The Dean of Norwich's sermon on Safeguarding Sunday

A sermon preached by the Dean of Norwich on Safeguarding Sunday on 17 November 2024.

Readings: Hebrews 10.11-14, 19-25; Mark 13.1-8

For some years now, this Sunday in the church’s calendar has been designated as Safeguarding Sunday.

The importance of creating a church in which all – all – are safe could not be of greater moment. Everything the Makin report has revealed, and the subsequent resignation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, will be uppermost in the thoughts of many of us today.

Our thoughts and prayers must first and foremost be with the victims and survivors of abuse, and their long wait for recognition and for justice.

The Makin review, and the light it sheds on the atrocities committed by John Smyth, is devastating. Those he abused have had their pain and trauma stirred afresh by the report’s publication. So too have the victims and survivors of other abusers.

And to the appalling suffering experienced by survivors, have been added the inadequacies and failures in the Church of England’s response, for which Archbishop Justin resigned this week. The life-long trauma caused to survivors both here and in Africa is unimaginable.

To quote a statement released by a number of survivors of Smyth’s abuse:

‘We hope this Review will bring some form of, even partial, healing to all those impacted directly and indirectly over the last 50 + years.’

It is absolutely right that survivors are at the heart of our thoughts and prayers. But they must also be at the heart of our actions.

As we express lament for all that has happened, we know that words are not enough.

Meaningful redress and meaningful change that addresses the Church’s safeguarding failures must come.

I say that conscious that across local churches and cathedrals there are so many people working with great commitment to nurture a positive safeguarding culture. As a Cathedral we need to go on learning and reflecting on our own practice, supporting and praying for our archbishops and bishops in the weighty responsibilities they carry.

I am grateful for the way in which our own Cathedral volunteers and staff undertake the safeguarding training we require and the due processes and checks that support it. I am grateful for the work of the Cathedral’s safeguarding advisor, Peter Sayer; for the scrutiny provided by the Cathedral safeguarding committee, independently chaired by Professor Marian Brandon; for the work Canon Andy does as Chapter safeguarding lead; and for support given by Canon Marie-Lyse as safeguarding friend on Chapter.

Information about how to contact them and the Cathedral’s safeguarding priorities is available in the safeguarding pocket leaflet available from the stewarding points today and on the Cathedral website.

Please do feel that you can approach them, or me, my clergy colleagues, or Chapter members and staff with any concerns or questions you may have. I am also grateful for the lead given by our own bishop, Bishop Graham.

In saying that, I am very conscious that creating a safer church is the responsibility of all of us.

That’s why safeguarding should never be seen as an ‘add on’ to our mission and ministry, but a natural part of what it means to care for one another and to seek the life of God’s kingdom. Its about standing against abuse, manipulation and evil, and for compassion, justice and transparency. This is what it means to be a pastoral church.

As we reflect on all of this, so we are led to ask deep and searching questions about the nature of the church, and those times when it has got things so terribly, terribly wrong.

Unhealthy cultures of deference, lack of transparency, a concern for the reputation of the church over the needs of individuals, have all been cited in recent days as causes of the church’s lamentable failures.

We need, together, to be on our guard against them, whether across the life of the Cathedral or the wider church.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus warns his disciples not to be seduced by the glamour and power of the Temple and the unchallenged prestige the scale and majesty of its buildings seemed to project. ‘Do you see these great buildings?’ Jesus asks, and then continues ‘not one stone will be left upon another. All will be thrown down.’

Jesus is challenging his disciples, and he is challenging us, to be on our guard against being drawn into power games and the collusions that can go with them. Later Jesus urges his disciples ‘do not be led astray’ by false accounts of what matters and misrepresentations of what is true and good and holy.

Instead, throughout the Gospel, Jesus commends the way of humility, of taking seriously the needs of others, of being attentive to the voice of others – especially the voices of the vulnerable.

As the letter to the Hebrews puts it, we are to be a people who ‘provoke each other to love and to good deeds’. It is a call to mutual care, mutual respect and mutual responsibility for the well-being of all.

And this, surely, under God and by God’s grace, is the pastoral task of the church.

The nourishing and renewal of the pastoral heart of the church, at every level, is surely what is needed in these days.

And that pastoral heart will sometimes need to be a courageous heart, ready to serve and to love, but also willing to challenge injustice and wrong-doing, to take responsibility and to be held to account.

This pastoral calling is one in which we all share. It is that vision of being a church in which we provoke, encourage, and enable each other to love and to do good deeds. It is a vision that recognises the reality of human sin, frailty and fallibility, but also the possibility of growth and renewal.

It is integral to such a pastoral church that it will seek to be a safe church for all people, putting victims and survivors at the heart of its safeguarding work.

Today, as a Cathedral community, we have an opportunity to renew our commitment to that calling, and to the vision of being a pastoral church for all.

And let us do that, not from a place of fear or of anxiety or of doubt, but because we rejoice to follow the example of Jesus Christ, who knows our weakness, failings and brokenness, and calls us into wholeness and the paths of truth and peace.