The AGM
We met at St George's West Church,
Edinburgh in an upstairs hall for coffee at 10.45 and the meeting started at
11.15. It was our first AGM taking place outside England and we welcomed two
visitors from the Church of Ireland who said that it would be very helpful to have an
organisation such as Broken Rites. They will write about Broken Rites in their
local church paper.
The Rev. John Chalmers who
is the Associate Secretary, for Pastoral Support for Ministers and their
Families, welcomed about fifty of us to Scotland. He spoke warmly of Broken
Rites being both a support group and a "safe place" for women - outside the
margins of institutions - and thanked us for being a referral point when clergy
families fell apart. He said how hard it was for institutions to change. I enjoyed his joke, "How many Presbyters does it
take to change a light bulb?" "CHANGE?"
During the business part of the meeting, there were brief
reports and elections of new officers. we heard that fund-raising was going well
and we were now advertising regularly in the "Church of England Newspaper;"
"Church Times" and "Methodist Recorder." It was agreed that
we should amend the constitution by stating that, "Broken Rites is an
association of divorced and separated wives of clergy, ministers and Church Army
Officers living in England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and the Republic
of Ireland."
Both our Chair and Treasurer were retiring and they were thanked
for all their hard work and presented with a small gift. We welcomed their
successors Rosie as our new Chair and Pat who has kindly undertaken to become
Treasurer and we hope they enjoy their new roles. We also said "Good bye" to the
Scottish Regional Representative, Anna May, and thanked her for organising this AGM.
We welcomed Nancy, her successor. Jean, the Editor of Rite
Lines, asked for contributions to be sent to her before May 15th for the next
edition of the magazine.
The next Annual General Meeting will be held on April 28th 2007
in London when Professor Martin Percy, Principal of Ripon College, Cuddesdon will be
speaking to us. Bishop Roy Screech closed the day with a
prayer.
Speaker
- Dr. Lesley Orr
Lesley has a vast knowledge of the church because she is a minister in her own right and married to Peter, Minister of St. George's West Church and daughter of a minister. She is an academic and has researched and written a book about women suffering abuse and violence.
Based at New College, Edinburgh University, she co-ordinated a pioneering
action-research project, "Out of the Shadows": She is currently employed as National Training and
Development Worker at Scottish Woman's Aid, with a remit to help implement the
Scottish Executive's Training Strategy on Domestic Abuse.
Lesley's talk was powerful and challenging. She spoke on "Challenging
the tyranny of respectability": A call to confront the evil of domestic abuse
perpetrated by Christian clergymen." Lesley shared some personal stories of
domestic abuse and said that domestic abuse cut across all ages, religions,
countries, cultures and classes and was pervasive in our society. Domestic abuse
and violence violates basic human rights and costs our country £7.2 billion a
year so we cannot afford to ignore it - especially as one in five women will
experience, at some stage of their lives, physical or domestic violence at the
hands of their partner. Yet many victims are driven to conceal what is
happening under this "tyranny of respectability" and those in authority are slow
to acknowledge its existence. Wherever Lesley travels in the world and
meets with religious leaders, they always say that domestic violence is not a
problem there!
Lesley defined domestic abuse as mainly perpetrated by men
against women. (In 93% of cases men are abusing partners or ex-partners) It is a
behaviour pattern with one partner purposefully and habitually exercising
control over another and isolating them from friends and family by physical,
sexual, mental, emotional and psychological means. Those that have suffered,
express feelings of isolation, self-blame, abandonment, shame, isolation and
anger. The effect on children witnessing domestic abuse can be as
devastating as being abused themselves.
Many believe the myth that abuse never happens in Christian
homes! But it does! Lesley said how hard it is to keep your faith when there
seems to be a collusion between church and culture to either ignore it or brush
it aside as "That is what men are like!" Too often churches and religions
enforce a structured and well-founded inequality between men and women
which encourages women to accept abuse without complaint. She said that we all
have a responsibility to challenge these unacceptable boundaries for men and
women to work towards greater equality for everyone. Many members asked
questions afterwards.
