Dear Acting Primate,
I have read with growing concern first your response to the resignation of Archbishop Justin Welby, then the “Letter from an Anglican” published on the ACCtoo website, and finally your response to the issues raised in that letter.
You are the figurehead of the Anglican Church of Canada. It is not acceptable for you to issue platitudes about making our church safe for all in response to the horrific abuse uncovered in the Church of England and then to respond to the abuses against baptized members of your own church with such profound apathy and lack of care.
Your job is to represent the Anglican Church of Canada. You received a letter detailing circumstances in your church that leave the people of your church, clergy and lay people alike, subject to abuse and unable to report for fear of losing their jobs and retribution from bishops. Your response to that letter was to say that there is nothing that you can do to help your people or to make your church safer.
In fact, you have a number of very clear options that you could pursue if indeed you wish to make the church a safe place for all and if you take your job as our church’s figurehead, and the well-being of the Body of Christ, seriously.
You could express compassion for the survivors who are described in that letter, as well as all other survivors of sexual abuse—both inside and outside of our churches. We know statistically that one in four women have experienced sexual abuse and that men have historically under-reported experiences of sexual abuse. That means that almost everyone in your congregations has either experienced abuse firsthand or in the life of someone close to them. As the figurehead of the Anglican Church of Canada, your words matter. Your words represent us—our beliefs, our values, our commitments. You need to take seriously your role and speak to the hurt and woundedness of your people.
You could speak to what the letter says, rather than issuing vague generalities which have the effect of further disenfranchising vulnerable people in our churches and telling them that the shepherds of our church have no desire, or ability, to care for their sheep. The letter details significant gaps across the Anglican Church of Canada in reporting and safeguarding processes, as well as grave inconsistencies in how bishops handle abuse and how abuse by bishops can be safely reported. These are issues which have been detailed in the Anglican Church of Canada for many years, which were expressly voiced in the ACCtoo movement, and which have gone unaddressed. You have a role to play in how this changes. Your words matter. And so do your actions.
You can place this at the top of the agenda with House of Bishops.
You can convene a national working group to examine practices across Canada and to seek consistency in reporting and safeguarding.
You can turn to the Church of England and the Episcopal Church to find out how they have set up neutral and justice-seeking mechanisms for holding bishops accountable when they fail in safeguarding their churches.
What you can’t do is wipe your hands clean of responsibility. You are in a position of responsibility. Your people are hurting and are not safe, and you cannot in good conscience turn a blind eye and claim you have no power to effect change. You do have power, and you must use it for the good of your people.
I can understand that nobody wants to think that the church that they have served faithfully is enabling abuse and hurting people. I can understand that you feel responsibility to your friends in episcopal office and to the institution of the church. But your calling is as a shepherd to the people of God and a baptized follower of Jesus Christ. With titles and honours in our church comes an even deeper responsibility to be speaking to and caring about the hurt of your people—especially when that hurt is deeper and the vulnerability greater because of inconsistent policies and lack of accountability in the highest offices of our church.
Yours in the Body of Christ,
A baptized member of the Anglican Church of Canada.