ViaMedia

Year: 2018

  • After IICSA: Facing Up to Clericalism

    by the Revd Canon Simon Butler, Prolocutor for the Province of Canterbury

    presentation1

    I tell a story against myself. When I was a young naval officer, I recall the first time the ship I served in docked in a military harbour. Keen to be acknowledged as an Officer, I recall leaving the ship on some sort of made-up errand and went looking for someone to salute me for the first time. Eventually I saw a young naval rating heading down a side road and I took a detour towards him, simply so that I could be saluted.

    It’s not a particularly edifying story, but it does illuminate a concern for status and acknowledgment in my young self. The insecurities of youth, perhaps.

    Well, almost. As part of my duties as one of the six Officers of the General Synod, I have the privilege in taking part in some big ecclesiastical occasions. Just occasionally, I catch myself feeling a little self-important. The big processions with their subtle hierarchies, the loud organ music telling everyone present that something important is going on, full cathedrals of expectant worshippers – it’s difficult not to be seduced into occasionally thinking it’s all about you. If I’m usually near the front of the procession (the subtle hierarchy telling me I’m not quite as important as the people behind me), pity the poor dean, bishop or archbishop at the back with all the weight of that expectation and projection.

    “I have seen afresh the insanity of clericalism and of a deferential culture and how we have to struggle against that.” These were some of the most pointed remarks of Archbishop Justin, in his evidence to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) last month. It’s difficult not to agree with him. Without naming names, some of the clergy giving evidence to that important Inquiry demonstrated from their own mouths how separate and elitist the clerical profession can become. We do well to remember the remedy offered to clericalism by Pope Francis that is the call to service and mercy. Criticising the clergy, “Clericalism”, he said, “leads to the functionalisation of the laity, treating them as ‘errand boys [or girls]’” He calls for a renewed commitment of the clergy to serving the people of God, showing mercy, helping ordinary baptised people live their faith in everyday situations. “It’s never the shepherd who tells the laity what they have to do or say in public life, they know it well or even better than us.”

    Clericalism inverts the God-given order of the baptismal covenant. Through it the People of God come to think their job is to support the clergy doing the work of God, rather than the clergy enabling the whole church to fulfill its baptismal calling.

    But there is another side to the coin. The obverse side is the way in which the people of God treat the clergy in a way that only feeds into such unhealthy clericalism (I have a personal dislike for the word ‘laity’, for which see the provocatively-titled R. Paul Stephens’ The Abolition of the Laity). Whatever the source of clericalism, its presence is not confined to the clergy. The unnamed ‘elders’ of 1 Samuel 8 press the prophet Samuel, “give us a king to govern us.” Despite the warnings of the Lord against such a course of action – “And in that day you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves; but the Lord will not answer you in that day” – the elders press for a king. The parallel is not exact but the effect is strikingly similar. Just as the Lord warns the elders of the dangers of kingship, so today we have become urgently aware of the impediment to mission that comes when a call to service becomes a caste with clerical status. Even those whose ecclesial tradition sit light to concepts of ‘priesthood’ can easily create an equally deferential culture around the role of the ‘leader’. The cult of the leader is clericalism’s bastard child.

    I was touched by an email I received from a member of my PCC the other day, in the context of a disagreement between us. Having set out her stall to me about why she thought I was wrong, she sent a second email saying, “Simon, do you have any idea how wonderfully rewarding and refreshing it is to be able to have a genuine conversation with clergy (you!) who doesn’t consider me as automatically lesser or second-rate just because I don’t have a Revd title.” Having told a story against myself at the beginning, permit me this little moment of gratitude. I can’t put my hand on my heart and say that I treat everyone quite as well as she feels I do her. But I work on it as a priority in ministerial development.

    But I take no ease on this matter. I’m currently chairing a national working group on clergy well-being and we can see the danger that clericalism is not just to the church but to the minister herself. If IICSA can do something life-giving for the church (as well, naturally, to the survivor), it will be to remind us that one of the fruits of our repentance from the sins of child abuse and institutional failure, one of the gifts of the ‘world’ to the church will be to challenge us to deal with the cult of the cleric and the culture of deference. This is an urgent task for the whole church.

    How can you play your part?

  • Challenging APCMs?

    by the Rt Revd David Walker, Bishop of Manchester

    Vicar Of Dibley

    I was a young Team Vicar, helping run a suite of community projects out of an ecumenical charity we’d set up in the parish. We were spending a day reviewing what was going on in our work, and had invited the senior chaplain of the Industrial Mission team to work with us. In preparation for worship, he asked us to each write on a piece of paper one thing we were worried or concerned about in our work together, and then two things that we wanted to give thanks for. Part of the point was the 2:1 ratio. Most of the good stuff was things we normally spent very little time talking about; the tricky things were the familiar dominant items of our agendas. It was invigorating and refreshing to be made to spend twice as long on the positive than the negative.

     With the clergy post-Easter break done, and April half way through, the next couple of weeks are peak season for C of E parishes holding their Annual Meetings. They may not be the hot ticket item on many people’s list, but they provide a rare opportunity in church life. They are one occasion when lay and ordained leaders can lift their attention from firefighting the latest problem, or grappling with the most intractable issues, and spend at least two thirds of their time reflecting on what has gone well. Parish by parish, across the land, church members will be hearing or reading reports on groups who have met faithfully, projects that have made solid progress, people who have grown in faith, engagements that meet the deepest needs in the local community, charities near and far that have been supported. In some places it will be the only meeting in the Church year that gives more time to what has gone well than what has gone badly.

     When I first sat down to think what I might write this week, I ran through the usual tricky issues where I could add a thought or word: would it be sexuality or sexism, safeguarding, antisemitism or Syria that got the benefit of my musings? However, remembering the wisdom of my IM colleague all those years ago, and with an eye to the APCM season, here’s a few people and things I want to give thanks for, instead.

     For Jean, whose passion for Street Angels lights up Oldham Town Centre at the weekend. For Ellie, in her inner city parish, who brings her huge skills and massive commitment to our Winter Night Shelters. For Gareth and his team, leading our fast growing Salford Resourcing Church as it begins to spawn vocations. For Manchester L’arche Community and their amazing café at St Paul’s,Withington. For Susie, who turns tetchy teenagers into young Christian leaders across the diocese. For Ben, who has grown a church from zero on a tough Bolton housing estate. And behind them, all the others who are working with diligence and imagination to be the people of God in their parishes, chaplaincies and communities. And behind all of us, the God whom we meet in worship, sacrament and one another, and whose grace takes us far beyond our mortal capabilities.

     So, here’s a challenge. If your church has an Annual Meeting coming up this month, do go along to it. Pick up something from the reports laid before you, and find some way of asking a question or making a comment that affirms the work being done and praises those involved. There will always be another time to worry away at the latest tough problem. For now, be grateful that you are part of a church that sometimes gets some things seriously right.

     

    Picture: Vicar of Dibley: Dibley Council on UK Gold

     

     

  • Are We in Love with Sin?

    by the Revd Canon Rosie Harper, Chaplain to the Bishop of Buckingham and Member of General Synod
    Rosie Haarper

    We all carry our early experiences of Christmas and Easter into our adult life. It’s inevitable and it is the lens through which we interpret the present. For instance, I know I have an over- sentimentalised blue print for Christmas. My Mum was Swiss but living in England, and recreating some of the Swiss traditions was a way of keeping her Swiss identity alive. So we had wonderful homemade Swiss cookies, a tree with real candles we were only allowed to see on Christmas Eve, and handmade presents that my Mother would be sewing in secret all through the autumn. Christmas as a result feels like a warm safe place for me.

    Easter however was very different. It was totally dominated by Good Friday. As a church we had a massive get together at around 5.00pm and most of the day was spent making sandwiches. I would help out the ladies (oh yes, all ladies of course!), who seemed impossibly old. They worked very hard at being nice but I could tell they didn’t really like children very much.

    My feelings however, were totally dominated by a sense of dread. I knew the Good Friday service was coming and I was terrified.

    Year after year after year the story of the crucifixion was told in the most graphic way imaginable. The whole process was unpacked. The torn flesh, the crushing sense of suffocation, the competing pain around the body. No detail was left untold. That was just the beginning. Then there was the sin. The weight of all the sin of the world was also suffered. A weight so vast that only God could bear it, a weight that went beyond that supreme agony when God himself abandoned his son. Then of course there was still hell to be tackled.

    All that would have been bad enough, but the real twist came when the ball of responsibility was thrown to every single person in the church. If you were the only person left on earth Jesus would still have had to suffer all this to deal with your sin. It was your sin that took him to the cross.

    I remember very clearly hearing Matthew Parris at a debate saying with considerable feeling that he was not willing to accept that he was personally responsible for crucifying Jesus – and thinking that he had a point.

    So I grew up, like so many of us I guess, feeling, if not actually thinking, that sin was the main point about Christianity. It was compounded by my experience in two very well know London churches where you were expected to invite your friends to come and hear the gospel (aka “Good News”).  What happened was that perfectly happy and well adjusted people would be told that they were wicked and sinful, but they were not to worry because Jesus had dealt with all that on the cross and if they gave their life to him they’d be alright after all.

    It was all about the sin. And all too often it still is. We seem to need to assess someone’s sin status before we can know how to relate to them. Whole parts of the Church break away because they are more concerned about the perceived sin of the other than about their humanity. Classically at the moment the focus is on loving gay relationships. It seems impossible to talk about the love and the flourishing and the relationship, because of the love of fixating on sin.

    So I opened my bible to preach on the Sunday after Easter. Surely if it was all about the sin then the risen Jesus is going to explain.  “It’s all right folks! All that agony that I went through means that your sins are dealt with. You are forgiven. The problem is solved.”

    Let’s skip over the fact that Jesus was capable of saying ‘Your sin is forgiven’ before his death which might imply that one is not necessarily a consequence of the other. The main point is that he simply didn’t go down that route.

    Just imagine that, as a consequence of some extraordinary sacrifice something very, very wonderful could happen. What would you wish for? If there were a cosmic Solomon moment what would change the whole world?

              ‘Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ ‘

    For me this year more than ever before the cross speaks of breaking the cycle of violence, and the resurrection offers us peace and hope.

    If there is any point at all in being Church we need to embody this by the way we treat one another. It’s costly. We’ve got into the habit of seeing each other’s sin and the recent IICSA hearings in a way underline this: Where are the shortcomings? Who failed? Who did wrong? The purpose surely must be to bring about peace not primarily to judge.

    There are many survivors whose dearest wish is for peace. It may be incredibly costly for some senior staff to look at how they have reacted, to apologise deeply and offer to rebuild relationships and make reparation. Peacemaking is hard. Until this happens the gospel will end up being “Bad News”, and all about sin.

    The true gospel of Easter is genuinely, tangibly good news and leads to peace.

     

     

  • IICSA – Is Clericalism to Blame?

    by the Revd Dr Jeremy Morris, Master of Trinity Hall, Cambridge

    Jeremy Morris

    For the time being, the Church of England’s excoriation before the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) is over.  We are all left trying to come to terms with the dreadful things we have heard and to work out why and how such things happened.  But it’s too easy to reach for ready-made explanations, for ‘buzz words’ that seem to carry everything before them and need only to be uttered to be taken as pinning down definitively what the particular malaise affecting the Church of England has been.

    I suspect ‘clericalism’ is one of these words.  In a church with an ordained ministerial hierarchy, with separate training for ordination at colleges and on courses, with distinctive dress, with all the private jokes and private language that goes with any assembly of clergy (and anyone who’s attended a gathering of clergy will know what I mean), it’s very easy to assume that our ills come essentially from clergy seeing themselves as a “specialized, privileged elite”.  These are those for whom the rules are different – those who   need no advice from anyone, who look out for each other (or at least they believe they ought to), and so on.  For all I know, that is what happened in the Diocese of Chichester – a lot of the IICSA evidence certainly points that way.

    But it’s curious, this leaning on the idea of ‘clericalism’., For in a way the whole history of the Church of England – and in a sense, even its very identity – has been a long battle to rid itself of clericalism.  At the Reformation clerical exemption from secular law and taxation disappeared.  The ‘parallel world’ of the religious life was abolished.  Mandatory celibacy, that badge of clerical apartness, was ended.  Clergy largely ceased to be part of a separate, privileged professional ‘order’: they were one profession amongst many.  In time, one of the more devastating indictments of Anglican clergy was the accusation of worldliness: they were too much like everyone else around them, preoccupied with property and patronage, and enjoying too much of the same worldly pleasures as others.  At a stretch one could even argue that the Evangelical and High Church revivals were in part a reaction against this ‘worldliness’, in favour of a certain kind of clericalism – an earnest, self-sacrificing kind.

    Yet even then much in the modern history of the Church of England has worked against that.  Even in the nineteenth century parishes were not run by clergy only, but by cooperation between clergy and vast teams of lay co-workers.  Lay assemblies have become an intrinsic part of church governance.  University theology departments have been emptied of the clergy who once staffed them; academic theology is mostly now a lay enterprise.  The recruitment of clergy has leant more and more heavily on those who have already had other careers: the average age at ordination has crept up into the thirties.  The Church nationally, and dioceses locally, have emphasized the importance of lay ministry, and sought to build it up.

    This is a strange background to the assumption that the Church of England has yet to purge itself of some presumed, residual ‘hangover’ of clericalism.  Of course, all professions have their codes and private language, and their defensive strategies.  I’m sure, as IICSA turns its attention to other areas of national life, we’ll see these things emerging in social work and social care, in medicine, in education, in the police, in local government, and in politics, to name but some.

    We have to get beyond the buzz words and try to understand what has really happened, from within the institution.  If we really want to understand clerical pathology – and therefore just why abuse could be handled so incompetently as it seems to have been – then we have to understand the social milieu and social implications of the various strands of theology abroad in the Church.  This is a very big question, and I can’t hope to cover it here.  Maybe I’ll try in a future blog.  But as I say constantly to my students, it’s not enough to attribute motives to people, from the outside, as it were.  You also have to try to get inside their heads, and understand how they themselves see things.  The vast majority of clergy genuinely try to live out what they believe.  Perhaps ‘cover ups’, the failure to deal with or confront problems adequately, the readiness to hand over responsibility to someone else, come as much from a misplaced attempt to be kind to colleagues, to be reluctant to assume the worst, to be truly collegial, and so on.

    I’m reminded of the cardinal who, in the late nineteenth century, fearing the damage to the Church, is said to have resisted opening up the Vatican archives to wider access on the grounds that ‘charity always comes before truth’.  He wanted to protect the Church he loved, and perhaps to protect colleagues.  But as we know, that is a fatal capitulation to a mistaken assumption that people have to be shielded from the truth.  On the contrary, truth must come first.  Only when we face the truth honestly can we begin to tackle our difficulties.

    Clergy, I have no doubt, do often avoid tension and conflict, and fail to act effectively.  But I’m not sure I believe – except in some hard cases – that it happens because of an inherent assumption of superiority, so much as from a fear of being seen to be hard and critical, and so of undermining the ethic of love that stands at the heart of the Gospel.  We have to keep reminding ourselves of the indivisibility of love and truth.  That’s why IICSA has been so sobering, and so necessary.

    We have to learn all over again how avoiding the truth usually ends up harming those very people we think we’re trying to protect.

  • The Challenge of Harmonious Difference

    by the Very Revd Dr David Ison, Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral

    David ison 2

    Cathedrals have been in the news over the last few years, though not always for the reasons that they or the wider Church of England might like.

    However, one result is that cathedral deans have had more investment in their training and development: which is why 25 of us were in Cambridge a couple of weeks ago to think about leadership and working in teams. And very useful training it was, not least for helping us work together on how we can better serve and lead the many teams which enable cathedrals to function well.

    There were many words of wisdom. But one thing that struck a chord with me spoke to the whole issue of how we live with difference.

    The course leader told us that research shows that, in terms of achieving results, harmony in teams is less important than difference. A team that prizes harmony and good relationships above all else will not do as well as a team where conflict is allowed and differences are expressed, though it will do better than a team which falls apart because relationships are broken.

    What we didn’t do on the course though was to think about the definition of ‘harmony’.

    In musical terms, harmony is having a group of singers or players who take different parts, who sing or play different notes at the same time, but do so in a way where there’s a relationship between them.

    The Oxford Dictionary uses words like agreement, correspondence, consistency, pleasing, to define the nature of harmony. It also notes the use of ‘harmony’ in relation to writings, where different passages are arranged together to show their agreement, and refers specifically to ‘harmony of the gospels’.

    There are two kinds of ‘gospel harmony’. One where the four gospels are set out side by side, so you can see what’s similar and what the nuances and differences are.  The other is when the four gospels are written into one account, in order to present a single view of the gospel message. But this latter way of treating the differences in the gospels isn’t actually harmony.

    Jonathan Sacks, in his important 2002 book The Dignity of Difference, wrote about ‘Plato’s Ghost’: the idea that has haunted Greek and then Western civilisation, that there is one right way for the world and us to be, one perfect form of everything from which all else is derived. And he points out how destructive this is of anything that’s perceived as different from the norm: the view that in everything important there is a right way and a wrong way, and getting it right matters.

    Musically, that’s not harmony – it’s unison, when everyone sings or plays the same note at the same time, all singing the same melody.

    So a gospel harmony which presents a single, composite, ‘right’ account of the ministry of Jesus shouldn’t be called a ‘harmony’ at all, but a gospel ‘unison’.

    And a team which doesn’t tolerate difference and can’t cope with conflict isn’t working in harmony, but in unison.

    So what, you may ask? Because it matters for how the Church and the world handle difference. There are three, not two, options on how we look at our differences.

    An insistence on unity, unison, conformity, will reject what doesn’t fit in with what whoever in power has defined as ‘right’, and will be poorer as a result – whether that’s liberal or conservative, socialist or free-market. You can sing a unison song on your own. But you need others to enrich you by singing and playing in harmony.  We need each others’ differences to be able to do things well, from leading a cathedral to sharing the love of God with the world.

    And harmony also requires relationship. That doesn’t mean being free from conflict. Harmony in music can range from simple chords to complex polyphony, and from Barry Manilow to Stockhausen. Some harmony can sound unresolved; at the edges harmony falls apart into disharmony and chaos – there is such a thing as disharmony, and two or more unison songs sung at the same time can be pretty disharmonious and unpleasant.

    Unison, harmony, disharmony. The Church has had an ambiguous relationship with difference, whether musical or spiritual. At periods in its life it has regarded polyphony and diversity as a dangerous pandering to the flesh, and emphasised the need for unison; at other times it has rejoiced in creativity and difference.

    In its leadership too, the Church has lurched from one division to another. On our deans’ conference we were asked what model of leadership we espoused, and we supposed it ought to be that of Jesus: but Jesus’ disciples competed among themselves before his resurrection, and went through conflict and division afterwards as Paul and John’s letters bear witness.

    To have a successful cathedral, to have a Church which resonates in a chord with the nation in the name of Jesus Christ, requires us to let go of assuming that we are all really meant to be in unison, and allow us to discover what being harmonious in difference can be.

    Fashions in music and leadership change; but the need to work together in harmonious difference continues, if we are together to bring the world to Christ and bear witness to the kingdom of God  where celestial choirs and harps for ever will sing…. in harmony.

     

  • Apologies, Forgiveness and IICSA

    by the Revd Canon Rosie Harper, Chaplain to the Bishop of Buckingham and Member of the General Synod

    Rosie Haarper

    It has been an extraordinary experience listening to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) on its excellent live streaming site.  I heard some detail that is new to me, although the basic stories are sadly familiar.  But it felt so different.

    The reason is simple. At long last these witnesses have been listened to and taken seriously. The whole point of the hearings is to bring into the light that which the institution has tried so hard to keep hidden. Anyone who previously spoke out for the truth was cast as a trouble maker and utterly disloyal.  This applied to individual survivors, their legal teams and their supporters.

    It will take some time before we know where this will all go. We will get Part 2 in June and doubtless there will be many more revelations and more attempts at robust defense. There will also be more apologies along the lines of: ‘We have done wrong and we are sorry and beg for forgiveness.’

    The spotlight over Easter is on forgiveness and the combination of very public apologies and the ongoing marginalisation of survivors has got me thinking.

    What do we actually think forgiveness is? Who does the forgiving? And – this is the critical – what has it all got to do with God?

    If I hit my neighbour over the head and then go to church, confess this sin to God and feel confident that I am forgiven, what’s going on there? I didn’t hit God on the head, did I? But being forgiven, I can tell myself that I’m basically a nice person who did this ‘sin’ and now it has been dealt with and I’m nice again. Objectifying sin lets you get right on with your life.

    You see, my issue with all the mea culpa that we have heard in these three weeks of IICSA is as much with the intent as the act.

    That is surely what Jesus is talking about in Matthew 5:27-28: ‘You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not commit adultery.  But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.’

    The problem with sin is that the act is secondary to its roots. If my husband cheats on me my pain isn’t just that he has slept with someone else, but that he has become the sort of person who would do that.

    The horror of what we learnt in the three weeks of the hearing is that the Church is run by the sort of people who are prepared to cover up and lie, and who have it within them to protect the institution rather than the very victims they have created. They proclaim a gospel of love and then treat survivors appallingly.

    It’s Easter and we make a huge song and dance about the resurrection. Rightly so, but we frame it as a moment – whereas the gospel seems to imply that it is the completion of a long and demanding process. The whole story of Jesus’ life is about resurrection: the difficult choices he had to make and the dark places he had to travel through until he emerged still fully human and restored and healed and complete.  There is no puff of magic. There wasn’t for Jesus and there isn’t for us either.

    If we want our churches to be safe places, we have to work a whole lot harder than just saying sorry and expecting a puff of forgiveness to sort it out.

    The easiest image is the resurrection of spring. This year especially it has been tough. Tiny little shoots. The frost gets some of them. They fight their way back into the light over many weeks.

    The real work of repentance is hard and often painful. Really tricky questions need to be answered, like: ‘What is there within me that drives me to put up a wall of silence to protect my chums rather than attend to the person lying beaten up on front of my very eyes?’ Why do I find it possible to talk about putting the survivor first and yet find it impossible to pick up the phone and talk, impossible to open my heart and wallet to make generous reparation?’ ‘Why, when we now know that the Church has damaged people do we continue to blame them for being damaged?’

    It’s Easter and it is a time of hope. I sincerely hope that what we are hearing from the Church amounts to the first tiny little shoots.

    But make no mistake these shoots are very small and very fragile.  We have a long way to go before the deep healing that forgiveness can offer has fully taken place.

  • Salisbury Under Siege – What Does it Mean to be an Easter People?

    by the Revd Canon Prof James Woodward, Principal of Sarum College, Salisbury

    Salsibury

     

    The last three weeks have been unsettling and at times disturbing that those of us who live and work in Salisbury. Sunday, 4 March 2018 changed the soil of this city. There was disbelief when reports first emerged of an assassination attempt on 66-year-old Sergei Skripal and his 33-year-old daughter, Yulia. The Bishop of Salisbury called it a violation. No one could have anticipated that such a thing might happen here.

    However, amidst the disbelief some commentators articulated a sense of déjà vu. As investigators moved in to a small area of playing ground adjacent to a shopping centre we were reminded of scenes of the poisoning Alexander Litvinenko at a restaurant in London’s Piccadilly, in 2006.

    Understandably information and emerged slowly. The city became quite literally scene of extensive police and military investigation. Thankfully Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey, who was one of the first on the scene has been discharged but  the Skripals remain in a critical condition in our local hospital.

    This is a crisis of significant proportions for Salisbury but also nationally and internationally. What are we to make of it? What questions might shape a search for truth and the work peace and justice here and beyond?  While events and information moves quickly I have a deep sense of the darkness of this terrifying situation that we now face globally. Slowing down, and considering the evidence carefully is an imperative for each one of us. Commentators have been quick to make hasty judgements. People going about their work in Salisbury have also been ready to take refuge in slogans, blame and fear.

    One of the most telling comments expressed in a supermarket queue from an older woman was this: ‘I didn’t come to live in Salisbury for this kind of mess and upheaval’. It was an understandable articulation of a desire to live peaceably without disruption and with a proper sense of security and belonging. Others have been more forthright about the necessity to control immigration and I have regretted the occasional comments about ‘foreign workers’.

    The most significant uneasiness lies in the quality and timeliness of information. We were told that there was nothing to be concerned about only later to be informed by England’s chief medical officer, Dame Sally Davies that around 500 people could have been affected in the time window. To her defence while she continued to insist that the risk was low this was not the message we ‘heard’. Indeed the advice was to wash the clothing, and to put any items that  normally be dry cleaned, in two plastic bags tied at the top and to store them safely. To  add to this list  we were asked that personal items such as phones, handbags and other electronic items were to be wiped clean with baby wipes.

    This has all contributed to a deep sense of uneasiness and mistrust. One message at the beginning of the week and quite another at the end of the week. What was the risk? Are we still in danger? I know that this is had a devastating and significant effect on those who work in the public house and restaurant in question that Sunday. The ripples of nervousness continue to affect businesses and especially those near to the incident. Our local MP, John Glenn, has worked tirelessly to generate confidence in public safety but the threat and the fear remain. One person expressed this in this way – “I am not reassured because I do not know all the facts. What are the long term effects?”

    This threat and fear is carried over into the national and international arena of political, social and economic life. The Prime Minister has told us that Russia was “highly likely” to be responsible for not just an attack on the Skripals, but of an “indiscriminate and reckless act against the United Kingdom”. We now know that the Skripals were poisoned by a chemical that is part of a group of nerve agents known as Novichok, which was developed by the Soviet Union in the 1970s and 1980s.   The United Kingdom has taken action against Russia and this has resulted in counteraction. There is a central question running through all of this that shapes our view of the trustworthiness of the world and its life: ‘So what really happened, and who is telling the truth?’ Do our political leaders take considered decisions based on facts rather than conjecture and political opportunism? In this uncertainty who are we to trust?

    I reflect upon this as the Church begins Holy Week. In all of this experience, we might wonder afresh about what it means to be an Easter people? What difference does faith make especially in our experience of sadness, fear and pain? Any seasoned observer of human nature will know that it is hard to shift and change people’s lives. In Salisbury we are reminded of the sheer fragility of life. Despite the refuge that we all take in easy or comfortable solutions or slogan there is little in life, which is certain, fixed, or secure. Faith must deal with what lies in our hearts and minds.

    It is the task of the Church to open up our horizons and offer us an understanding of the world that captures imagination in both heart and mind. It is perhaps important for us to be honest about our resentments, our griefs, our hatreds and suspicions. Complacency and self-interest can so easily dominate the shape of the faith we live by.

    In the gospel accounts of the resurrection, there is both fear and joy. Following Jesus is not a protection from the difficulties and challenges that face us in life. Being an Easter people does not mean that any of us will not require handkerchief to mop up our tears. All of us will know deep in our hearts what our lives, our world is like, and how much of a struggle it is. As human beings we have to deal with our fears and the reality of how little control we are able to exercise over circumstances and experiences.

    It is into this condition of who we are and where we are that God can touch us with Easter life and hope. Easter peace is not the obliteration of our past or present, but the re-drawing of our lives into a new way of seeing. Faith can give us the opportunity for direction, redirection, meaning and depth.

    As we live with complexity and uncertainty in Salisbury we have an opportunity to take this opportunity to work together in live for what is good. However partial limited our faith may be that always lies the possibility of transformation. We can be confident but we must safeguard against a triumphalism which does not listen carefully to human experience and its sensitivities. We can nurture faith that embraces doubt and in doing so can  grows through openness and honesty.

    Remember Salisbury in your prayers. Consider the longer view, the enduring truth that goodness is always stronger than evil. Love will conquer. Justice will prevail.

    That will mean a change for us. It will also require a much stronger sense of the relational and our readiness to move on and beyond our internal dialogues and contestations to listen more carefully to human experience. We need space and time to share our story..

    In the words of Desmond Tutu, a Canon of Salisbury Cathedral (and gratitude to the Bishop of Salisbury for sharing this with the City)

    Goodness is stronger than evil;

     Love is stronger than hate;

     Light is stronger than darkness;

     Life is stronger than death;

     Victory is ours through Him who loves us.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • Is There Life for the Church After IICSA?

    by the Revd Canon Anna Norman-Walker, Rector of Streatham and past member of General Synod

    Anna Norman-Walker

    Perhaps Holy Week is the perfect time for the Church to be putting its beliefs to the test.

    Death happens and with it the all-important grieving process. Those of us who walk with people up to the point of death and subsequently with their loved ones in its aftermath know that there is a truth surrounding this journey; there is such a thing as a good death. Good deaths involve important conversations, honest expressions of hope and fear, a process of letting go and an acceptance of the inevitable. Ultimately there is a moment of submission into death’s strangely kind embrace made so particularly through the gift of faith in the one who is both scarred and risen.

    There is also such a thing as a bad death. Bad deaths involve denial, the clinging on to illusion and the refusal to face facts and to talk about it.

    The voice of the Bishop of Chichester in the recent IICSA public hearing bore all the hallmarks of a man preparing for a good death when it comes to matters of safeguarding in his diocese. There was an honest acceptance that the former practice of collusion, cover up and the abuse of power had come to an end. There was a clear expression of regret regarding the ‘thoughtlessness, pride and arrogance’ of the institution something which must have taken some courage to give voice to, considering that many of those who have behaved in exactly this way are still living.

    However, the good death will not come until the Church of England as a whole lets go of its independence regarding matters of safeguarding. This is the only way in which we will navigate another, not so comfortable death, that is taking place in society. The death of trust in the Church.

    We have been exposed and nothing short of a new and transparent system for dealing with matters of safeguarding (both historic and current) will do. The former Archbishop of Canterbury knows it and has said so. He knows it from the inside. He knows just how much of this stuff bishops are dealing with in their Dioceses and he knows how underqualified and compromised they feel under the weight of it all. Our present Archbishop has said he has learned to be ashamed again of the Church and was visibly moved  on camera, but this is not enough. For the victims of abuse, assurance of a different future is what is needed.

    To continue to cling onto our defunct systems, which have led to a spectacular break down in trust, would be just another step towards a very bad death indeed.

    Of course, what this requires is the relinquishing of power (as with any death), and for an institution that has enjoyed its privilege for hundreds of years this is a tough call.  Perhaps if we were to rediscover the subversive power of weakness as modelled by Christ himself on road to Golgotha we might find a place from which to find the confidence to let go. Humbling ourselves always hurts.

    Trust can be restored but it will take a good deal more than words; things need to change not just in matters of safeguarding, but in much of our self-understanding and practice within the Church. In a society now largely ignorant of our history and the privilege it has afforded us, the time has never been more right to take stock and rebrand. Shameless marketing speak I know; but the old model is no longer fit for purpose. The product is a timeless treasure, we are custodians of it and urgently need to change the way we go about our business.

    People often quote Charles Darwin as the one who coined the phrase ‘The survival of the fittest’, but this is a mistake. Darwin was far more intelligent than that. His theory was that it wasn’t the fittest (the most powerful) who survived, but the most adaptive.

    The environment has changed, and we need to adapt; and in doing so, some things need to be given a good death.

    In the final scene of the film ‘The Theory of Everything’ the character of professor Stephen Hawking brilliantly played by Eddie Redmayne, is asked the question – ‘You have said you do not believe in God, do you have a philosophy of life that helps you?’

    He responds ‘Where there is life there is hope’

    It received a standing ovation, but for those of us with faith in Christ, this is a rather bleak summary of the meaning of everything and not the best final word…… because we believe in Christ, we believe that ‘Where there is death, there is hope’.

    Perhaps it is time to put our faith to the test and start dying well?

  • St Francis – Suffering, Abuse of Power and the Love of God.

    by the Rt Revd Dr David Walker, Bishop of Manchester

    david w

    The popular image of St Francis of Assisi is that of a gentle lover of nature; a man who preached to the birds, tamed an aggressive wolf, and even picked up worms from the path so that they wouldn’t be trod upon. The love of Francis for every part of the creator’s handiwork lies at the heart of his spirituality. It’s one of the reasons why he continues to inspire me and many others, who make vows and promises within the Franciscan Orders, 800 years after he walked this Earth. Yet an equally important, if less immediately attractive, aspect of Francis’s Way is his deep devotion to the suffering Christ on the cross. As we enter the season of Passiontide, heading solemnly towards Holy Week, I believe this medieval saint has something profound to teach us.

    Late in his life, Francis prays one of the most challenging prayers I have ever come across. He asks that he might feel in his own body, as much as he can bear, the suffering of Jesus on the cross. If it had ended there, the prayer might be construed as belonging within the family of monastic masochism practised in the flagellant movements of his era. But Francis goes on. His desire to share in the suffering of his Lord is entirely in order that, thereby, he may experience in his body as much as he can bear of the love for which Christ willingly went to the cross. It’s that entering into the divine love of God for the world which is the heart of his prayer.

    Love is what matters, suffering is the price that it willingly pays.

    I don’t pretend to have anything approaching the spiritual depth of the saint whose example I attempt to follow. But, when I gaze at the figure of the crucified, I seek to look through and beyond the agony, and to encounter the love that saves the world.

    Debased theologies of suffering abound as much today as they did in Francis’s world. Often, they are associated with the maintenance of regressive imbalances of power. The poor and marginalised are told to see their plight as holy suffering. They are to accept their lot rather than to protest or rise up against it. Moreover, alongside this justification of the acceptance of generic oppression, the same corruptions of theology take place at a very individual level. I have read with horror of how some of the victims of Peter Ball testify that he groomed them for abuse by inviting them to embrace punishment and suffering as part of their spiritual growth, even alluding to St Francis as his example.

    I am more and more convinced that any understanding, religious or otherwise, of suffering which does not have the overwhelming love of God, shown in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, at its heart, runs the risk of offering camouflage for the exploitation of the weak by the ruthless. Yet Francis offers a better way. He has met in the face of his Lord on the cross, an invincible and overpowering love that no amount of suffering can sunder. Far from seducing him into stoicism, it fills him with compassion for the pains of others. He clothes the naked, embraces the leper, and undertakes a personal peace mission to end the crusades.

    May our devotions this Passiontide be grounded in love, pursued in love and graced by love, that like Francis, we may be formed more deeply in the image of Christ.

  • The Stonewalling of Sexual Abuse…

    by the Revd Dr Hayley Matthews, Director of Lay Training, Leeds Diocese

    Pam Ayers

    As a young child this limerick amused me no end, but as an ordained minister in the Church of England I’ve been bemused at the ready use of stonewalling in circumstances when one might expect ‘the very stones in the walls cry out against you [perpetrators]’ (Habbukuk 2:11) as we exercise our vocation to speak up and speak out for those who most need it.

    Running through the scriptures like a silken thread that cannot be a broken we are reminded time and again to ‘Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves; ensure justice for those being crushed.’ (Proverbs 31:8-9); directed as an imperative ‘Do not withhold good from those who deserve it, when it is in your power to act (Proverbs 3:27-28) and taught that an intrinsic part of our faithful discipleship of Christ is to ‘Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless [read powerful advocate, not ‘orphaned’] (Isaiah 1:17).

    It is notable to me that the prophetic, legalistic and pastoral texts all speak of our need to break impenetrable walls of silence that protect only those hidden behind them.  This reinforces the call as global, not just for some brave individuals who have particular prophetic calling, or social-justice activism.  This is an undergirding call to each and every Christian, irrespective of age, position, gender, status.  We are called to speak out for those suffering any form of injustice both within and beyond the walls of the Church.

    Having once found myself hemmed in by an actual dry-stonewall, I can attest to the utter frustration they add to a difficult journey. I had simply walked too far, for too long, and in my exhaustion thought I’d espied the next stile in the corner of an enormous field. The mud was deep and rain filled the footprints of those who had struggled through before me. With legs now shaking with exhaustion, I could have wept to discover that my eyes had failed me.  This wall was long, and high. ‘Fine,’ I thought, ‘I shall climb over it’ and in my defense, I can climb over most things given my army training. What I hadn’t accounted for was the skill of the dry-stone waller. Every stone was tightly packed to it’s neighbouring stones, and the smooth faces gave me no rough corner for a toe-hold. I pressed here and there to see if anything would give, if I could just get enough of a foothold to gain purchase, but nothing. Not even finger holds, so tightly packed were these stones. And so very cold, and silent. At that moment in time nothing felt more impervious to my (relative) suffering; the wall had nothing to give me and was incapable of resonating with or yielding to my plight. As I turned to survey the field, barely able to walk for cloying mud, all I could see were the two trajectories of wall as far as the eye could see, and no way out.

    I cannot begin to imagine how that transposes to the experience of a victim of sexual abuse with a person to whom one has turned in good faith.

    These walls of silence need to be dismantled and however painful the process for the institution, we need to be reminded that we are specifically called to ‘Rescue those who are being taken away to death; hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter. If you say, “Behold, we did not know this,” does not S/He who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not S/He who keeps watch over your soul know it, and will S/He not repay man according to his work? (Proverbs 24:11-12).  What could be more deadly than having one’s body and soul pillaged by one in whom we trusted?

    Lent is a time of fasting but giving up chocolate or alcohol or social media simply will not do.  ‘Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? (Isaiah 58:6).  Whether or not the timing of the IICSA is coincidental, there is no better time in the Church year to bring to light the sins of commission and omission through the use of stonewalling, addressing them – once and for all?  No, that is surely not what we would want.

    For the book of Amos yearns that ‘justice [will] roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream’ (Amos 5:24) – yes, historical justice must be done and closure brought to many who have remained trapped in a place where their journey towards healing, life and ongoing faith in the Church, others and even God could not continue. But we must work towards much, much more than that. This process needs the healing streams of ongoing justice to keep flowing that – God forbid – any further abuse takes place by or within the church, the victims of such abuses will know that they can and will receive justice.

    Perhaps then it will be time to build a new stonewall. One that refuses to allow injustices to persist, or to find a way through robust safeguarding procedures. A theological undergirding for all Christians that is not based on a naivety that lauds position, politics and presence – or even visibly good works – but one that looks to the heart of a matter, grasping the possibility that profoundly gifted individuals can also be deeply flawed and behave completely inappropriately.  Perhaps also a wider understanding that Christians – or people of any faith group – are not meant to perfect, but those who know better than most their need of God.

    Deuteronomy undergirds the religious underpinnings of five major faiths and in these words reside: ‘Cursed be anyone who perverts the justice due to the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’’ (Deuteronomy 27:19).  Far be it from me to curse anyone or anything, but may those appalling, unjust, silent stonewalls crumble to nothing.