Tuesday, 17 December 2024

Culpable naivety?

Mostly cloudy with intermittent showers throughout the day but mild at 11C. After breakfast Clare walked to the School of Optometry to order new prescription specs. I listened to the final Reith Lecture, this week from Bergen in Norway. Dr Gwen Adshead spoke about Norway's penal system citing its low re-offending rate, humane imprisonment conditions and above all the number of offenders whose lives are changed for the better as they get to understand why they offended in the first place. Money is invested not in bigger and better prisons, but in psychotherapy and where possible restorative justice initiatives. It's altogether more cost effective than the British penal system. 

I made a couple of loaves of bread and prepared lunch. I did some writing while waiting for the dough to rise. It went into the oven when we'd eaten and was baked as we got ready to drive to Chris' salon in Rumney for a haircut. While Chris did Clare's hair I walked around the lake in Parc Trederlech, and got caught in the rain. Fortunately the salon was warm enough for my top coat to dry out by the time we left for home. It was already dark and still raining and the journey was slow and difficult in rush hour traffic. I hate driving in these conditions, fearful of making a mistake, but so far fortunately, I've been able to do it without accident or incident that annoys other drivers.

When we got home I went out with my new brolly in the rain for a few things we needed from Tesco's. Clare went off to meditation group and I completed my daily step quota walking up and down Llandaff Fields in the dark. After supper, I watched another episode of 'Strike'. All of them are on iPlayer even though it's being screened live, two episodes this week and two next. 

In the evening news, a report from a new media investigation into historic cases of abusive clergy under the leadership of Archbishop George Carey has implicated him in case of the abusive cleric about whom Archbishop Stephen Cotterell is currently under criticism and facing resignation calls. On Carey's watch, Bishop Peter Ball abused a series of young men and was eventually jailed. After a long drawn out review of historic abuse cases Carey was asked to resign as an honorary assistant Bishop by his successor Justin Welby, now resigning himself.  

Carey was granted a local PTO, restricting him from the wider ministry senior church leaders often have in retirement. Now it seems he's withdrawn from public ministry entirely, returning the PTO he held. At his advanced age it's not exactly a surprise. Ill health could just as easily lead to him taking this step. But it takes him out of the media firing line, and further criticism that could lead to his PTO being taken away from him. No doubt he regrets errors of judgement made when he was in charge finding that he, like many other church leaders was taken in by Ball's charm and piety. It seems Carey supported the reinstatement plea of a priest banned for five years due to inappropriate behaviour, but not yet charged for child abuse.

I imagine Carey acted in the belief that if offenders had been punished, shown repentance and changed behaviour they should be given another chance, presuming the person's honesty and sincerity. But how well informed was he, and Cotterell for that matter, about the deceitful behaviour of sex offenders who haven't undergone therapy. Whose advice did they rely on?  Church Safeguarding policy has only arrived in the aftermath of the Peter Ball affair, the church playing catch up on secular organisations and learning to listen to professionals in the realm of care and protection of children and vulnerable adults. 

Looking back a few generations, clergy weren't as well trained in care for people as they imagined. Maybe only good at looking out for each other in the ecclesiastical boys club. Thank heavens things have begun to change, not least because of capable women  and some with disability included in the ordained ministry. More steps in the church becoming what it's meant to be. So sad that so many have given up belonging. The news describes Carey as having 'left the church', equating church with its clergy. In reality it's the laity that has left the church, having lost confidence in its ministers, and maybe its message too, if they ever understood it well in the first place.

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