Church of England Sued For Blacklisting Anti-Gender Ideology Chaplain
Ordained Church of England chaplain Rev. Bernard Randall took legal action against the former Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby in Nov. for “blocking a disciplinary case against the Bishop of Derby, the Rt. Rev. Libby Lane, who labeled Randall a safeguarding risk due to his traditional Christian views on gender identity,” reports the Christian Post.
Randall was blacklisted shortly after delivering a sermon in 2018 at Trent College in Derbyshire, where he questioned the teachings of Educate and Celebrate, a group who claim to “break the binary and be gender inclusive,” according to CP and The Telegraph. The group was described by the Women’s Right’s Network as promoting “highly contentious theories about gender identity to children of primary school age and above, teaching them that human beings can change sex and that sexual orientation is just a matter of choice.” The group is said to have disbanded after a series of scandals, according to CP.
Randall was cleared after his comments by the LADO (Local Authority Designated Officer), the TRA (Teaching Regulation Agency) and the DBS (Disclosure and Barring Service), but CofE continues to ban his ministry, citing “safeguarding concerns.”
Randall’s Comments
“The failure to hold anyone to account for such deeply flawed processes is a scandal. It looks like a whitewash, as if the Archbishop’s knee-jerk reaction was to protect a senior colleague, rather than to seek justice or reconciliation, even to the extent of ignoring a safeguarding complaint,” said Randall.
Randall argues that Welby “misunderstood the scope of his powers” in blocking the complaint against Lane, which alleged that he misused the safeguarding process
Welby Steps Down
Welby stepped down from his position on Nov. 12 over a report that “found he did not act quickly enough to help stop a heinous serial pedophile” of then-church-camp-operator John Smyth, reported the New York Post. As many as 130 boys and young men from Great Britain and Africa are believed to be victims of Smyth.
“When I was informed in 2013 and told that police had been notified, I believed wrongly that an appropriate resolution would follow,” Welby said recently. “It is very clear that I must take personal and institutional responsibility for the long and re-traumatizing period between 2013 and 2024.”
