Abstract
This short but incisive presentation of the issue of clergy sexual misconduct takes its impact on the vocations of women to the priesthood or to the religious life, as a special focus. While this might appear to be a ‘niche’concern, based on the author Miryam Clough’s personal experience and that of a number of other women, her point is that sexual abuse is pervasive in our world. In response, she argues, the church should be leading efforts to make changes. It should do this by addressing the conditions in which abuse continues to flourish within its own structures and communities, including the supervision and mentoring of women ordinands and clergy. On any fair assessment, she says, this process has barely begun.
Clough draws on qualitative data gained from interviews with a range of – mostly Anglican – women and men and adopts a carefully defined approach to autoethnography in respect of her own experience. She recognises the significant area of clergy abuse of children and young people but sets this aside – as the title of the book suggests, it has emerged in response to the #MeToo and #ChurchToo movements, which have been more concerned with the abuse of adult women. Nevertheless, there are useful signposts to recent enquiries encompassing faith-based institutions with responsibility for children and vulnerable adults, in Australia, the United Kingdom and Aotearoa New Zealand, where she is currently based.
The heart of the book is formed from Clough’s descriptions of her own experience of clergy misconduct in both Aotearoa New Zealand and the United Kingdom, and the transcriptions of interviews with other research partners and collaborators. She says that opening up about this misconduct has been helpful for her, and, in her view, it would be much better for the churches to do the same thing. Nevertheless, participants should be commended for their willingness to share uncomfortable and sometimes equivocal feelings. In this sense, Clough finds it difficult simply to rely on the term, ‘abuse’. While recognising that something extremely painful and damaging has taken place, both to herself and to her sense of vocation, she wants to acknowledge the full complexity of relationships developed outside properly negotiated or regulated boundaries. The aim is to identify and eliminate those factors within the institution that facilitate harm. She is not interested in demonising ‘abusers’.
Aside from listening to the voices, views and advice of survivors, Clough suggests that it would not hurt for leaders in the church to read Faith and Belief in New Zealand (McCrindle Research Ltd., 2018), a report commissioned by the Wilberforce Foundation (available on line). They need to accept that the combination of the church’s history of abuse and what is perceived as its inability to practice what it preaches is having a decisively negative impact on its reputation. And this is happening precisely at a point when the church is increasingly seen as irrelevant to the lives of New Zealanders. Clough is more than conscious that to come to grips with the problems ‘. . . it requires an entire cultural paradigm shift. So many things need to change on a whole lot of different levels’. These are the words of Emily Colgan, one of a group of theologians in Aotearoa New Zealand which has devised an education programme on sexual abuse. Colgan fears that even if the church gets its policies sorted out, it will fail to recognise that the difficult part of the job is in ‘the bits that are intangible, that you can’t just get lawyers to sort out’ (p. 93).
However, in her final chapter, #WhereTo?, Clough begins to outline some ground rules: maintaining respectful relationships and accountability are foundational to resolving issues of abuse in the church (p. 87). There are already some models that suggest a basic ‘rule of thumb’ approach, such as Darryl Stephens’ pragmatic questions to help safeguard against professional misconduct (p. 93). Churches need to recognise that sexual violence has a theological dimension and that the many narratives of sexual violence in the bible cannot simply be read from the perspective of the powerful. The sexualised violence of crucifixion as a stripping naked, also partakes of the shame and humiliation of female and feminine bodies challenging the dominant discourse of God in the image of an inviolate manhood (p. 88). There is a need to recognise that in a society still characterised by high levels of sexual abuse and violence, this will inevitably be articulated in Christian and church contexts in one way or another. Clough points, for example, to the persistence of various forms of purity and rape myths circulating in the wider culture. In church contexts, these can be given added credibility when women’s spiritual and moral worth continue to be measured in relation to a fetishized sexual status (p. 70). Finally, she points to the use of language in both theology and liturgy as ways in which conservative, masculinist models are permitted to disempower some individuals and communities while shoring up power for others. As she says, ‘This is not the way of the Gospel’ (p. 95)
The bottom line, however, is that churches sometimes find themselves dealing with cases of misconduct, not because they are unaware of policies and procedures that are now standard across a wide range of professional contexts, but because of clericalism and an ecclesiastical exceptionalism. This is underpinned by patriarchal values that remain unrecognised and unproblematised. Ensuring that there is inclusive, intersectional representation in governance and adequate research and training to prevent and support around cases of sexual abuse and misconduct must be made a clear priority. Churches, and particularly church leaders, need to stop downplaying these issues, minimising the abuse and trying to silence those who have been harmed. They have to concede that not to do these things is significantly damaging the church’s reputation right now.
This short book is well researched but also accessible. It offers genuine insight into difficult issues, as well as a wealth of useful and current reference. Sadly for those who like to hold a book in their hands when reading, or who wish to make references to this book in their own writing, there is no paperback version on sale. The hardback is priced at over £40. Instead, the publishers have focussed on e-market sales, with a kindle price of £15.29.