Dean Percy’s parting shot: You think I am leaving in disgrace … I am not

May 16, 2022 by Jill

by Rosie Dawson, Religion Media Centre:

Rosie Dawson attended Martyn Percy’s farewell service in Oxford on Saturday. In an interview conducted shortly beforehand he told her why he’s calling on congregations to withhold their giving from the Church of England, and why he’s not leaving quietly….

It was perhaps the nearest thing the Church of England gets to an illegal rave. Those attending the leaving service for the Very Rev Martyn Percy were told only the day before where the event was going to be held.

Christ Church College, Oxford, where Martyn Percy had been the dean for eight years, refused to host any sort of farewell. The University Church of St Mary was proposed as an alternative venue but became unavailable once it became clear that the Bishop of Oxford, the Rt Rev Steven Croft, and the dean, who is also professor of theological education at King’s College London, could not agree on the content of the service.

In the end it took place in the 19th-century chapel of Exeter College just off Broad Street. The chapel is outside the jurisdiction of the bishop, and he did not attend.

Martyn Percy was head of both the college and the diocesan cathedral until Easter, when he stepped down after an acrimonious dispute with the college lasting four years. Among the contested issues were the college’s safeguarding protocols and the matter of the dean’s pay. The role of the Dean of Christ Church involves being the head of both the college and the diocesan cathedral which sits in the corner of Tom Quad, the Great Quadrangle at the heart of the college.

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