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Tag: bullying

  • Winded After the Death of LLF

    by the Very Revd David Monteith, Dean of Canterbury

    Much metaphorical ink has already been spilt on the announcement from the House of Bishops of the death of Living in Love and Faith (LLF).  These reflections add nothing to that discourse but are an attempt to articulate something of what this announcement does to the likes of me as a person.  I had intellectually concluded months ago that LLF was terminally ill, but the actual death notice has a far deeper impact.

    Firstly, the document was issued about a process not about people.  It wasn’t in any way a pastoral letter to the church. I used to mark draft pastoral letters on ordinand selection conferences.  This would not have cut muster.  The same depersonalising dynamics have gone on at nearly every stage of this process.  This just doesn’t upset one or two people as Archbishop Stephen suggested. This is gut wrenching and hurtful for those of us most impacted. It seems there is need to return to a basic course in pastoral care.

    Secondly, this multiplies our shame which so many of us have and still experience as LGBT+ people in our families, churches and neighbourhoods. Dealing with internalised homophobia is often a life’s work for many of us, with the kindly welcome and acceptance by our Christian communities often being a key part of that healing. I found my life and heart constrict as I received this news once again; being told loudly and clearly that our minority lives and loves must remain marginal, hidden and uncatered-for like a vegetarian in 1980s France.

    Thirdly, I am asked to carry the public shame of this as a priest and in my case as the Dean of Canterbury.  Images of our cathedral accompany the press stories of ‘bishops do U-turns on gay blessing’ headlines. No matter what I do or say or no matter how I care or try to love others here, the iconography is clear: that LGBT+ people are never fully welcome here.  I am embarrassed and feel a deep sense of personal moral injury without even any remaining left-over crumbs to offer.

    Fourthly, the social media storms of recent days about our graffiti exhibition so often focussed on the fact that we worked with marginalised communities. This means I was ‘woke’ and what else was to be expected since I was in a gay relationship.  These vulnerable young people asked far from marginal questions; they were those all of us might ask. The haters piled in with force and now they have even more reason to pile in again. What could I say when these young folks asked me if the church excluded them? What could I honestly say?

    Fifthly, I realise that all this is so niche and of none or little concern to many people in the church, unlike for those in the wider world who mostly do not comprehend why love does not mean love.  None of my clergy colleagues have enquired as to how I am doing.  No one from the bishop’s staff on which I sit have said a word. None have even alluded to noticing that the bishops had issued their conclusions. Nothing.  We are invisible despite being present and our cares and concerns are best kept to our own little minority lives.

    Sixthly, this invisibility intensifies all the other experiences of invisibility. For example, when giving a talk and the last part of my biography is omitted; when a bishop asked me to make sure my partner was not around when certain clergy visited; when as a new Dean I didn’t get invitations from the county set because they didn’t want to invite my partner but were too polite to want to enact a social snub so didn’t invite me either. Being told directly never to mention my sexuality when dealing with visiting bishops from the Communion unless they brought it up, because many would see me as possessed. Talk about making me disappear. So many active processes, not just passive assumptions.

    Seventhly, there is little likelihood of anything improving and every likelihood of things getting much worse for LGBT+ people.  Many agree that it is now far harder for us in the church than it was 30+ years ago. The tide is turning in the world with gains in equality now being questioned and many, including me, are fearful that what we see with far-right parties elsewhere, we may see here too. From early in ministry, I learnt to respect bishops but not to trust them.  I couldn’t begin to make a list of the broken promises and quiet assurances that ‘all will be well’. When the chips are down for the church, both the institution and her leaders find us an easy victim to hurt in playing out politics of so-called normality. Why else was my sexuality highlighted when I was trying to uphold safeguarding during the departure of the last archbishop?  I don’t think we can trust the church to defend us if such a terrible day came. We would not justify care.

    Eighthly, I have bent over backwards over the years to be gracious and kind, to not walk away from the table, to become vulnerable in sharing my self in conversations and dialogue.  I have listened to those of a conservative view with grace.  I have watched them behave despicably in meetings, soaking up their violence against me and mine and so often with an annoying smile. Following Archbishop Rowan’s insight, I remember that unity is the quest which keeps on asking ‘who is not here?’ rather than ‘you do or do not belong’.  But it is exhausting and sapping of limited energies. Non-reciprocation of generosity breaks the relationship and yet apparently it is me bringing disunity to the church?

    Ninthly, many of us simply slog our guts out day in day out. This news has winded me and made me see that no significant change is likely in my life span. The sense of being an ‘alien in the household of God’ grows. As a Dean I spend a lot of energy on taking care not to demoralise our teams, despite the challenges, and to look forward hopefully.  There is no hope for significant change in the C of E with respect to LGBT+ people yet many of us are stuck having given our life to this ministry yet not being able to afford to retire nor having the heart to abandon our sense of calling.  Pay us all off to get rid of us and I may just rethink, if that is really where you want to head! Why, if you really do think that we are living without true repentance and are unworthy of blessings, do you not just get rid of us as that is the conclusion of the logic now received in this settled view ?

    Tenthly and finally, this is akin to a bereavement with all the usual feelings and thoughts.  I have no idea what to grieve well looks like in this situation. Of course, I can rely on the church and the bishops not to provide me with any assistance on that. In one theory of bereavement, key to recovery is to invest in the new future beyond the loss. The problem for me is that no new future is articulated in any way for LGBT+ people.  That which was perhaps previously imagined is killed off. The hollow words of apology never came to anything. Micro aggressions and visceral fear and anger continue to be experienced by us. The new Christian Inclusion is but fantasy. Apparently, as the bullies of old told me in school, I am to take it on the chin ‘like a man’ (clearly a heterosexual one) and just let these acts of violence and harm keep on coming.

    Perhaps the only lasting hope might be another victim who also had to take it – that is about all that remains.

     

  • A Peek under the Episcopal Carpet – Past Cases Review 2 and its Blind Spots

    by the Revd. Dr. Brenda Wallace, a former member of General Synod, an active member of Broken Rites, and part of the organising group of the Campaign for Equal Marriage

    Last week, without much fanfare, the Church of England published the Past Cases Review 2. This summarises the thorough investigation into past cases of abuse which have been “swept under the carpet” by church authorities across the country. Time and time again, the need to protect the ‘integrity’ of the organisation has been prioritised over the need to protect the individual victims of abuse.

    The report notes that: ‘The review of the 75,253 files within the scope of PCR2 was conducted by independent reviewers across the dioceses and other church bodies between July 2019 and April 2022. […]  The independent reviewers identified 383 new safeguarding cases relating to children and vulnerable adults’ (p. 11).

    The continued scandal of the sexual abuse of children and vulnerable adults in the Church of England has – rightly – received much attention in recent years, as the Church has been forced by IICSA to wash its dirty linen in public and admit to its persistent failures to protect its most vulnerable members. Despite much handwringing by Bishops and Archbishops, and in General Synod, there is still a long way to go, both to address and redress the past failings, and to create a safer church.

    I don’t want to minimise this appalling record of cover-up of the abuse of children and young people within the church. But I want to draw out two areas of abuse which continue to receive little or no acknowledgement in discussions about safeguarding.

    The first is around the whole issue of human sexuality. Sexual orientation is a protected characteristic under equality legislation. Yet the Church has continued to allow discrimination against LGBTIQA+ members. In over 400 pages, the Living in Love and Faith book only mentions safeguarding twice, briefly, and in both cases, in relation to children. There is no comment on the constant abuse, marginalisation, and exclusion that many gay people receive in their churches and in social media. Pressure by some individuals and organisations for churches to be exempt from proposed government legislation to ban conversion therapy highlights the safeguarding issues and the danger that young people are in within certain church traditions, where attempts to ‘cure’ them of their supposedly aberrant sexuality continue to be practised.

    When the LLF discussions were taking place last year, the Campaign for Equal Marriage ran a series of workshops where those sympathetic to our aims could have a conversation within a safe space about the LLF Report. We heard numerous stories of individuals who had not felt that discussions within their Diocese or local church were a safe space for them to be, and that the Pastoral Principles which were supposed to provide protection were frequently ignored. While taking part in the national Safeguarding training required regularly for all licensed clergy, I raised the question of safeguarding for LGBTIQA+ people within church contexts. Those delivering the course looked puzzled that I even raised the question, and quickly replied that it was not part of the training. Of course, all young people and vulnerable adults need to be protected within the church, but an awareness of the particular vulnerability of young LGBTIQA+ people in our churches appears not to feature.

    The PCR2 report briefly mentions bullying (p. 107), quoting from a case of a priest who was persistently bullied by a member of the congregation and was forced out of post, which the church authorities dealt with inadequately. But there is no mention of numerous recent cases where gay, partnered priests were forced by Bishops to relinquish their licences and their posts because of their desire to marry their partners, the alternative being to live in enforced celibacy. The lack of pastoral care for clergy in many such cases, and the attempts of church authorities to suppress complaints, is well documented. This is yet another area where safeguarding is inadequate, and the institution is protected in preference to the individual.

    The second area which I would like to highlight is the issue of domestic abuse within clergy marriages. This does indeed get a mention in the PCR2 report – three whole pages (pp. 102 ff.)! It wryly notes that ‘The number of domestic abuse cases seems low for the size of the organisation and where allegations are made there is an inconsistent approach to investigating and identifying risks. There were cases where no final outcome was recorded, which could suggest that risks were left unmanaged, and no safeguarding was put in place’ (p. 103).

    In this context, I am writing as a member of Broken Rites, a charity providing mutual support when clergy marriages fall apart, founded in 1983 at the initiative of Frank Field MP. We are an ecumenical organisation with members from other UK Church denominations; it’s obvious that this is not just an Anglican issue. Our broken and bruised members, victims of failed clergy marriages, tell time and time again of the way in which the circumstances of their breakdown have been swept under the carpet by church authorities. These spouses, the majority of whom are women, have often suffered decades of physical or emotional abuse, coercive control, or narcissistic behaviour. Others have seen their marriage ripped apart by adulterous relationships by their priest partner. While marriage breakdown is always painful, it is particularly so for clergy spouses who have to leave their home in the vicarage, their own role within the church and its supportive network, and fight for financial support for themselves and any children. Some have to find paid employment for the first time, after many years of faithfully supporting their clergy partner’s parish work. Whatever their situation, they face being forced out of most of their familiar settings to make a fresh start, while recovering from the trauma of an abusive or broken relationship.

    The Church does now make some practical support and financial provision for separated clergy spouses, but the support is patchy and poorly signposted, and inconsistent across the country. In many cases, the offending priest gets to stay in post and in the clergy house, whilst the spouse is the one to move out. Even more patchy is the pastoral and emotional support for the departing spouse. Once again, the Church protects its own and has prioritised the safeguarding of the Church’s reputation rather than the individual. This is not the space to tell my own story, simply to note that I talk from personal experience.

    The stories we hear through Broken Rites are only a few – the stories of women and men who have had the courage to break away, despite the emotional and financial cost. We have no idea how many more continue to suffer because of the pressure to hold on to their marriage vows no matter what, and because of the lack of awareness of the problems by church authorities. Allegations of abuse by their partners have been repeatedly ignored or downplayed.

    PCR2 has taken a peek under the carpet and found a massive pile of debris. But, if you will excuse the mixed metaphor, there’s still an awful lot of muck left in the Augean stable under the episcopal floor-covering.