This article is drawn from a sermon preached by the Canon Chancellor on March 7th 2021 and touches on themes of safeguarding and abuse. If you are affected by it, do feel free to make contact with the Canon Chancellor who is the Cathedral’s Safeguarding Lead, or with any other appropriate organisation, for support and advice. For further information visit: https://www.churchofengland.org/safeguarding/reporting-abuse-and-finding-support

There is another virus taking hold among us, even while it seems the Coronavirus may be relenting.  It gets into our bodies, flows through our veins, inflames our arteries and does our heads in.  It damages mental health, deprives people of sleep and can cause violent physical reactions and even death.  It is infectious, virulent, and to some extent incurable.  It brings on increased levels of adrenaline and affects body movement, facial expression and even language.

It has so many variants that there is no point even trying to vaccinate against it – rather it has to be managed.  It has been with us a very long time and cannot be eradicated – the word for it originates in the Old Norse language – Anger.  We’ve all had it from time to time, and none of us is immune.  It was the fifteenth century monk John Lydgate who famously said, “You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”.  Which effectively means that whatever you do, someone will get angry about it.

Meanwhile behind closed doors, a whole palate of passive and aggressive anger becomes available.  From cold shoulders to sulking, undermining others’ achievements, psychological manipulation, or constant criticism, the spectrum turns red towards bullying, abuse and violence.  One of the metaphorical viruses that Covid has aggravated these last twelve months is the hidden phenomenon of domestic violence and abuse.  It happens – a lot.  So much in fact that back in October the United Nations called for a ‘ceasefire’ in response to what Secretary-General António Guterres has called a horrifying global surge in domestic violence.  Here in the UK, the charities Refuge, and Respect have reported significant increases in calls concerning domestic violence against women and men.  It has taken the pandemic to wake up the world to this.  One thing we have learned during the lockdowns is that there is a lot more pent-up anger, released violently in homes.

Everyone us pretty much at home at the moment.  You could be a victim yourself, or perhaps a perpetrator.  This would not be surprising.  Or you might know someone – the numbers of folk affected is staggering.  If you need to talk to someone do visit this website or be in touch with us here at the Cathedral.

Some say 1 in 6 people are affected by sexual abuse during their lifetimes.  This might well, indeed should make us angry.  There are lots of things to be angry about, but one of the things we should be angry about – angry in a rational, controlled, active way that is - angry about not only the abuse that is inflicted on so many people in so many, emotional, psychological, physical, sexual or exploitative ways, but angry about the way in which we treat and ignore the victims and survivors.  There are victims and survivors of domestic, sexual and institutional abuse all around us, and the way in which we here at Rochester Cathedral, and in so many churches, clubs, youth organisations, schools, children’s homes, sports clubs, media organisations, is a catalogue of disaster, irresponsibility, negligence, which extends into carelessness, disrespect and even cruelty of its own.  One of the main burdens of being a survivor of abuse is the mountain of disbelief that so many do not have the inner strength or ability to climb.  So many suffer in the silence of despondency – defeated by the system.  And they do so because they say organizations, such as the Church of England, are not taking this seriously.  No wonder people are angry.

And Jesus would be too.  He turned the tables over and shooed out the Temple scribes and priests for exploiting the pilgrims who were encouraged to come up to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover (John 2:13-22).  It was financial exploitation – financial abuse – yes that’s a thing – it was financial abuse of those who really had no choice but to buy what was being sold and pay the price demanded.  The Temple priests had a monopoly on supplying ‘unblemished’ lambs for Passover meals, and it is this exploitation that Jesus criticises when turning the tables on them.   His action was politically powerful, religious dynamite, the repercussions of which still reverberate today.  And one of those repercussions which the church has largely failed to see, and has been rightly criticised for, is failing to notice what Jesus does to those who abuse others.  Jesus turned the tables on abusers.  He kicked them out.

And it has taken us nearly two thousand years to notice.  And while ‘sorry’ may be the hardest word, the word ‘apology’ hardly cuts it does it?  What we need is some anger – good anger.  Anger that is controlled, level-headed, humble even, that manifests itself in a desire to put things right.  We commit to that here at Rochester Cathedral, where our own failures in safeguarding scream loudly in the face of those whose damage only partly includes the desire to be believed.

The church, local and global, cannot carry on not taking sides.  The barriers have come down, there is no fence to sit on any more.  Sometimes we have to take sides.  We must take the side of those who are abused, the victims and the survivors.  It is simply not true to say that Jesus did not take sides: he took a side – took a stand – against those who exploited others for their own pleasure and gain.  He took a stand against sin, and an even bigger stand when he submitted to a world of sin from the Cross.

And yet, here’s the thing – what we see in all this, is humble anger.  Humble anger - that doesn’t make sense.  Yet it is what Jesus managed when he kicked out the abusers from the Temple.  It involves a blend – a paradoxical blend even – of humility and anger.  It involves a recognition of worthlessness and failure and repentance, combined with a humble angry resolution to turn the tables on past wrongs, to retune to the voices of victims and survivors in a spirit of sorrow, remorse and submission.

I’m sure I speak for all of us here at Rochester Cathedral in making an apology to all and any who have been hurt in or near here.  We are angry about it and we are truly sorry.

The Revd Canon Dr Gordon Giles, Canon Chancellor, Rochester Cathedral Lent 2021