Church leaders have a moral responsibility to make public the names of clergy found guilty of sexual abuse, says church historian and poet, Dr Jane Simpson.

Speaking after the release of the final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care, Simpson argues this is a practical form of redress they could do right now.

“The Commission (2018–2024) made the names of perpetrators public by posting witness statements on its website. But I have yet to hear that any of the eight denominations within the Commission’s terms of reference has made this information readily available, so that the victims and survivors can have some sense of closure,” Dr Simpson says.

“Media statements by church leaders responding to the final report so far are full of generalities. Making the names of clergy guilty of professional misconduct through sexual abuse could demonstrate their commitment both to redress for past wrongs and to genuine reform for the future,” Dr Simpson says.

“This is more complex in the Anglican Church. Until recently, cases heard under ‘Title D’ in its canon law were handled at the diocesan level. Each bishop had the names of clergy stripped of office. Cases are now handled by an independent national Ministry Standards Commission which has the names. However, these are not published,” Dr Simpson says.

“Historians like me can find out most of this information, because we have many networks and are familiar with the way records are held. Victims and survivors have no official confirmation of the names of their abusers. As a result, they are left hanging in limbo, sometimes for as long as 30 years,” Dr Simpson says.

Dr Simpson says some priests in the Anglican Church who have since died were known perpetrators but they never faced justice in civil or church court.

“As a church historian in the late 1980s, I was aware that priests with otherwise impeccable credentials had consistently abused women in their care.”

“At the Royal Commission, witness statements showed that the Rev. Rob McCullough, Principal of College House in Christchurch, was a major perpetrator in the Anglican Church. He had sexually abused many women under his care, including ordinands, university students and college staff.”

The Rev. Louise Deans documented in her book, Whistleblower: abuse of power in the Church – a New Zealand story (2001), the years she was manipulated and sexually abused by the Rev. McCullough, who was responsible for her training for ordination to the priesthood.

“Due to the possibility of defamation, Deans referred to him as ‘R.’ However, in her witness statement to the Royal Commission, she named him publicly for the first time. Having been attested to be true, her evidence could then be used by others,” Dr Simpson says.

Simpson says McCullough’s death in July 2023 and the concomitant silence from church authorities prompted her to write her new book, Shaking the Apple Tree, poems in response to sexual abuse by clergy in the Anglican Church.

“I discovered in the course of my historical research for this book how difficult it is to find the names of perpetrators. The Anglican Church’s General Secretary, the Ven Michael Hughes, told me their filing systems were so complex that the records of clergy stripped of office under Title D may never be found,” Dr Simpson says.

Less than a month after the Commission’s final report has been published, it is clear there are many obstacles to be overcome before the eight denominations will publish their perpetrators’ names, thereby offering significant redress to victims and survivors.

About the author

Jane Simpson is an historian and an award-winning poet from Ōtautahi Christchurch. After working as a journalist, she gained a PhD in religion and gender in New Zealand (1939-1959) at the University of Otago, where she was Ross Fellow of Knox College. She has taught in universities in Australia and New Zealand. Later she taught Muslim women in a desert school in the UAE. In 1993 Simpson became the first tenured woman academic in Religious Studies at the University of Canterbury. She taught the Christian tradition and new approaches to it, including feminist theology and post-colonial studies. She gave lectures on sexual abuse and the abuse of power in faith-based institutions.

Simpson’s history publications include books, chapters and articles in internationally refereed journals. Her fields of expertise include NZ social and religious history, te Tiriti o Waitangi, and pre-contact Māori religious beliefs and practices. She has also published in gifted and talented education, textual analysis of liturgy, and feminist studies.

As a poet, Jane Simpson has won a number of awards. She came second in the NZ Poetry Society’s 2023 International Competition and third in 2020. She was highly commended in the Caselberg Trust 2020 and 2021 International Poetry Competitions. Her poems have appeared in leading journals including Allegro, London Grip, Poetry Wales, Hamilton Stone Review, Meniscus, Catalyst, Poetry Aotearoa Yearbook and takahē.

Simpson has three full-length collections. A world without maps (2016) drew on her teaching of Muslim women English in a desert school in the UAE. Tuning Wordsworth’s Piano (2019) weaves together environmental themes and art. She wrote and published The Farewelling of a Home (2021), a critically acclaimed liturgy created for people who lost their homes in the Christchurch earthquakes. Her third collection, Shaking the Apple Tree, was published in 2024 before the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care published its final report. Her fourth collection, Imagined Scar, about her breast cancer journey, is due out later in 2024.

About her new book

Simpson started to write Shaking the Apple Tree: poems in response to sexual abuse by clergy in the Anglican Church (Christchurch: Poiema Books, 2024) following the death in Christchurch of the Rev. Rob McCullough, a major perpetrator priest in the Anglican Church. Her poems broke the silence of the church authorities about his death, a silence which left victims and survivors hanging in limbo.

Simpson writes as an historian and as an Anglican committed to reform. Witness statements published by the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care provided crucial evidence. Commission Chair, Judge Coral Shaw, had said she welcomes such creative endeavours to keep the voices of victims and survivors to the fore.

Survivors of sexual abuse have welcomed Shaking the Apple Tree as overcoming their sense of isolation. Sexual abuse counsellors and safeguarding advisors say it is making a much-needed creative contribution in the field of health and wellbeing.

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