Updated
The trial of Chris Brain on multiple charges arising from the Nine O’Clock Service has led to the following outcomes:
A further hearing is scheduled for 4 September, to determine if there are grounds for a retrial on any of the latter charges.
The Church of England has issued these statements: Statements following the trial of Chris Brain, the founder of the Nine O’Clock Service in Sheffield.
The Diocese of Sheffield has this: Statement from the Bishop of Sheffield following the trial of Chris Brain
South Yorkshire Police has: Former priest guilty of multiple sexual offences following SYP investigation
Update
Crown Prosecution Service has: Former vicar convicted for rape and sexual assaults connected to his nightclub ‘Nine O Clock service’
Note: this headline has now been amended.
Why did this take so long to be reported (when was it first reported), investigated & prosecuted? (Genuine question)
Well worth asking. The events happened in the 1980s and early 90s, and were quite well documented by the mid-90s – there was a TV programme and a book.
From a CofE perspective lessons should have been learned 30 years ago.
Reading the police statement it was 2019 when the police were informed. I think women did complain at the time but were dismissed within NOS and the Diocese as being liars or ill or just nasty. I imagine it has taken great courage to put themselves out there again and believe there would be justice of a sort for themselves and others affected.
The scandal received a huge amount of media attention in 1995. The police could have investigated then, I suppose, as they would certainly have been aware of it. But Me Too has made a huge difference to how women’s reports of sexual predation. We still have some way to go, but the climate in 2025 is thankfully very different than it was in 1995.
Do bishops still have the power to fast track ordination? Do they have the power to override ABM selection conference recommendations? Surely if they have those powers, that ought to change?
good question. Are there any other examples of respectable organisations where a senior figure can just push their personal favourites and override the established processes? It surely doesn’t need a review which won’t even be set up for weeks yet to ensure NOW that this can’t happen.
Are academy schools respectable? There are a *lot* of stories like this.
I’m immediately thinking of the UK Government – Prime Ministers can appoint whoever they like as Secretaries of State and Ministers. No doubt many ministers over the years have been appointed against the advice and wishes of others. For my own part, I think it’s a good thing that the ultimate decision and responsibility to ordain someone rests in a single visible person, the bishop. they usually taking the advice of the BAP panel and the C of E’s committee systems are opaque enough as it is. At least we know in this case who made the (very bad) misjudgement… Read more »
But the Prime Minister is in charge. It’s an autocratic set up. The church isn’t supposed to be. By all means just decide that Bishops are In Charge. And abolish all the other costly, arse-covering, mechanisms which can so lightly (and disastrously) be set aside. Let the Bishops and their young chums have a cosy fireside chat, over a glass of sherry, like something out of Antony Trollope.
In any event, the Prime Minister can’t appoint who they like. For practical purposes (it’s the old “unwritten constitution” again) they have to be either an MP, which means elected by the general public, or they have to be a member of the House of Lords, which for any new appointment means they need to have passed through the House of Lords Appointments Commission. The exceptions are excepted hereditary peers and the Lords Spiritual, but neither seems an immediately fruitful avenue for corruptly appointing your mates. Of course, you can accuse the HoLAC of being a puppet of the incumbent… Read more »
I believe Canterbury, York and London are automatically privy counsellors. Historically, of course, bishops were frequently members of the Council and held high office in the king’s government.
Many thanks! An intriguing idea – as many will know, there are the three prelates (Canterbury, York and London) who are sworn of the privy council upon appointment, by convention. I am struggling to think of any other prelate who has been sworn of the council since the diplomat, John Robinson (then bishop of Bristol) was made lord privy seal in 1711 (he was translated to London in 1714): that was the last time a bishop was made a minister, but then Anne’s reign was characterised by strange things happening ‘for the last time’. Of course, the CNC exists only… Read more »
With memories of Justin Welby’s tone-deaf valedictory speech to the House of Lords as Archbishop, I doubt he will ‘prudently decide not to take a peerage’.
I would love an answer to this as I became aware of something similar happening in the 90’s.
The short answer is yes. Ministry selection panels are advisory, and their recommendations are treated with great seriousness, but decisions about who will be ordained and the meeting of requirements for training are, in the end, in the hands of bishops. Eyebrows were raised, for example, at the speed of the ordination of the wife of the last archbishop of York. Pushing people through is rarely a good idea, as the Brain case shows.
Yes they do and fast tracking happens (very) occasionally. Bishops differ about overruling BAP recommendations. Some will never do this as a matter of principle. Others take each case on its merits – and I’ve seen some BAP disasters where, e.g. the advisors muddled two candidates up or were not up to speed on matters of theology when the candidate was – so they dismissed her as arrogant. Likewise if a TEI declines to recommend a candidate for ordination (as Chris Brain’s tutor did – I don’t know if this was the decision of the whole staff) a bishop can… Read more »
Questions have also been asked about Bishop Andy John and the ordination of Sion Rhys Evans, erstwhile sub-Dean of Bangor Cathedral, apparently against recommendation.
Charles, you would presumably have seen Brain without his entourage, and he evidently made some effort to impress you. But anyone who saw Brain going round with his escort of ‘Lycra lovelies’ should have known something was wrong. Male spiritual leaders are not usually accompanied by a bevy of attractive young women. Brain and a group of young women, all dressed in tight black clothing, turned up once at a St. Michael-le-Belfrey staff lunch. It was clear to me that something was amiss, and I think it ought at least have caused others to ask some questions. One of the… Read more »
“It was clear to me that something was amiss” I say this not as a “gotcha”, but as a genuine question: what did you feel you could or could not do about it? It strikes me that the power that such people obtain is a sort of reality distortion field, in which lots of people genuinely felt unease at the time, but no-one felt there was anything they could do. They somehow subvert the whole process. Some of the people saying that they knew Savile was a wrong ‘un are self-serving, but most of the accounts are entirely genuine and… Read more »
In answer to your question, I didn’t feel I could do anything about it. I can’t remember whether or not I said I thought Brain was creepy and rude, but I doubt it. It wouldn’t have made any difference, and I knew that. I was very low on the totem pole and no one was going to listen to my inconvenient opinion.
The common denominator is cultural transition. Every so often big societal changes happen which appear to drive themselves rather than being the result of controllable factors. Then the powers that be look to re-connect with the changed society. And they are inevitably drawn to people who are immersed in the new, have links to the old, and for their own reasons want to bridge the two. Sometimes those reasons are good, sometimes self-serving. But because the societal changes were not anticipated and it’s not clear what will happen next, such people temporarily have immense cultural prestige – they do seem… Read more »
There’s a lot in what you say, but it’s clear Brain wasn’t operating instinctively. He was deliberate and calculated.
I think the dominant factor in how Brain, Pilavachi, Ball etc managed to get away with it, is how often leading figures in the Church are obsessed with ‘success’ – and they see success in terms of numbers. Then it’s easy to assume that numbers of followers or converts, particularly among the young, is a sign of God’s blessing. And if God is blessing someone’s work, they must be OK… I don’t see any biblical warrant for that.
Was he always calculating? Or did he start out with a vision for bringing the gospel to people whose lives were distant from the church? Then was he overwhelmed by the culture he was engaging with? If the latter, was he also a victim of the church not asking difficult questions? Did anyone realise he was navigating two very different worlds and try to support him? If there were problems with his training, shouldn’t they have been escalated to a higher level, given the important work he was doing? And shouldn’t someone senior have sat down with him and explained… Read more »
Apparently, he first wanted to be a rock star. He was in a band when he first went to St Thomas Crookes, but the band wasn’t as successful as he wanted. So he identified rave-style services as a way to bring him the success and attention he craved. Some witnesses have said he was sleeping around before he ever started NOS.
It seems to have been a case of a wolf identifying a pasture full of tasty sheep, rather than an innocent being led astray by the world he was valiantly trying to take the gospel to.
Yes, and is it not also the result of a kind of humility (misplaced, as it turns out) in trying to be open to something unconventional rather than only approving what is traditional anglican? One can imagine a bishop thinking “well i’d never want to attend that church but i must try to be open minded”
Yes, I do think the openness to new things is a plus. But it needs to be accompanied by discernment, and it was clearly dodgy for Brain to surround himself with young women in the way he did.
If theology is not the bedrock of the churches teaching in parishes, then we shouldn’t be surprised when these things happen. Building a church on sand is not a good idea!
Good theology doesn’t prevent predators from targeting vulnerable people. Whatever your brand of ‘good theology’, there’s an abuser who believed and taught it.
No, it isn’t hard. You have a simple ‘don’t touch rule’, especially between men and women. A married man should never be lying down in a room and with a woman who isn’t his wife, unless she’s a physiotherapist. Not rocket science. Every school teacher knows these rules. Billy Graham did.
But good theology should help lay people hold ordained clergy to account. It shouldn’t just rely on bishops.
I think that’s a brilliant insight. Janet makes the point below that she thinks that, in the case of Brain, it was calculated; I think that’s one option, but as you suggest, the other is that he was genuine to start with and then became bad, in part because of flaws in his character, in part because of poor management, mentorship, formation, etc. I cannot remember who misquoted Lord Acton to say that all power corrupts, but absolute power gives you a terrible headache by Tuesday (was it Henry Kissinger? Willy Rushton? I don’t know). But if someone starts out… Read more »
The evidence just doesn’t support the view that Brian was genuine to begin with and then became corrupted.
In which case, you really do have to ask how it all happened. Why was the fact that he wasn’t genuine not spotted and acted upon? From what I’m reading in this thread, plenty of people at ground level saw he was a wrong ‘un, but…something.
They were afraid of him. Also, the Archdeacon liked the edgy riffs in Brain’s “theology”, so much more interesting than old fashioned charismatic evangelicalism, and gave a good deal of money to NOS. And people like John Rogerson had preached at NOS, so Brain had some (borrowed) intellectual street cred among those who are impressed by university theology.
I suppose whether Brain was initially genuine is between him and God. For the rest of us, it may have little practical consequence. A service designed to reach out to clubbers clearly had the potential to reach people who were not interested in conventional churches, so as an idea it was right to explore. But it begs the question of how it would actually differ from a night club. Which comes down to preaching and teaching, liturgy, leadership, and perhaps the music itself – do different musical styles convey particular messages, regardless of the accompanying words? Given the potential impact… Read more »
Or he might have been to begin with – but was basically a superficial person without much self-awareness who was flattered by those around him, including those in authority who were afraid of him. That includes the Archdeacon. He certainly lacked some obvious Christian graces such as humility to his spiritual elders (did he recognise any?) and grace toward those who thought differently. He was manifestly a very arrogant young man who manipulated emotionally weak people. You also have to reckon with the fact that postmodern liberal theology has long attacked conventional evangelical mores as ‘puritanical’ and ‘repressive’, expressing ‘fear… Read more »
There is no evidence that Brain was genuine to begin with, and there is evidence that he wasn’t. Nor was his vicar, Robert Warren, a postmodern liberal denigrating those with a ‘fear of the body’. It wasn’t about liberalism or catholicism, it was about people who were so obsessed with church growth that they overlooked any doubts they might have had about those who could put bums on seats. That was a criticism levelled at the Church Growth Movement from its inception in the late 60s/early 70s. I think the real lesson is that if people look like fulfilling our… Read more »
Tragically, this is the story of Jimmy Savile: he purported to reach a youth audience David Jacobs couldn’t, and therefore credulous BBC managers convinced themselves that “the talent” was so vital that anything he did was acceptable. It’s more and more apparent that plenty of people knew, and some of those spoke up, but management wouldn’t listen. Seeing photographs of Chris Brain leaving court, he looks like a Woolworths Russell Brand, who is another hideous charlatan who fooled producers into thinking he was the voice of youth.
Agreed. One other factor these cases have in common: the CofE provides a fertile environment in which to develop convoluted justifications for behaviours that are just wrong. So Brain’s conspicuous rudeness, which was publicly evident, should have been dealt with and that might have curtailed some of the other stuff. But it wasn’t, in part because of a lot of guff about leadership styles etc. Meanwhile, over at Iwerne, why didn’t someone ask why they were running camps exclusively for kids at Britain’s most expensive schools, when the founder of Christianity so identified with the poor, the humble and meek?… Read more »
You are attributing to me things I didn’t say. I never said Robert Warren was a postmodern liberal, he wasn’t, though I think he fancied himself as a kind of guru on growth and mission with some insight into the spiritual state of modern Britain. But Brain definitely acquired a kind of postmodern liberalism and the memes I quoted on “fear of the body” and overcoming one’s “repression” were exactly the kind of stuff that Brain was coming out with. Liberalism has long condemned evangelicalism for being puritanical snd repressive, and evangelicals themselves have become ashamed of teaching purity in… Read more »
I’m more inclined to think 80% of the problems we encounter in modern society come directly from the failure to follow New Testament economic morality, about which Jesus had a great deal more to say than he did about sex.
The facts are against you. First, Jesus said adultery in your heart was just as bad as the act – that really offended a lot of people. Second, many more people proportionately were much poorer in AD 30 than they are today, the gulf between rich and poor was much wider than today, and slavery was very common. Just about everyone is much richer today. I was referring of course to pre-marital pregnancy, abortion, children born out of wedlock, childhood poverty caused by abandonment, STDs, the failure of so many to form stable marriages today, sexual abuse of women, the… Read more »
Under LLF, no one will be able teach biblical sexual morality due to a certain ‘coyness’, we are told.
To be fair to +Alan at St Albans he was very aware that Soul Survivor Watford was in need of finding a ‘regularised’ place in the diocese and C of E. Although planted from a C of E church SSW was an independent entity (and independent-minded!) with little external accountability. +Alan had inherited a wider situation in the diocese (I think he arrived in 2009) where relationships between evangelicals and diocesan leadership were very poor, so it was no small achievement to bring SSW into the fold by persuading Mike Pilavachi to get ordained, along with other team leaders, MP… Read more »
LBJ, and others, have been quoted as preferring people on the periphery of their party to be on the inside pissing out than on the outside pissing in. In that sense, bringing charistmatic preachers in non-aligned churches into the CofE, where they are subject to the strictures of internal governance and safeguarding, is a good thing. Just so long as everyone remembers that the purpose _is_ to impose discipline and discipline, not to ignore it as “they’re special”, Because everyone also needs to remember that they have just bought in to significant reputational risk, which means the governance needs to… Read more »
I was under the impression that if a bishop overuled then the responsibility for placing the ordinand in their title post was theirs.
Responsibility? Not a v Anglican concept I suspect.
And in the situation I was aware of, the bishop did not inform the training incumbent that the priest had not been recommended, nor did he offer any support when the priest publicly started opposing his vicar!
Lesson for all bishops: don’t fast track anyone to ordination. If they are God’s greatest gift to the CofE, it won’t do any harm to them to study another year or two and continue to learn. I know …it costs money, but well worth it. Does RC Church fast track ordination? Not sure, but generally they study for longer I think. Study before ordination should be lengthened if anything, not shortened imo.
Did anyone proofread the CofE statement?
“The conviction of Chris Brain on 17 counts of indecent assault has resulted in lasting damage to their lives.”
Is this meant literally? The conviction has resulted in lasting damage?
Well, no.
If I may:
“The indecent assault on the women by Chris Brain, who was convicted on 17 counts, has resulted in lasting damage to their lives, and were an appalling abuse of power in leadership. This should never have happened.”
Still grammatical problems; were in the second line should be was.
Oh dear- they left the ‘more’ out. In reply to Shamus, just search Soul Survivor online .A great deal of money has been thrown at this more recent scandal in the shape of a KC enquiry and the leader, the fast tracked Rev Canon Mike Pilavachi has resigned his licence and slipped into the shadows , but that seems to be about it- presumably for the next 15 years or so when the bishops involved have retired with their pensions, unless of course just maybe the next similar case emerges ? But Synod was manipulated into rejecting independent safeguarding see… Read more »
It just shows how little care they take over these statements – though the Bishop of Sheffield’s was rather better than most.
We ought to be able to expect a bishop to do better than ‘The conviction of Chris Brain on 17 counts of indecent assault has resulted in lasting damage to their lives’.
I despair at these statements. “We are truly sorry”; what, as opposed to not-really-that-sorry? More independent reviews, which ”can identify where lessons can be learned”; but we have seen so many cases in which somebody uses their charm, impresses the hierarchy by bringing in ‘young’ people, and/or is fast-tracked to ordination. And then their actions are covered up for years, or decades. Two points seem to me to stand out: first, that we should not be so gullible as to be seduced by those who try to appeal to the ‘young’, and second that it is very difficult not to be charmed… Read more »
Yes indeed. And looking across most recently to Texas it is not only Anglicans who are easily deluded. If it looks too good to be true it probably is. But we are (some of us are) so keen to bring about a transformation in engagement and numbers that common sense is suspended, or I suppose trust is placed in the Spirit to make sure all is well. Hmmm…
‘We are truly sorry’ is the form of words used in the Common Worship confession during Holy Communion. I agree it would have been better had the statement said ‘We acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, which we from time to time most grievously have committed.’
Having been at his selction conference and seen his pride, and having heard from assistant clergy from his parish in Sheffield, and from his tutors at his theological training, there were oportunities to stop him. His theology was heretical (matthew Fox and gaia nonsense), others wrote his essays, neither his conference nor his training recommended him for training and ordination… the existing congregation expressed concerns… This is about the hubris of the bishop and archbishop and the way he sucked htem in and spat them out, all in the name of chasing success and getting young people in what purported… Read more »
Maungy Vicar,
It is very concerning to read that neither his selection conference nor training course (NOC) recommended him, yet he was ordained anyway. Do you know this for a fact? I have read that a theology graduate said he wrote his essays for him, so his certificate should be cancelled.
After quite a long time in active ministry and a few years in retirement I’ve come to the conclusion that an essential training course for priests should be a week long residential on ‘How people manage to pull the wool over your eyes”. On “preferrment’ Bishops should be required to do an additional fortnight.
Excellent idea. And the course should include a section on being aware of your own vulnerabilities and how bad actors might prey on them.
I despair that we are here again and no lessons were learned from the NOS shambles. Instead we have Soul Survivor mirroring much of the behaviour and on and on we go. A BBC programme about NOS from years ago challenged the then Bishop and Archdeacon who came across as out of touch, shady and ridiculous. Nothing has changed sadly. I suspect there is no real intention to change as too many people in influential positions have too many skeletons waiting to be uncovered. I think Chat GPT would do better statements than these nauseating attempts at sincerity – words… Read more »
I note the entry in Wikipedia for David Lunn, +Sheffield 1980-97, and his ‘strong leadership’, recognised by the University of Sheffiled by the award in 1997 of an honorary LL.D (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Lunn).
Thank- you for the link .He was apparently also anti the ordination of women . What you didn’t share with us was that said ‘strong leadership’ was needed to heal the wounds resulting from the collapse of the NOS.Small wonder the poor victims – who presumably failed to get the message that they were healed -took till 2019 to get response from the police.
He also had a bad attitude towards his clergy who were gay. He sat in the congregation of my friends funeral and was not welcome there after his appalling treatment of him. He did not seem very pastoral. Not sure but once again the institution has protected its own until outside agencies have stepped in to call things to account.
So they are truly sorry which means that they want us to move on & forget about it as soon as pssible.
Of course he was fast tracked & all red flags ignored. After all it was thanks to him that the bishop got to confirm 95 people in one session, which confers serious episcopal bragging rights.
The Times is reporting that women who attended the NOS were told not to go to the Police and not to speak to the media. One woman did see Bishop Lunn in 1992 to discuss her concerns. He had been told by other NOS congratulation members that she had issues with drugs and her mental health and she found him rude and arrogant.
The comments in this thread have been absolutely magnificent from everyone. My fear is that a mixed verdict could be used by the Death Eaters and NYE clones in ABC and the National Safeguarding team to prevent both a massive class action on behalf of the survivors and their families and also the spectre of the Ecclessiastical Insurance Group placing victims whose evidence did not result in conviction under a huge burden of aggresive cross examination. My other question is if victims apply for the new internally developed Redress scheme whether acceptance of any settlement prevents civil action for vicarious… Read more »
“Brain will do 15-20 years hopefully” He won’t. The sentencing range for historic indecent assaults is complex, but is typically done by comparison with the sentencing for current sexual assault offences under the 2003 Sexual Offences Act. The maximum for a post-1985 indecent assault on a woman, under a Sexual Offences Act 1956, would be ten years. Looking across to the post-2003 guidance, it could be the most severe Category 1, on the grounds of severe psychological harm, and it’s almost certainly Culpability A as abuse of trust. Even so, a barrister might like to try the defence that he… Read more »
Thanks interested observer. In Australia it would be likely that given the multiple charges against multiple victims sentencing may be calculated differently either cumulative or concurrent. Multiple trials of separate victims are more usual . UK criminal law and sentencing may be different. It may soon change if due to the deadlocked jury Brain faces retrial on some dismissed charges. In my more emotive post you commented on I was likely being reactive without thorough research. If the Rape charges that were deadlocked were re litigated would a longer sentence be a possibility. The serious implications of Richard Scorer’s commencement… Read more »
It would be open to a judge to sentence consecutively rather than concurrently. We might hope, but I would be surprised. Rape has a maximum sentence of life, and always has done. So yes, were the case to come to court again, and he be convicted, all options would be open to the judge. But given the total absence of forensic evidence and the time that has passed, it is a miracle that a jury was able to reach a verdict on even half of the indecent assult charges. I doubt a retrial on the rape charge — even as… Read more »
The CPS will receive a report from prosecuting counsel which will inform the decision on whether or not to seek a retrial. Generally it will do so once but not if there is a second hung jury.
Mr Brain admitted some of the massages he received were sexual in nature. The issue seems to have been whether the victims /complainants consented. If this is the issue in the rape allegation I would imagine there will be a retrial given its gravity.
The Terms of Reference for the Safeguarding Practice Review (SPR), formerly known as Lessons Learned Review (LLR), announced by the diocese of Sheffield will be critical. The Statement notes: ‘The detail and scope of this will be decided in the Autumn, but will examine our safeguarding responses, culture, and processes so that we can identify where lessons can be learned and strengthen best practice for the future.’ Will the ‘detail and scope’ include why it has taken until 2025, and a public trial (understandably it could not have happened during the police investigation) for a Review about the NOS even to begin? The NOS was shut… Read more »
One darkly comical part of the book about NOS is Brain’s conversion to liberalism. At a stroke the diocese thought he was even more fantastic since they got the same great evangelism with less of the evo theology, like a religious form of Miller Light; and he no longer had to square his behaviour with conventional interpretations of scripture. Pages 88-89 of the book describe the NOS event at Greenbelt 1992. “There were aspects of the service which the audience found disturbing. The use of erotic lyrics in worship (‘Come inside me’) raised eyebrows and the presence of black lycra… Read more »
As an academic who studies religion, I took an interest in NOS at the time, and have spoken to several people involved since. This interesting thread has covered a lot of the relevant points, so here are a few additional ones. John Wimber was the big influence at the start of NOS, Matthew Fox at end. After all the scars of Hillsborough 1989, the pit closures, riots, steel mills closing, here was a success story, that church and city needed. The Diocese were defensive, angry and ashamed to be exposed as the hosts of an unpleasant ‘cult’. As with Peter… Read more »
It is good to have Linda Woodhead’s confirmation of what I had heard some years ago that plans to have a Review of the NOS in the Hope/Carey years were dropped/suppressed. The refusal to face the legacy of the NOS must form part of the Terms of Reference.
It is hard to remember what life was like in the late 1980s/early 1990s, particularly as the people who are senior now would have been junior then. One indirect source of how things were is the Osborne Report on homosexuality (available eg https://thinkinganglicans.org.uk/uploads/osborne_report.pdf). Today paragraph 295(e) is almost unthinkably shocking. The concern of bishops about scandal is reported in appendix 1 – para 357(ii). The whole report paints a picture of a very different world. It has taken scandals (more than one) to force the church to face the moral bankruptcy of what was seen as banal normality. The report… Read more »
thank you Linda, a really helpful few notes that give an insight into how things were dealt with “back then”.
It reminds me of that senior Irish policeman saying as a justification that abuse allegations against priests were covered up as the truth would destroy the Church
One of the difficulties of the CofE’s de facto latitudinarianism is that we’re trained to suppress our sense of “something amiss” to avoid it being triggered by differences in worship practices. I can well imagine that senior clergy, well used to flitting from Anglo-Papalist to Charismatic to Civic to plain old BCP services might have found their senses dulled to the point of uselessness.
I wonder how much spiritual abuse of a less blatant kind has slipped under the radar in the guise of allowing different parties in the church to do their own thing?
That’s exactly what I was saying above, about Brain’s attacks on traditional Christian sexual morality and modesty. I recall reading accounts of NOS Services and NOS at Greenbelt in 1992 and found them rather disturbing. This was public knowledge. Those in charge who failed to call Brain et al to account then were manifestly failing in their responsibilities.
Equating women not wearing hats to church (“traditional Christian modesty”) with this abuse is part of the problem.
The specific problem here is a guy who used his position as a church leader to get women into his bedroom.
We can debate all day whether traditional Christian morality and modesty is a good thing – I think it is, and support extending it to equal marriage. But it seems unarguable that teaching conventional Christian ethics would have made it more difficult for Brain to persuade women from his congregation to put him to bed.
The amount of abuse that takes place in churches that teach “conventional Christian ethics” suggests you’re wrong.
Are there any reliable statistics on rates of abuse within different sectors of the church?
It was very obvious that I was referring to the description above of lycra-clad young women in bikinis dancing in NOS “worship services”. Stick to the topic and avoid the deflections. Hats in church have not been an issue since the 1960s, when women generally wore hats or scarves outside (as the Queen did), and wearing them to church reflected fashion.
I have a small bit in this sad drama and now criminal event. Some time after this blew up I was approached by a senior leader in the CofE inviting me to come and lead a team to serve this community and “bring some healing” to these folk. I had some training as a counsellor but my skills were developed to help with families experiencing IUFD and neonatal deaths of their children, I wasn’t really equipped to deal with what was described to me then. What was described to me back then would indicate that this leader at least had… Read more »
In the midst of all of this, and the assorted assurances that lessons have been learned, there is a question that needs to be asked. The Church of England currently has within it a very significant element that is charismatic, wealthy, successful in attracting younger people, and which often operates on the margins of or outside the parish system. What systems are in place to monitor the HTB and CRT networks? It’s important to ask this question because I seem to recall someone asking something similar at general synod a while back and getting a response from the lead safeguarding… Read more »
The inaccurate headline on the CPS ‘story’ has been changed, but the ‘Notes to editors’ still state erroneously (as at 4.20 pm on 26 August), “Chris Brain (DOB: 19/06/1957) of Wilmslow, Cheshire, has been convicted of one count of rape and thirty-six counts of indecent assault.” Although the text of the post reports, accurately, that Brain was found guilty of 17 counts of indecent assault and cleared of 15 further counts of the same offence, with the jury unable to reach a verdict on four further such counts and one count of rape, it begs the question as to whether… Read more »
The Note remains unaltered on Wednesday at noon. It seems extraordinary that the official CPS website should contain such an error.
And still unaltered at 1.45 pm on Thursday 28th August, despite the error having been drawn to the attention of the Director of Public Prosecutions – the head of the CPS.
Linda Woodhead rightly draws attention to the role of Stephen Lowe, then the overseeing Archdeacon, in this. He himself attended NOS regulalrly and praised it. His role, combined with his forceful manner, must form part of the enquiry.
Later he washed his hands and played down his appreciation of NOS and tried to put pressure on people (like Linda) to shut up and let it go away.
It was said he did this in order to gain preferment – and he got it, becoming a bishop. Apparently his manner shown to Linda was a feature of his episcopacy.
It was, as I can attest.
Chris Brain is to face a retrial on the five outstanding charges on which the jury failed to agree – but not until September next year!
Former priest Chris Brain faces retrial on sex assault charges – BBC News
In the circumstances, I suggest that further comment on the case (including by the CPS, which has still not corrected their incorrect press release of 18th August) prior to the outcome of the retrial is inappropriate.