Updated: Spiritual leader of global Anglican Communion resigns amid sex abuse cover-up
News Story by Cassy Benefield | FāVS News
Updated 11/12/24 8:30 p.m. to include comments from The Episcopal Diocese of Spokane’s Bishop Gretchen Rehberg.
Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby resigned Tuesday (Nov. 12) after admitting he knew about several years of physical and sexual abuse by a volunteer at Christian summer camps, which he failed to report to authorities.
Welby, head of the Church of England, originally said he was not going to resign, despite knowing about this abuse since 2013. However, pressure had been increasing since Nov. 7, when an investigation into the matter released its findings.
“It is very clear that I must take personal and institutional responsibility for the long and retraumatising period between 2013 and 2024,” Welby said in a statement on the archbishop’s website.
Local reaction
As part of the Anglican Communion, Welby oversaw The Episcopal Diocese of Spokane and its 38 congregations, as a spiritual leader, but one without authority.
When Bishop Gretchen Rehberg of the local Diocese, heard about Welby’s resignation, she was surprised, she said, adding that when she read his statement, she realized there was more to the story.
“In his statement, he says that he knew about the allegations of abuse but also he had been told that the perpetrator had been reported to the police, and so he ‘believed wrongly that an appropriate resolution would follow,'” Rehberg wrote in an email FāVS. “I can have sympathy for a leader who expects others in authority to properly execute their own duties.”
She said Welby did the right thing in resigning, as he had the responsibility to see the matter carried though.
Welby hoped the decision showed the world that the Church of England understood the need for change and for creating a safer church.
“As I step down I do so in sorrow with all victims and survivors of abuse,” he said.
The Makin Review
The 251-page report of the Makin Review showed that soon after Welby became the Archbishop of Canterbury in 2013, he knew about John Smyth’s abuse.
“The abuse at the hands of John Smyth was prolific and abhorrent,” said Keith Makin, the independent reviewer of the abuse, in a press release. “Words cannot adequately describe the horror of what transpired.”
Makin said many of the victims who took “the brave decision to speak to us about what they experienced have carried this abuse silently for more than 40 years.”
Smyth sexually, psychologically and physically abused about 30 boys and young men in the United Kingdom and 85 in Africa beginning in the 1970s until he died in 2018, the AP reports.
Bishop Rehberg’s final thoughts
Rehberg minced no words calling abuse in any form, especially toward the most vulnerable, abhorrent and not to be accepted.
“I am grieved that the Church, in all its various forms, has not been and is not now always a place where all of God’s beloved children are kept safe,” she said.
In answering the question, why does this kind of abuse happen and why does it often get covered up, Rehberg responded with one word: patriarchy.
She went on to say this is something that happens beyond church walls and crosses into cultures and other institutions.
“I fundamentally believe that patriarchy is a disease that infects our cultures and institutions that leads to abuse,” she said.
Reminds of the LDS (Mormon) church and Boy Scouts of America. Now I notice an LDS sexual abuser website: FLOODLIT.org — clever after the movie titled Spotlight that exposed the Catholic church sexual abuse coverups on the East Coast. Recently (this year) the Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles agreed to pay 880 million to victims. I like the idea of a website, like those we can look at to see where sexual predators live in the neighborhood. Knowledge is good.
Also, both the LDS and Catholic churches use their vast wealth to fight mandatory clergy sexual abuse reporting in Idaho, Utah, Arizona and Nevada. Not great for protecting kids, the separation of church and state, or the church who (hopefully) pays in the end.
I am stewing on a column about the ills of purity culture, which is a large contributor to the problem of ecclesiastical abuse. That, and the appalling lack of good human biology education. I’d love to column brainstorm with you Cassy when I get ready, as I think the topic is important.
Totally! Anytime. Have you checked out my story about the “Sons of Patriarchy” podcast? That should help the brainstorming too. Also, this story about the Archbishop of Canterbury was just updated to include The Episcopal Diocese of Spokane Bishop’s comments.