Church of England safeguarding drove Fr Alan Griffin to suicide

Jul 19, 2021 by

by Archbishop Cranmer:

A priest is dead. That’s okay: all priests die; ashes to ashes, and all that. But this priest killed himself because he was subject to a CDM. That’s a Clergy Discipline Measure, which, for those who have feelings, is perched somewhere between Purgatory and eternal damnation. We’ve talked about this before, and there are some real high-profile cases, but no-one really takes it seriously (except maybe a few in the General Synod), mainly because not enough priests are killing themselves, or those who are doing so are somehow the ones we are best rid of: you know exactly what you think of their theology or their morality or whatever they’ve written to challenge your orthodoxy or done to someone you admire. The Church is better off without them, and so their suffering is passed over with a few minor ripples and a ‘Lessons Learned’ review.

They’re great, those things. A priest is dead, which is very sad indeed, and condolences to his (it’s always a man) friends and family and all that, but we can have a ‘Lessons Learned’ review, so that lessons might be learned.

Except they aren’t.

And so a priest is dead, and others will die, because the Clergy Discipline Measure is a mechanism totally devoid of natural justice.

The Rev’d Alan Griffin killed himself on 8th November 2020. You didn’t know, did you? A priest killed himself, and it didn’t really make the news because all priests die; ashes to ashes, and all that. It’s very sad. He must have been stressed. Condolences to his friends and family.

He’d devoted decades of his life to the Church of England, but was ordained into the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham in 2012. He preached a few decent sermons, too, but he “died suddenly at home“, the congregation was told. But all priests die; ashes to ashes, and all that. Condolences to his friends and family.

The Coroner’s Report has now been published, and so damning and concerning is its judgment that the Coronor, Mary Hassell, has copied it to a number of very senior Church clergy, including the Archbishop of Canterbury. She determined as follows:

Read here

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