Thinking Anglicans

Wycliffe Hall: Richard Turnbull writes

A letter appeared in last week’s paper edition of the Church Times and is now on the web: Wycliffe Hall: doing very nicely, thank you by Richard Turnbull.

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liddon
liddon
17 years ago

That’s reassuring. Nothing to worry about then. Bless.

Cheryl Clough
Cheryl Clough
17 years ago

Good. We have in writing that they started with a house that was in order and respected. Look forward to seeing what is written in four years time.

dodgyvicar
dodgyvicar
17 years ago

yawn, so this is ‘newsworthy’?

It doesn’t do much for me except make me feel sorry for Richard

drdanfee
drdanfee
17 years ago

Who ever doubted that the Reverend Dr. Turnbull ever had and has my best interests, ever at heart? Even if I do not yet accurately recognize just what my best interests as western liberal democratic citizen and as Anglican believer really are, as defined exclusively and authoritatively by him? Time for tea?

Cheryl Clough
Cheryl Clough
17 years ago

drdanfee Maybe he could set up a quarterly communion with souls such as yourself, just to prove how inclusive he really is? Or would it be like the gestapo before the holocaust, who were hospitable to the Jewish and community leaders, so they knew who to scoop up first once the travesties started? Chile also comes to mind, unfortunately some souls seem to learn the worst lessons from history. Now of course, we can’t shouldn’t give prophetic warnings of the fears of the worst possibility happening. We are meant to be happy and smile and allow it to come to… Read more »

Robert Klein
Robert Klein
17 years ago

>>Women are meant to be submissive and compliant, no matter how cruel or abusive their husbands are.<<

Cheryl, there is something wrong with you mentally if you believe that anyone at Wycliffe preachs or even thinks that. There is something wrong with you spiritually if you know that no-one at Wycliffe thinks that but you are willing to say they do on a public message board.

Cheryl Clough
Cheryl Clough
17 years ago

Robert

I live in Sydney. There is nothing wrong with me saying that, that is our reality. If you don’t believe me, contact Muriel Porter who moved to Melbourne to get away from their cruelty.

There is nothing wrong with my expressing a fear that Wycliffe could become as repressive as Sydney.

At least if it does, you can’t claim that no one warned you.

If I am wrong, then it is simply the voice of conscience. If I am right, then get the house in order or don’t complain to me later when things go horribly wrong.

L Roberts
L Roberts
17 years ago

‘… there is something wrong with you mentally if you believe that anyone at Wycliffe preachs or even thinks that. There is something wrong with you spiritually if you know that no-one at Wycliffe thinks that but you are willing to say they do on a public message board.’ Posted by: Robert Klein on Monday, 3 September 2007 at 10:14am BST Either Robert Klein is wrong and should not be saying such things. Or he is right ( long distance diagnosis ?) and should employ a pastoral approach — a loving approach even (in light of Jesus’ message) THIS IS… Read more »

Erika Baker
Erika Baker
17 years ago

“Either Robert Klein is wrong and should not be saying such things. Or he is right ( long distance diagnosis ?) and should employ a pastoral approach — a loving approach even (in light of Jesus’ message)

THIS IS A DISGRACE.”

I quite agree. It’s shocking that this is the second post within a few days questioning the sanity of one individual contributor.

Is there really no way the moderators can ensure that comments like this aren’t published?

Simon Sarmiento
17 years ago

Erika and L Roberts

My view was that Robert Klein’s views were an interesting insight into the mindset of those who support Mr Turnbull and were unlikely to upset the person addressed, namely Cheryl Clough.

Naturally, I stand to be corrected by Cheryl.

Erika Baker
Erika Baker
17 years ago

Thank you for your reply, Simon.

Of course, if Cheryl really doesn’t mind I shall be less concerned.

But the principle remains – some things are too dangerous to say/print. As L Roberts points out, long distance “diagnosis” is impossible and any comments on the mental state of anyone who appears to the writer to be fragile should only be made by a professional with the necessary skills.

Afterwards it’s only possible to assess the damage and to be thankful if it appears that there wasn’t any.

Göran Koch-Swahne
17 years ago

There is also (which Erica hinted at) the damage done to Society at large or to the sense/notion of Communion in Society.

The Tone.

I say nothing regarding someone who loses their temper and utters a few angry words in the heat of the moment.

Une fois n’est pas coûtume.

But the Tone, the Damage, the Habit.

The belief (long learnt) that you can get away with anything.

All are God’s creatures.

Peter Owen
17 years ago

Erika Baker commented above: “It’s shocking that this is the second post within a few days questioning the sanity of one individual contributor.” I approved the first of these posts. That was a mistake on my part for which I apologize.

Cheryl Clough
Cheryl Clough
17 years ago

Simon I agree with you that these postings provide useful insights into some souls’ mindsets. I chose to work with TA because you do allow such postings to be made, and once they are made they can not be removed. Similar things happen elsewhere, but the evidence is intangible or editable, so the perpetrators can claim they never said/did it and thus their victims must be delusional or insane. I chose to accept being called insane or delusional a long time ago, as I knew I had the character to tolerate being rejected and abused by “the authorities” due to… Read more »

NP
NP
17 years ago

Please note: 1) I did NOT call Cheryl insane…..Cheryl said that she might be insane and I agreed with her statement based on certain things she has said about Gaia and being a player in the “end times” herself…..Cheryl did not seem upset but others were determined to be upset. 2)Yes, posts can reveal MINDSETS – see L Roberts post above which could have (quite rightly in my view) criticised R Klein’s tone and apparent harshness…..but instead does all sorts of somersaults to turn the whole thing into the old emotional blackmail: “We’re being persectuted, we’re being persecuted!” L Roberts… Read more »

Matthew Firth
Matthew Firth
17 years ago

L Roberts commented that ‘it is also in the public domain that a large number of staff have left of late.’ Well, it may be in the public domain, but the public domain has got it wrong. As a current member of Wycliffe, I can report that of the 13 academic staff which were in post at the start of last academic year, 2 left to take up jobs which they saw as career progression and 2 left because of disagreements about how Wycliffe is being managed. Given that it is perfectly natural for people to take new jobs on… Read more »

drdanfee
drdanfee
17 years ago

My lingering fears about WH as a clergy training college have less to do with published Guardian reports than with a direct reading of Turnbull’s past address to his CoE con-evo confrere’s in which he basically lays out strong, clear aspirations involving an institutional takeover Anglican plan, creepily and uncannily similar to what we in USA have come to know as the Chapman-Barfoot documents. His view of training properly con-evo clergy is that they then become the incursion troops who have some exclusive authority to police the pilgrims, and squeeze out progressive believers as well as queer folks from church… Read more »

Frozenchristian
Frozenchristian
17 years ago

Matthew Firth You must be aware that in your college: -David Wenham resigned as Vice Principal over disagreements with Turnbull and was then offered a post in Bristol so has gone completely from WH – Adrian Chatfield has moved to a new post in Cambridge just over a year after joining the WH staff – not a good sign to lose someone so fast – Geoffrey Maughn has returned to parish life – Gordon Kuhrt has stepped down as preaching lecturer – the Mission lecturer has left and in their place come – Simon Vibert as VP and in charge… Read more »

Matthew Firth
Matthew Firth
17 years ago

drdanfee – all groupings within the church, be they Anglo-Catholics, Liberals or Evangelicals, use various strategies to advance their own cause. For instance, each year in the CofE liberal catholic bishops offer disproportionately few evangelical curacies in order to squash evangelical ordinands into less evangelical title posts; a shrewd strategy if ever there was one.

I look towards the day when no such strategies will be needed by anybody: the day when we are all completely unified around Jesus Christ, who is the Truth personified.

philbody
philbody
17 years ago

‘The public domain knows very little of the real Wycliffe’ ! I am very sorry that Matthew Frith is so anxious to protect Turnbull that he cannot face the truth. No fewer than 12 staff have left Wycliffe since Turnbull went there as Principal. Most left because they found it difficult to work with him, or in the atmosphere he created. This academic year, none of the 6 academic staff who left went for ‘career progression’ as those of us who have talked to them know very well. Has Matthew Frith seen the resignation letters? Has he seen the many… Read more »

Cheryl Clough
Cheryl Clough
17 years ago

Still posting NP? Your name wasn’t mentioned in this thread and it’s not yet November. 4 out of 13. That’s 32.5% turnover in twelve months. It would have been better to acknowledge there was a big change than to pretend that no significant change has happened at all. For those who do not seem to understand the power that educational bodies have and the damage that can be done behind closed doors, look at this boarding college example http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070904.wgrenville04/BNStory/National/home If challenged, I could go trawling the net and find other examples from the UK, Australia, US… I have accepted that… Read more »

Paul Frost
Paul Frost
17 years ago

Apologies if I am being a bit slow, but Cheryl did you really intend to put your last post on this thread as I am honestly struggling to see the connection?

Cheryl Clough
Cheryl Clough
17 years ago

Paul,

Please date and time which post you are referring to. You will get a more appropriate answer to your questions. Posts are quite disparent and what answers one merely confuses another. Quoting the passage or sentence that has confused you would be even more helpful. 🙂

Göran Koch-Swahne
17 years ago

“For instance, each year in the CofE liberal catholic bishops offer disproportionately few evangelical curacies in order to squash evangelical ordinands into less evangelical title posts; a shrewd strategy if ever there was one.”

Maybe there aren’t enough “evangelical curacies” (?) to fill the demand from an outpouring of anti catholic ordinands?

And God forbid that this be a stratagem ;=)

Paul Frost
Paul Frost
17 years ago

Cheryl
Apologies for the vagueness – I was referring to the post on Tuesday, 4 September 2007 at 10:19pm BST. I realise that the turnover percentages refer to Wycliffe Hall but fail to see how the awful situation as reported in the globe and mail etc connects.

On reflection maybe your point was that educational institutes can be impacted by sin? Perhaps I misinterpreted the hyperbole – although it is a bit like comparing an argument between my children to the 2nd World War… come to think of it… 🙂

Sarah
Sarah
17 years ago

Frankly, I’m glad I’m not the only one who has read Cheryl’s posts here and thought ‘this really sounds quite bonkers’. And I’m usually arguing on the same side of the debate. This is not a slur on Cheryl’s sanity: it’s a criticism of her florid prose style and the occasionally bizarre theological connections she makes. I’m trying desperately hard to follow the line of reasoning which links Wycliffe with 9/11; gender discrimination with Rwandan genocide; conservative evangelicals with wife-beating – but it seems to me that these are impressionistic and instinctive rather than reasoned associations. As for the extraordinary… Read more »

Ford Elms
Ford Elms
17 years ago

“each year in the CofE liberal catholic bishops offer disproportionately few evangelical curacies in order to squash evangelical ordinands into less evangelical title posts; a shrewd strategy if ever there was one.” Granted I live across the pond and in a relatively isolated place far from the high and mighty, but this sounds to me like the usual Fundamentalist “we’re being persecuted” myth. Is it really the case that evil liberals are refusing to put Evangelically minded clergy in Evangelically minded parishes in order to crush Evangelicalsim in the Church of England? Are there so many “liberal catholic” (from which… Read more »

Matthew Firth
Matthew Firth
17 years ago

philbody – Students at Wycliffe are only aware of 4 academic staff who have resigned this past academic year, and I myself have heard two of those say that their new jobs were quite surprising because they had not intended to leave. If you are claiming that 6 academic staff have left, perhaps you could list them in a new post on here because I for one would be very interested to hear about it. You might as well also list the 6 others that you claim to have left, too. You ask if I have seen any of the… Read more »

liddon
liddon
17 years ago

This letter by Turnbull was for wide public consumption. The video of him speaking to Reform was a private communication to friends. Which do you believe? you may think that this letter suggests he is a liar; far from it. He is a politician, which is a completely different thing, I’m told.

L Roberts
L Roberts
17 years ago

The last three Principals feel constrained to write, making thier grave concern public, it would be wrong to ignore them.
**************************************************

On another matter, the idea of squahed evangelical ordinands does not appeal to me, and must be unscriptural in most contexts

Ford Elms
Ford Elms
17 years ago

“each year in the CofE liberal catholic bishops offer disproportionately few evangelical curacies in order to squash evangelical ordinands into less evangelical title posts”

Proof, please? If you are going to make this very inflammatory claim, which only bolsters the already overpowering myth of the poor persecuted Evangelical in a sea of conniving Liberals, you need to document.

Cheryl Clough
Cheryl Clough
17 years ago

Hi Paul Well done, yes it is about recognizing that sin (e.g. abuse of power, aiding and abetting acts of aggression or violations) can impact educational institutions. Your liking the dynamics between yourself and your children and World War 2 are not that far fetched. One of the things that struck me in this lifetime is that human dynamics follow fractal patterns. One previous corporate job was as Staff Development Manager. Often developmental issues or conflicts in a team were often similar to their family difficulties. Each soul has internalized paradigms about power, implementation, consequence, team contributions, the voice of… Read more »

Matthew Firth
Matthew Firth
17 years ago

Ford Elms – you will find the proof you requested by consulting the minutes of the Association of Ordinands and Candidates for Ministry (a CofE organisation). Each year, the hierarchy of the CofE, which has a disproportionate number of liberal catholic bishops, offers disproportionately few evangelical curacies, despite requests for a fairer system and the fact that there are plenty of evangelical incumbents who are able and willing to train curates. However, as Petertide approaches, the bishops get very unsettled when they realise how many evangelical ordinands are still unplaced in title posts and suddenly they magic up a bunch… Read more »

mynsterpreost (=David Rowett)
mynsterpreost (=David Rowett)
17 years ago

MF is correct insofar as there is pressure in some places for mainstream (not Mainstream, note)evangelicals to avoid, certainly Oak Hill. But the question is not so much whether it is right for bishops to do so (after all, it is the bishop who accepts a candidate and who ordains), but whether there are lessons to be learned by a college when that happens. When I went forward, I was looking at two colleges of the catholic persuasion: the bishop (himself a catholic) made it very clear that he thought it would be a bad idea to go to either.… Read more »

cryptogram
cryptogram
17 years ago

MF writes of the CofE having “a disproportionate number of liberal catholic bishops”

I strongly suspect that the true reason for this is that the rise in strength of the evangelical constituency is relatively recent. Those who’ve been around long enough to be diocesan bishops were ordained at a time when there was a larger proportion of catholic ordinands. Look at the ranks of suffragans and you will see that many of those who will be diocesans within the next 10 years come from the more traditionally evangelical colleges.

Frozenchristian
Frozenchristian
17 years ago

Most of the evangelical colleges find their students are placed in curacies fairly early on, I gather from friends who work in them, but Oak Hill anf WH often have students left unplaced at Easter because such students are rather fussy about only going to a curacy which ticks all the right boxes. (Again, so I am told by staff in colleges).

Ordinands can always turn a curacy down, so the idea that helpless evangelicals are being forcibly rigged out in tat and sent to work with a vicar who does not believe in the creeds in frankly laughable.

Ford Elms
Ford Elms
17 years ago

“consulting the minutes of the Association of Ordinands and Candidates for Ministry (a CofE organisation).” I live on another continent in another country, how do I get my hands on this? “a fairer system” You should consider this statement in terms of the comment you make at the end of your post. It asumes the conflict that underpins these political machinations. I would think an exposure to the various styles of Christianity practiced by Anglicans is a good thing. There is a myth generating machine that all of us can get sucked into, and it is not good. Our previous… Read more »

Cheryl Clough
Cheryl Clough
17 years ago

Ford made reference to “…about “faithful” Anglicans suffering in “faithless” parishes and such like…” Before resorting to non-Anglican correspondence, I did a lot of internet research to understand what was happening to me, if I was being unreasonable or if there was a pattern. I looked to see if others had gone through similar experience to me and what research had been documented. That is how I came to understand how bullying is done in a church context. How there are less overt signs of aggression (they don’t hit you in the face, they just advise others not to talk… Read more »

Cheryl Clough
Cheryl Clough
17 years ago

Before this thread completely disappears, the Canadian example has given us the gift of showing how the church and theological colleges can be interweaved. So just after the scandal hit the papers, there was a denial that the college was even Anglican. http://www.anglicanjournal.com/100/article/church-denies-that-closed-controversial-school-was-anglican/ http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20070906.GRENVILLE06/TPStory/TPNational/Ontario/ But in the last day, the Canadian Anglican authorities have begun an investigation. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070907.wgrenville07/BNStory/National/home. This article reports “…the school’s board of directors met with the allegations on their agenda and the board chairman, Canon Geoff Jackson, was quoted in the Brockville, Ont., Recorder and Times as offering a personal apology to any student of the school… Read more »

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