Dear Church House,
Lambeth Palace has quite a big problem with receiving and responding to concerns, so I'm sending this concern to you.
I'm sure that you're aware of the recent two-week advertising campaign by Justin Welby, which started before Easter, just after the news that the victims of Fletcher and Smyth, close associates of Justin Welby, were yet again denied justice as a result of redacted reports and refusal by senior leaders to resign over their part in the cover-ups.
As well as appearing totally insensitive to the distress that he causes victims when he does his advertising campaigns, Justin Welby appears out of touch with his own distressed church and without proper modulation or instruction on what he releases into the media. Both Justin Welby and Lambeth Palace seem unable to process the responses to the advertising campaigns, which is going to prevent his recent aim, stated in the financial times, of making the church more appealing to the secular world.
As things currently stand, the only group he is making the church attractive to is paedophiles. Because the widespread anguish of victims in response to Justin Welby's advertising campaigns, and the way that Lambeth Palace ignore these victims and everyone who gives feedback and complaints on the back of Mr Welby's advertising, indicates that the Church of England will remain a closed fortress, the only victims with a voice in the press in answer to Mr Welby are the Smyth victims, who have enough money and power behind them to be successful in being heard. The secular world are not going to find an archaic closed fortress attractive unless they want to be able to abuse people and power and be protected, for that is what the church of England have a reputation for; well, that and being ridiculous and out of touch.
Mr Welby's advertising campaign was launched immediately as the victims of Fletcher were left in shock, very callous and inappropriate, victims were crying in shock and anger. The failed safeguarding Bishop, Paul Butler, whose misconducts are many, still hasn't resigned or been suspended, Justin Welby and the church of England's usual response to being exposed for misconduct is the advertising campaign and this recent one has been a bumper one, leaving victims reeling. Some of his most stomach-churning vanity advertising has been seen during the pandemic while the congregation of the C of E have been left in confusion, Mr Welby makes headlines by 'secretly' causing a safeguarding and health risk interfering on covid 19 wards when he claimed to have had pneumonia and isn't medically qualified, he made minds boggle when he showed off his kitchen as an advertising stunt, and then this recent vanity run, he posed holding a phone and pretended to be on the phone to the Queen.
Apparently the Queen told him to talk to the press about Prince Harry's wedding, which isn't appropriate. And presumably she told him that the Duke of Edinburgh was about to die. But did she tell him to say that being in the Royal Family was a life sentence without parole, immediately before the Duke of Edinburgh died? It is widely wondered if Mr Welby's communications team deliberately set him up for these unpleasant gaffes as they happen so frequently. But more of us think that what happens is, Mr Welby has a relief carer who doesn't make him take his medication and he goes out of control until his normal carer returns.
His Easter messages were just scripted tripe, irrelevant to anyone and could have been trotted out by any politician. The Archbishop of Wales' message of hope was more respected, Welby just kept muttering about 'A better future for all'. Which is typical of what his script writers turn out, irrelevant.
If Mr Welby wants the church to be more relevant to the secular world, he needs to stop tearing his church apart, restore respect and dignity to those who work to uphold it, stop the vanity advertising, stop ignoring the general public who contact Lambeth Palace or give feedback on news articles, stop ignoring abuse victims, and take responsibility.
A failing and very troubled organization with unsuitable Archbishops isn't attractive to the general public - secular or Christian, and hundreds of Christians who have given a lot of time to the church of England have had to leave because of Mr Welby. Does he really expect to replace those people with non-Christians? Does he really not understand what he is saying? Sometimes you have to wonder if he is fully lucid. He doesn't have the general public's support because his behaviour and words are not okay. Whoever writes the joke scripts finds the pettiest of cliches and Mr Welby appears to think that he will gain the general public's favour by trotting these out rather than being a Christian role model. 'Cancel Culture'. Pitiful to see a man who is supposed to be the leader of the Christian church trotting out such cliched non-expressions. The church of england has fallen hard.
'Cancel Culture'. Mr Welby has destroyed abuse victims in cover-ups, he has cancelled lives, most notably the disabled female victim who he and his safeguarding team publicly assassinated, and who he and his safeguarding team are still not prepared to redeem. Mr Welby committed open and criminal misconduct in that case in conjunction with peers, judges, Lords, Politicians and authorities, and that isn't an isolated case. Mr Welby should be looking at 'Cover up Culture' and his own misconduct. The fact that he and senior leaders involved in the misconducts of that case and others are still not stepping down, says more than any vanity advertising run. It is a daily abuse to the victims of Mr Welby and the senior leaders to have to endure seeing these men in the press and media with advertising and meaningless ramblings.
Of course there is plenty of feedback to the C of E advertising campaigns. But as I said, it is ignored by the church. At the moment there is a petition against an abusive clergyman being reinstated, which will be ignored by the church. There are victims crying out in anger on social media. There are articles in the smaller media. For example a very astute article picking apart Mr Welby and the Bishop of Dover's cruel and bullying accusations against their own congregation of racism. You cannot simply accuse people en masse of racism without any grounds, it is a very nasty and unjust thing to do. And then there's the more recent article by Linda Woodhead, an extract below which made me think of you.
'It explains why those who try to blow the whistle are ignored or traduced, and why bad news has to be hushed up. It explains why so many large and costly ‘comms’ teams are employed by dioceses, Church House and Lambeth to pump out good news and bury bad. It explains why truthfulness is not a value you ever hear preached. This all makes sense because there is institutional grandiosity to defend, and an ‘it’ to be denied'.
That out of touch and narcissistic advertising campaign by the archbishop, followed by all criticism or concerns being ignored, will be the death of the church of england, and all the money in the world, all the power to corrupt government and Lords, authorities and press, won't save the C of E. Each time letters, emails, phonecalls, feedback on press articles and articles criticizing the church are ignored, or those who speak up are attacked or made out to be mad, it is another nail in the church of england's coffin, and it beggars belief that Mr Welby can talk about making the church more attractive to the secular world when he is destroying it for Christians and for all.
All the money being wasted on a very poor PR representation of the C of E, easily seen through and an imposition on the general public, could be being used to reform the church of england, and to implement safeguarding, because as long as the Bishops of Manchester, Bristol and Southampton and the NST continue to ignore the safeguarding complaint made against Justin Welby and other senior leaders, a serious and amply evidenced matter, as long as it remains that Justin Welby does his vanity advertising while he knows he's guilty of manslaughter through his actions, and nothing is done about that serious matter, there is no safeguarding, no prospect of the church of england being attractive to anyone, and no future for the church of england.
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