down, not only by the evil behaviour of individuals, but by widespread institutional failings.  With your help, they hope to see robust recommendations which will bring light and healing to dark places.  Sorting out safeguarding will commit the Church of England to enormous costs.   These costs are not just about finance.  They are also about getting used to a better way of doing things and creating new structures that will promote integrity and justice for the future. 

A final word.  One crucial failing in the Church that we, the observers and the critics of the institution, have noticed is the way power operates within its structures.  We hope you will come to your own conclusions on this vital issue and address it in your recommendations.  Many of us want to see damaging power networks challenged, so that the forces of transparency and democracy can flourish better.   You have an important contribution to make to the restoration of the Church’s weakened integrity.  Maybe also the long process of repairing the Church’s damaged reputation in the eyes of the nation by radical self-examination is something your words can promote and encourage. We sincerely hope that what you produce in your report will help our flawed, even failing, national Church.   Somehow, we all want it to return to its essential and urgent task of proclaiming the work of God and serving the nation.

Stephen Parsons, Greystoke, Cumbria.

 One of the interesting features of a recently published Lessons Learned Review about events at the parish of Tylers Green, in the Diocese of Oxford, is the frequent use of the expression ‘spiritual abuse’.  The authors of this review, Elaine and Patrick Hopkinson, use this term often in describing the malfeasance of the Reverend Michael Hall at St Margaret’s Church between 1981 and 2000. During that period this expression was not in common use as a shorthand for a range of harmful behaviours. perpetrated by some church leaders against members of their congregations. We could speculate as to why this term spiritual abuse has taken such a long time to emerge as a way of describing poor behaviour by the clergy.  One reason is that no one then wanted to admit that a man of the cloth (women were not incumbents until the last years of the century) would ever act malevolently.   It was also not an expression available to clerical victims to help them describe their pain. Those in oversight roles in the Oxford diocese seemed, for a variety of reasons, to be unable to check the tragic twenty-year period of harsh and harmful behaviour on the part of Mr Hall.  Another new concept used by the Review authors, one that finds its origin in domestic dysfunction, is the term coercion and control.  These words have gained a currency only at the beginning of the present century to describe non—violent controlling behaviour used against another.  The law of the land now recognises such behaviour as potentially criminal, especially in the context of abusive domestic relationships where the victim is typically female.  The language of coercive control allows the law to identify a situation where men (typically) may control and humiliate others without the use of physical force. It has taken society a long time to understand fully the nature of such things as threatening and coercive behaviour against a weaker party in a relationship.

Mr Hall’s offences and the descriptions of them that are made in this Review, attracted my attention for two key reasons.  First, the twenty-year period of Mr Hall’s time as an incumbent of the Church of England dovetail very closely to my own time as a Vicar in in two English dioceses.  In short, the parochial environment, especially the account of the interactions with figures in authority in the Church, are similar to what I knew at that time in other dioceses.   Bishops and Archdeacons in those days were fairly remote figures and the freehold system could effectively screen the hierarchy from involvement in ordinary parishes.  A short summary of the pattern of the bonding between the parishes and the centre would be to say that it was, at best, weak.  It would also have been possible for a Vicar to remain at arm’s length for long periods of time from any contact with fellow clergy, if he chose it that way.  I have thus some feel for the situation described in the Review about the way that bishops, archdeacons and other church overseeing authorities could be, during the twenty years of Hall’s incumbency, kept firmly out of the way.   The ill-tempered and forceful actions of a determined freehold incumbent, bent on exploiting his legal status, would be enough to terrify any bishop.  While the system of freehold worked fairly well for incumbents, it never worked well for bishops when faced with a Vicar known to be harming members of his flock.  Whatever we may think now of the operation of CDMs or its current proposed replacement, the situation in the 80s and 90s gave far too little power to the those in episcopal authority to check clerical malfeasance.

The second reason that the Tylers Green Review has attracted my attention picks up my interests on a more personal level.  Having written a book on Christian healing in the 80s, I was, in the 90s, invited to join a committee in London which had some supervisory powers for accrediting healing organisations.  To obtain this accreditation, these organisations had to be open to being visited and to be free from scandal and ethical lapses.    I was present when some truly dreadful abuses by individual healing organisations were discussed.  The saga of the Nine O’Clock Service in Sheffield was not in fact within our organisational remit, but I found that the committee work had sensitised me to have some insight as to what was going on at the church at Sheffield.  The link between sexual misbehaviour and religious leadership was at that time something quite hard for many to admit or understand.  From 1995 onwards I was beginning to explore why and how certain forms of spiritual practice could be a prelude to truly dreadful and harmful behaviour on the part of Christian leaders. 

I think it was in 1997 that my reading on abusive power and forms of exploitation within the Church was consolidated into a book proposal for Lion Publishers.  The commissioning editor did not find it easy to sell my text to his superiors when I eventually presented the manuscript at the end of 1999.  Nevertheless, the work, Ungodly Fear, was well received as an attempt to explore the way that power, spiritual and authoritarian, could be abused in church settings.  People knew that church abuse was taking place but there was then little help in understanding the psychological and theological context of what was going on.  In much of my book I was writing about spiritual abuse, but this expression had not then been formulated so it was not available to me to use.

After the book appeared in 2000, I began to read more widely to see in the psychological literature whether there were writings about power abuse, personal and institutional, that could be applied to the Church.  To summarise, in my reading on the topic over several years, I stumbled on the notion of narcissism.  There I saw clearly that the so-called narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) was something that well described the self-inflation evident in many Christian and cultic leaders involved in abuse.  I pursued this idea at my first presentation to the International Cultic Studies Association at their conference at Trieste in 2011.  Being then a new boy in this organisation, I was surprised to discover that it was considered a novel idea.  Since then, the notion has become commonplace and reading the Tylers Green Review, it can be offered as revealing a further interpretation of the dysfunction apparent in the extraordinarily harmful behaviour of Michael Hall.

I am well aware of the warnings in the psychoanalytic literature against applying the diagnosis of NPD to someone who is not accessible to detailed examination.  My use of the narcissism label is not in any way offered as a professional diagnosis for Michael Hall.  Nevertheless, using the idea of narcissism we are helped to have a coherent pattern of understanding allowing us to see many of the salient aspects of Hall’s personality described in the Review as a coherent whole.   The phenomena of extreme anger, litigious and threatening behaviour and apparent indifference to the pain and suffering of others, are all part of the typical NPD profile.  The word narcissism is also now frequently used to describe an insatiable appetite for power and importance.  I would maintain that whether or not we claim the diagnosis of a full personality disorder for Hall, the categories attached to the ideas of narcissism are appropriately applied as a description of his behaviour. 

So far, we have seen how the reviewers of 2023 have had the categories of coercive control and spiritual abuse at their disposal and have made good use of them.  Thankfully the use of term spiritual abuse has passed into general use in spite of the defensive paper put out by the Evangelical Alliance in 2018, saying that it was an unnecessary expression.   No doubt they may have felt that ‘conversion-therapy’ and hellfire preaching from some of their members could be regarded as spiritually abusive.  Some of us do indeed believe that certain strands of preaching are designed to foment terror in their hearers.  When fear, reinforced by aggressive preaching dominates an institution for twenty years, as at Tylers Green, is it any wonder that the observer might describe this as spiritual abuse?

The reviewers of 2023 have been allowed to think in the categories of the current age when looking at the past behaviour of Michael Hall in the events that took place 20 to 40 years ago.   The expression, spiritual abuse and the ideas around coercion and control, have greatly assisted their task.  To these two expressions, I have added a third, narcissism and the various ideas that are associated with the word.  The cultic world has already widely adopted into its discourse concepts like ‘toxic narcissism’ to describe the damaging behaviour of individuals like Donald Trump and Michael Hall who seem incapable of acting in a truly altruistic way.  Perhaps we should face up to the terrifying thought that there are, among our existing leaders, a number who are afflicted in this way.  For reasons deep in their psychological make-up, some Christian leaders are incapable of acting in a way that builds up another.  Unless such leaders are named and inhibited, they will have the power to create the same appalling damage as was created in a parish in the Oxford diocese 20 -40 years ago.  One thing has changed in the intervening time, and we should use it to good effect.   This is our ability to articulate and describe better what may be going on inside the minds of individuals who lead us.  The battle to prevent another Michael Hall appearing is a serious struggle and will require enormous resources of psychological insight as well as wisdom of leadership and management. Even a small number of destructive leaders can wreak terrifying damage on an institution like the Church.  The task of neutralising the impact of toxic leaders as well as the individuals who use their power to abuse in other ways is urgent and should demand much of our energy and resources. 

By Caroline Newman

This article is sent in by a reader of the blog.  The author is of African Caribbean background. The article gives us a perspective on power dynamics and safeguarding issues in the Church that we have not hitherto encountered on this blog.  Caroline’s struggles with the ‘system’ in her battle over safeguarding will be familiar to many of my readers, but the added layer of reactionary racial attitudes gives her account a special power and topical relevance. All of us need to be sensitised to the voices of a community which historically has found it hard to make its voice heard. Caroline is thus helping all of us to think about power issues and church safeguarding in a new way.

I was born in the 1960s and my parents are of the Windrush generation. This article contains my experience of church and my opinion about ongoing matters in the diocese in which I live and worship.

 I have attended various churches throughout my life.  I started out in a Pentecostal church. Recently, I have been questioning why I go to church at all and if it is necessary.  Aren’t church people supposed to be better than the rest?  Aren’t “heathens” supposed to look up to us?  Aren’t we supposed to lead “non-Christians” to Jesus and ultimately to join us in church?

In 2012 I started attending a Church of England church in a diocese in the south of England.  The vicar was from Pakistan and of Asian descent.  Prior to his arrival the church had always had white male vicars.  Apparently this vicar was not the first choice of the members, who are mainly older and white.  Their first choice (white male) withdrew and the second choice, the Asian vicar was appointed.  Members of the church have told me he was “forced onto them” by the Bishop.

The Asian vicar told me that the members of the church “made my life hell”.  He told me that they refused to help him.  They were disruptive of his efforts at PCC meetings.  I wondered why his son, daughter and nephew were always up at the altar serving and generally helping him.  He told me that the members “don’t want to work with him or help him so he has to use whoever will help him”.  I told him “it didn’t look right” having all brown people on the altar and all the white people not on the altar but on the benches, those who still came.  Black and brown people were in the minority although that number grew while he was the incumbent.  Non-whites felt welcomed by him.

Members of the church told me “he has a funny accent”, “we can’t understand what he is saying”, he is “always late requesting assistance or in the planning of services”.  They said this is the reason why they won’t work with him.  Because he asked them too late and was “disorganised”.  The vicar stayed over 7 years at the parish after which he was promoted to Archdeacon in another area.  The vicar told me that he had implored the Diocese to introduce unconscious bias training but they had refused.  The vicar also told me that whenever he would report racism to the Bishop he was told to “hang in there”.  They took no action to provide training or to raise the issue of race discrimination with the members of the church or even with the Parochial Church Council. 

I should say that since we started attending the church, black women have tolerated various micro aggressions by the white members; questions and comments about our hair and clothes, wanting to touch our hair or just touching it without permission, being misnamed and mixed up with each other. Black members of the worship team were told they could not sing cultural songs as the members would not like it.  Their attire was scrutinised and criticised.  We were told “this is not a black church”.   I was even told that if I did not like it I should “go to Jesus House” (a majority black church).

Then came the pandemic and various “lockdowns”.  In May 2021 the PCC appointed a new vicar, a white male, with whom they were happy.  I was appointed a churchwarden in April 2021.

As soon as I started to get involved with the church I experienced race discrimination.  I also heard racist and sexist insults about other church employees (eastern Europeans) by the white English members.  I was most uncomfortable with the racism and sexism.  Initially I kept quiet.  Although I felt obliged to call out the casual racism towards others, at first I did not address the racism I personally experienced. Then in July 2021 my position became intolerable when I experienced direct racial discrimination by the other Churchwarden (a white woman).

I reported this to the new vicar, hoping that he would at least use his position to tackle the issue of racial discrimination and perhaps recommend training for the leadership team. Instead, he turned on me and took the side of the other churchwarden and decided that I had to be moved on.  Together they manufactured disciplinary situations and tried to force me out of the position because I had made accusations of discrimination. It was textbook victimisation.

I also had a report of a safeguarding concern.  I reported the race discrimination and safeguarding concerns to the bishops of the diocese and the chair of the PCC.  Their instincts were to make excuses for the vicar “he’s inexperienced”; “he didn’t mean any harm”; “it was meant as a compliment” and to sweep it under the carpet.  The diocese tried to force me to sign an NDA so I could not discuss my report with anyone.  It was clear from the start that they did not want the take the race discrimination or the safeguarding situation seriously. They just wanted to protect the vicar and the reputation of the diocese.  I declined the offer of mediation and an enforced NDA. I was then told they could not investigate the vicar as only the Clergy Discipline Measure (CDM) process could do that.  I would have to pursue that myself.  I had never heard of a CDM. So, while they were investigating the churchwarden and employees for race discrimination, I completed the CDM.  The investigation was of course a white wash designed to protect the vicar. 

Then the tsunami of victimisation by church members started against me and the person they believed had made the safeguarding report.  The victimisation against me continues to today. I was even subjected to verbal abuse and harassment at the church and had to involve the police. Because it was deemed a racially aggravated offence, a criminal investigation was carried out.  I have now taken my claim against the diocese, the PCC, the vicar and others who have harassed, victimised or abused me to the Employment Tribunal.  Instead of trying to resolve the issues and take responsibility and accountability, the diocese, the vicar and the PCC (funded by Ecclesiastical Insurance) are arguing that a churchwarden elected by the parishioners, appointed by the Bishop as his representative in the Parish and appointed as a trustee of the PCC (a registered charity) does not have the status or standing to take a claim to the Tribunal to address the issues.

I wrote to the Archbishop of Canterbury telling him what was going on in the diocese.  I told him that I was being coerced into signing an NDA even though he had decreed that NDAs should not be used.  My first letter was ignored.  Then I wrote again and I received a reply to this second letter.  He essentially said these issues are delegated to the diocese.  This sounded very familiar to the issues raised by the survivor of abuser, the late Trevor Devamanikkam when the Diocese declined to take responsibility for dealing with abuse.

Soul Survivor Watford (SSW)

I left my church in July 2022, as a result of the victimisation.  I started going to Soul Survivor after trying several other churches in July 2022.  I like Soul Survivor and just as we were settling there we were informed on 4 April 2023 that Mike Pilavachi was being investigated for serious safeguarding issues.

There were some things about SSW that had caused me discomfort.  Firstly, the leadership had said on several occasions that SSW “aimed for family, and settled for a mess”.   With the background I have and the experiences I have had in life, in churches and in organisations I felt this would become a problem, even before this issue with Mike Pilavachi came to light.  If you settle for a mess you will have a mess.  I had checked the website and there were none of the governance policies that should be there according to the law and the Church of England’s own guidance. 

I was shocked when I heard the content of the statement about Mike.  I felt traumatised because I had left the other church because of abuse and safeguarding concerns in a church.  I have been crying a lot since then as I weep for the church and the young people having some affinity with what they have gone through.

Mike was suspended followed by some of the other pastors in the church.  I was surprised to learn of the allegations against Mike.  I was not surprised to learn that people in senior positions in Soul Survivor and the diocese knew of the allegations and did nothing.  This fits with my experience of the Church of England.  Ignore it when it is happening and then try and sweep it under the carpet.  Protect the vicar and the reputation of the Church of  England at all costs.

I have become increasingly concerned about the investigation that is taking place by the safeguarding team in the diocese and the National Safeguarding team.

It is my firm belief that the authorities of my diocese should have no part in the investigation of the historical and current safeguarding issues at Soul Survivor.  I now believe firmly that this investigation should be carried out by an independent body.

I agree wholeheartedly with others that the Church has failed in relation to protecting victims of sexual abuse, spiritual abuse and racial abuse.

I say this not to diminish the serious issues raised in the safeguarding investigation but to point to a pattern of conduct from my diocese in relation to protecting vulnerable people from abuse.  Discriminatory abuse is included in the Bishop’s guidance on safeguarding but it has not been taken seriously locally.  Abuse in church has to stop.  In my experience the diocese is incapable of management and leadership. The Church needs to bring in professional advisers and, if necessary, professional experts to help them sort out the mess they have created.

Well run and funded corporations struggle with these issues so it is inevitable that most clergy will be incapable of dealing with these issues.

Too many people have been left broken by abuse in churches.  I agree with Gavin Drake that the Church of England is not a safe place for vulnerable people. But they don’t care.  Sadly, they are more interested in preserving the institution than protecting the people they are called to serve.

.

Last Sunday at General Synod in York, something seemed to crack.  The power dynamics that have kept the members of the Church of England hierarchy firmly in charge. shifted significantly to favour voices from the floor in a decisive way.  At a critical moment, it seemed that the rule book of Synod would prevail to suppress the manifest desire of the gathering to hear from the two sacked members of the Independent Safeguarding Board.  On the fourth? attempt, a procedural arrangement was found to allow them to speak.  Jasvinder Sanghera and Steve Reeves who, until two days ago, were members of the ISB, were allowed to present Synod with their perspective on the recent struggles to bring clarity and decency to the whole tarnished record of safeguarding in the Church of England.

 Any examination of the power struggles that have  been going on around the CofE on safeguarding will have noticed that survivors and their supporters have grown in confidence in recent times.  This is in no small way thanks to the ability of the internet to allow communication between supporters of this cause to flow freely and quickly.  The power of the ‘establishment’ to dictate a version of reality that suggests consistent competence and good judgment on the part of senior members of the Church, has been increasingly questioned and challenged.  Finally, the voice of the weak, illustrated in the Gospels by the importunate widow, has broken through decisively to claim the moral and political high ground.  It is quite clear that institutional power as represented by the Archbishops’ Council did not hold the version of truth that the bulk of Synod members wanted to affirm.  They applauded the cause of the abuse survivors and those working for them, especially Jasvinder and Steve.  Attempts by the platform to control the narrative and show the Church of England as a consistently compassionate and competent body seem to have totally failed.

Overall the dynamics of power within the Church of England have proved remarkably stable over the centuries.  Looking at the office of bishop, we see how anyone achieving this rank in the past acquired automatic access to the highest social and legal institutions in the land.  Even the manner of your dress was meant to impress your social inferiors with an aura of high status and power.  The ordinary folk did not disagree with a figure who could claim superior learning, the authority of God and the law of the land on his side.  Whether the advent of women to the status of bishop will do much to change this still powerful dynamic is unclear.  What still seems to be true is that, despite many changes in society, bishops still possess considerable power and influence over others.  Synodical government in the CofE and the later institution of Archbishops’ Council (AC) by Archbishop Carey attempted to inject a more collegiate feel to the office but the influence of each individual bishop is still strong.  Currently, particularly over the past day or two, the role of the AC has come under scrutiny.  Although the membership of this body, which includes lay and clerical members is known, much of what they do and the way decisions are reached is shrouded in mystery, since no minutes are published.  It is also unclear who has the most powerful voice within this Council. The episcopal voice nevertheless appears to be strong. We are also assured that the Council decision to dissolve the ISB was unanimous.  There is however a suggestion, based on some informal remarks of Archbishop Justin, that both Archbishops wanted a pause in putting this decision into effect.  It would be expected that someone on this Council would have realised how utterly devastating to survivors the precipitate dissolution of the Board would prove to be.  The sudden withdrawal of support to dozens of survivors would be a reckless action and probably seriously detrimental to their well-being.  A ‘unanimous’ decision on this point would indicate a lack of heart as well as a political insensitivity to the mood of Synod as well as the wider Church. It is hard to believe that a true representative body containing so many illustrious members of the national Church would be so totally lacking in emotional intelligence and good old fashioned common sense.  If the decision to abolish the ISB was indeed unanimous, then this should give us serious concern for the calibre of those who manage the affairs of the Church at the highest level.

July 2023 will be remembered in the CofE as the time when some of the old patterns of unquestioning obedience to bishops and their power was challenged.  Another momentous day took place in the Winchester diocese two years ago when a group of courageous clergy and laity made it known that they intended to propose a vote of no confidence in their bishop.  For those in stipendiary positions this was a high-risk action.  Bishops have considerable power over the careers and livelihoods of active clergy, and it was possible that some careers would be blighted for ever because an individual had been identified as a ‘troublemaker’. Promotion in the Church seems to work well some of the time, but it is easy to become ‘non-grata’ for taking a strong line or taking up an unpopular cause.  I am also aware of at least two recent cases of the opposite – favouritism.  Two individuals have been preferred or promoted in the middle of serious CDM processes against them.   The question arises:-  Was this individual being promoted to remove them from indiscretions in their old post? Was there a hope that all the CDM problems would thus somehow vanish?  Are sending or receiving bishops in the CofE, by ignoring an unresolved CDM, colluding with what is effectively a corrupt procedure?  I mention these two CDM processes left hanging because they indicate that at least four bishops are using their authority to steamroller the statutory systems of justice so as to favour individuals.  Arbitrary decision making by bishops is likely to be an issue in many parts of the church, but it is only occasionally, as during this past week, that the curtain is pulled back sufficiently for us to see arguably dishonest, even shameful activity among our leaders on the AC. Perhaps it is only a matter of time before laity and clergy routinely question episcopal decisions that are made.  Of course, the bishops may be correct in their judgements but equally they may be wrong.  No one should ever be penalised for not adopting the necessary awe and deference to the fathers and mothers in God.

The speeches given by Jasvinder and Steve this week at York will have considerable impact on the future of church safeguarding.  They will also make it much more difficult for people with power in the church to ignore the needs of survivors and the abused. I suspect that every bishop in the CofE will feel the effect of the fresh air of decency, justice and fair play that were on display at York.  Any future attempt by those In authority to favour the institution over abuse sufferers will find that task far harder.  They will be less inclined to ignore or suppress systems of justice because they can.  Rather they may be inclined to look for the path that indeed puts the survivor at the centre rather than the reputational and financial interests of the Church.  We will see.  At the very least we hope to have a clearer sense of the way that everyone in the Church, from archbishops downwards, can work together with the standards of love, justice, openness and healing right at the top of the agenda.

       by Janet Fife

Originally published in The Church of England Newspaper and reproduced with permission

Trying to get the Church of England to deal with a complaint of sexual abuse is like wrestling with a jellyfish – you can’t get a grip on it, and the tentacles keep whipping round and stinging you when you least expect it.

The labyrinthine complexity of the Church’s safeguarding structures is partly to blame.  A couple of years ago I put together a safeguarding glossary in an attempt to  help survivors and others  in their dealings with the Church. https://survivingchurch.org/2020/12/15/alphabet-soup-a-glossary-of-safeguarding . It ran to 5 1/2 pages.  If I were to write it now it would be even longer.  The remit of the various church safeguarding bodies is often unclear and they overlap. We may contact our bishop or diocesan safeguarding officer, only to have staff from one of the 5 national safeguarding bodies reply.  We may get no response at all.  Our case can be picked up, dropped, resumed, then dropped again. This would be unacceptable if we were dealing with the gas company – but our complaints concern the most traumatic, painful, and humiliating events of our lives. Each time we speak to someone about the abuse it takes courage and enormous amounts of psychological energy, and at that time we are very vulnerable. And when our complaint is passed from pillar to post within the Church of England’s ‘safeguarding’ system, we are forced to retell our stories over and over.

Reviews, inquiries, and data access requests have revealed lies told by bishops and other personnel. Survivors are sometimes referred to in internal correspondence in denigrating terms, rather than with compassion. It’s no wonder that the Church’s treatment of survivors has been labelled ‘re-abuse’. This would be terrible if the Church were doing it to people who had come for help after being attacked by an atheist.  To treat in this way people who are victims of crimes committed by the Church’s own representatives is unforgiveable.

The damage done is real. Survivors subject to this re-abuse have become depressed and unable to work. Many have lost their faith; some have lost their businesses or homes. A few have taken their own lives. The Church of England is answerable to God for their blood.

The Church’s abusive treatment of survivors has been repeatedly criticised by reviews and inquiries, and by the statutory Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA). The latter identified the culture of the Church as of serious concern, contributing to both the poor treatment of complainants and to opportunities for abuse to occur.

The Independent Safeguarding Board was set up in 2021 in response to recommendations by IICSA.  There were concerns from the beginning:  the Board was not independent. It seemed yet another deception practised on vulnerable people by Church authorities. Understandably many survivors, having had such shabby treatment already, didn’t trust the ISB or anyone working for the Church.

Three very highly qualified people were appointed to the ISB. Steve Reeves and Jasvinder Sanghera CBE, the Board’s Survivor Advocate, slowly and painstakingly began to gain the trust of the survivors they were working with.  The Chair, Dr. Maggie Atkinson, proved a different story.  She ‘stepped back’ and then resigned after three complaints of confidential data breaches were upheld by the Information Commissioner.

The two archbishops imposed Meg Munn on the ISB as temporary Chair, without consulting the two existing members or survivors, and in violation of the Board’s terms of reference. Ms Munn had a serious conflict of interest, since she also chaired the National Safeguarding Panel and was a member of the National Safeguarding Steering Group. As Chair of the ISB she would be required to audit her own work on the NSP and NSSG. And in her NSP role she had gained a bad reputation among survivors for her refusal to engage meaningfully with victims, and what was considered her poor response to people in critical situations.

Around 80 survivors of C of E abuse protested Ms. Munn’s appointment; a number requested that their data not be shared with Ms. Munn. Jasvinder and Steve also objected. It was obvious that Ms Munn could not function as Chair of the ISB under these circumstances. But the Archbishops, instead of backtracking, doubled down.  As Jasvinder commented, ‘‘I have to say that in my role I have experienced a disregard for the wishes of the survivor community at every point. I’ve been an advocate for victims/survivors for over three decades and I have never experienced anything like this before.’

Last week the two ISB members who many survivors had begun to trust were sacked, leaving the one survivors didn’t trust to tidy up. Those working with the ISB had their support suddenly withdrawn without notice, and without alternative arrangements being put in place. Everyone who has done C4 safeguarding knows how dangerous that is. There is uncertainty about who has now has access to survivors’ confidential data. What happens to the case reviews that were being conducted by Jasvinder and Steve?  The message tweeted by the ISB on Monday, 26 June didn’t reassure survivors:

‘Morning. We’re back from annual leave and what a week to miss! Understandably there is a lot in the inbox and we will be in touch with everyone who has reached out to us over the next couple of days. Please email contact@independent-safeguarding.org if you need anything.’

The anxiety and psychological damage inflicted on survivors is immense – and it was done knowingly and deliberately by the Archbishops and the Archbishops’ Council.  They should heed Ezekiel’s words: ‘Should not shepherds take care of the flock? …You have not strengthened the weak or healed the sick or bound up the injured. You have not brought back the strays or searched for the lost.…. This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am against the shepherds and will hold them accountable for my flock (Ez. 34:1-10 NIV).’

The Archbishop of York wrote to a complainant regarding several serious cases of miscarriage and misconduct of process and injustices in safeguarding policy and practice, to which the individual has been repeatedly subjected. The diocese concerned, Lambeth Palace staff and the NST were all culpable of serious errors, misconduct and coverups. Nothing was done. The email from the Archbishop of York is dated 29 March 2022 (with emphasis added in bold):

Dear XXXX

I hope this finds you well, or at least better than you were.

So many letters have been flying around that I have to confess I have possibly read them in the wrong order. However, I do know that is how it seems to you, and I get that.

Neither do I completely understand why referring the serious issues you raise to the Independent Safeguarding Board isn’t the best way of trying to independently understand what has happened and plot a better way forward.

For a long time people have accused the Church of England of marking its own homework. I share that concern. Hence, I have been a champion of independence over scrutiny of safeguarding for many years. Now that this Independent Board exists I believe it presents the best (and maybe the only) way of taking your complaints and concerns seriously, holding the Church of England to account and enabling us, where necessary, to change.

Now I know your concerns are much wider than your own particular case, and of course I am aware of the pain that others have experienced. And as you may or may not recall I have also myself been subject to investigation myself, so I have a very small taste of how this can feel and what it does to you.

You remind me in one of your letters that evil flourishes when good people do nothing. But we are not doing nothing. We are setting up an Independent Board to scrutinise safeguarding in the Church of England and provide a place where grievances, concerns and alleged injustices can be brought.

That may not be enough. But it has barely started, and I believe it needs to be given a chance.

Evil also flourishes when good people stop talking to each other or only communicate with megaphones.

Or where good people who are trying – often under the radar – to bring about change are so stymied and defined by the mistakes of the past that the very real hope that has been worked for a long time is not given an opportunity to work.

I don’t want us to get into that place. And of course I am dismayed  at some of the actions you propose making.  I honestly believe that there is a better way of having your legitimate concerns addressed.

And here I don’t want to put things in writing, not because I fear being quoted – though I note your intention to publish correspondence – but because words on a page don’t have a tone of voice. And I want to communicate to you how dearly I hope to bring change and development to safeguarding, but I also want to say that I truly believe real progress has been made and I see it in the way that we are responding to many survivors at the moment, and I could quote several recent examples where people have thanked me for the care and support they have received. I don’t want this put in jeopardy. I know you don’t either.

So this is where I am now. Archbishop Justin and I are proposing that all your concerns are laid before the Independent Board. That is what it is there for.

Help me understand why this is not an acceptable way forward. Or bear with me, and give this a chance.

With my prayers and very best wishes,

++Stephen

Terms of Reference were duly published by the ISB for independently assessing the grievances in question. However, the Terms of Reference did not engage with the grievances, and specifically excluded them. After objections were raised, both Archbishops reiterated the independence and integrity of the ISB  in a joint letter (June 14^th 2022).

Readers are invited to form their own view as to whether or not the Archbishops regarded the ISB as acting independently and competently in complex safeguarding cases? There is no mention of Phase One or Phase Two.

Dear XXXX

Thank you for your email to both of us.

We realise that we don’t have a common view about what ‘independent’ looks like, but it is difficult to see how the Church could be overseen by any body in this area without contributing to its costs. The ISB is still a new body and it is entirely appropriate that this matter is referred to it.

As you know the ISB has drafted the terms of reference for the work it thinks is appropriate to do and, having discussed the matter on several occasions we really do think we need to afford them the space to do that work. It is a source of continued disappointment to us that you don’t have confidence in this and are unwilling to participate. As we understand it, the invitation to be involved remains open and we hope you realise this.

You seem convinced that the dice are loaded against you before the game has begun. We categorically don’t believe this is the case. As Stephen has consistently repeatedly said whenever you have spoken, we both believe there are important questions to be asked and issues to be addressed. It is our belief that the ISB will do this and we have both worked hard towards its establishment and creation. Moreover, they have indicated that they will be able to report by the autumn this year.

Why not then cooperate with the process, let them make their report, and then see where we are? How could this possibly be worse than the situation we are in at the moment? We have been part of a process that has referred this to the ISB. They have said that they will look at this and report back.

So can we invite you again to reconsider your opposition to cooperating with this process and also, if we may, reconsider the language you use to sometimes besmirch those who are actually trying to help you and move this forward. We are amongst those people and so is Maggie Atkinson. Please think about giving [Maggie] the space and time she needs. If it turns out you’re right, and the whole thing is a sham, and the ISB is in the pockets of those who are against you, then that will become clear. We, however, do not believe it for a moment. And, if we are honest, can’t quite understand why you have reached this conclusion, and wonder whether you have considered how others might interpret this?

With every blessing,

The Most Revd & Rt Hon Justin Welby The Most Revd & Rt Hon Stephen Cottrell Archbishop of Canterbury Archbishop of York

Footnotes: This investigation was subsequently removed from the ISB. Maggie Atkinson was suspended and then dismissed for data breaches. Although William Nye cancelled the investigation, no other process of inquiry is yet in place. The Archbishops’ Council have now sacked the ISB.

The telling of stories was one way that Jesus used to communicate truths about God and human behaviour.  Preachers in the church know how, when we read and study these stories, they keep on giving.  There is never only a single interpretation to the parables that we find in the gospels.  There are always new facets of meaning and insight to be extracted as we ponder them over a lifetime.  It is also perhaps legitimate to try to imagine the stories as they might be retold today with another teller and another context.  Here is an example of how one well-known parable might be retold to resonate with some of our contemporary issues.

Travelling from Jerusalem to Jericho is a dangerous business.  I never know whom I might meet when I travel that way.  Sometimes people are after my money and possessions and sometimes they simply want to recruit me into one of their gangs so I can work for them and bring others under gang control.  If I were to be young, there is the added danger of being harassed or worse.  The journey along that way always makes travelling very stressful indeed.  I would rather not do it, but my whole livelihood depends on it.

As a frequent traveller I know others who make the journey regularly.  So far, I have managed not to suffer the humiliation of being stripped naked, wounded and left half dead.  I gather from talking to survivors that not all the bandits on the road are true outlaws.  Some are well respected members of the Samaritan community, and they go in for banditry during their spare time.  One or two of these part-time bandits have been brought to justice. The religious ones among them seem to get off and go free.  When the Romans get involved, which is not very often, then justice seems to happen. They are disowned by their community and get sent to prison.  Others, especially the ‘religious’ ones, are let off on some technicality.  I also hear about individuals within the religious hierarchy who refuse to testify against their chums when they are brought to justice.  The higher up the chain of religious importance you are, the more likely it is that you will be let off.

Recently I have heard about a new initiative designed to help travellers on the Jerusalem-Jericho Road.  The organiser is a Gentile, and he has studied abroad in things like law and philosophy.   This fact alone and his independence of the religious establishment gives us travellers confidence.  If it were organised by anyone linked to the important people in the Samaritan hierarchy, none of us would be able to trust it.  This Gentile is a true independent and will not be compromised by any of the strands of loyalty that have linked some of the bandits to the top people in the Samaritan network.  The main part of the new initiative involves organising safe spaces for travellers in danger.  The organisation has been able to recruit Innkeepers along the way to help in the project.  All of them are being thoroughly vetted to make sure that their inns are safe for vulnerable travellers.  They will be trained in first aid and self-defence skills.  All will have emergency funds to tide over any travellers who have had all their money stolen. 

For a time, the scheme has worked well.  The Priests at the top of the Samaritan network are also gradually being forced to own up to their past connections to the bandits.  Many links, that some of those convicted of terrible crimes have had with people of religious importance in Samaria, have been brought to light. All members of the ruling body have been on safeguarding training.   Now they can recognise the way that abuse of power is not only found in armed robbery but also in the way the Priests conduct their business in everyday religious administration.  Also, they have come to understand how money raising is not the same thing as common extortion.  People are everywhere learning to question and hold to account those who have positions of religious importance.

Recently a terrible event occurred on the Jerusalem Jericho Road which reminded us of the old days of banditry when things were really bad.  A traveller was beaten and left for dead on the roadside.  He was not rendered unconscious so he was able to tell us what happened while he was waiting for help.  Two people passed on the other side of the road.  He recognised both of them as being members of the Samaritan religious leadership.  He knew that each had been on several levels of safeguarding training.  This had been arranged by the Priests for everyone working in and around Samaria.  They will know what to do, the traveller thought.  But no, it seems that helping a wounded traveller is too complicated; there are too many forms to fill in and the witness might get something wrong when they try to apply the high priest regulations to the situation.  Worse still, if too many questions are asked, it may turn out that the bandits are themselves Jews in good standing.  Helping to bring a fellow Samaritan to justice would be betrayal.  Passing by on the other side is the best strategy in this situation.

Fortunately, one of my group, the Survivor Supporters Cabal (SSC), was on hand nearby and quickly helped the wounded traveller to a designated inn where he would be safe.  Here he was able to recover his strength and tell his story.  He was able to describe his attackers as well as those who declined to help him.  Both groups were identifiable, but the religious authorities in Samaria refused to get involved.  But even more serious was the response as a result of all the publicity to this new case.  New pressure has been placed on my network in SSC by the religious establishment.  The religious authorities cannot stop the volunteer workers, but they can undermine the livelihoods of those who work in the inn network project.  Overnight the secretary, who makes sure that the safe inns who help travellers are properly supplied with money and first-aid material, was sacked and the financial support for the project withdrawn.  The Priests of Samaria were not prepared to offer any help to a project which showed them up in a bad light.

The result of this latest outrage and the totally inept response to it is twofold.  Lots of people are asking questions and the top religious authorities are starting to look really shamed and embarrassed.  Because the member of SSC and the inn keeper’s (a gentile) help was so vital and effective, the religious authorities now want to try to hit back.   There is a plan to buy up all the inns that are part of the support network and make sure that they are only run by approved Samaritans in good standing. Only the high priests’ regulations are to be followed when it comes to rescuing wounded travellers.  It is obvious that the authorities do not want to do the necessary work of making sure that the road is kept safe and that those who are wounded get appropriate help.  Perhaps it is because the whole structure of the ruling authorities in Samaria has become so tangled and wrapped up in human power games, that the will to do the necessary work of reform is simply not present.