Labor standoff at LA’s Loyola Marymount University a battle over Catholic teaching

While the social teaching of the Catholic Church — including that of several popes — has long supported the philosophy of labor unions in the private and public sector, such an imprimatur hasn’t always extended in practice to the Church’s own institutions.

At Jesuit-run Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, a group of non-tenure track professors currently accuse its administration of union busting in violation of Catholic social teaching, while the administration charges it has the right to invoke a religious exemption to bargaining with a “third party” labor union in order to protect the school’s “distinctive Catholic mission” and ensure the school can financially continue to serve students for generations to come.

OSV News spoke to representatives of both parties — as well as the Catholic Labor Network — to learn where the situation currently stands.

Arik Greenberg, clinical assistant professor of interreligious dialogue in the Department of Theological Studies, who has taught at LMU since 2003 — has been involved with the movement to unionize non-tenure track LMU professors since 2011. He was one of the founders of the initial unsuccessful union drive in 2013.

“We spent the next 10 years playing by the university administration’s rules,” Greenberg told OSV News. “We did what they asked, to just give them a chance to make things better, to show they can treat us better, and we are, in fact, a family — and that we don’t need a union, a ‘third party.'”

“I’m using a lot of scare quotes here,” he continued, “that we don’t need a ‘third party’ — big bad union speak — they’ll negotiate directly with us. And they’ll try to find what it is we need, and take it under advisement. And really, very little has changed in the last 10 years.”

Labor negotiations start, then stall

In June 2024, LMU union organizers tried again — this time winning their drive to join Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 721, with 90% in favor. The bargaining unit includes nearly 400 faculty members who teach in LMU’s Bellarmine College of Liberal Arts, the College of Communication and Fine Arts, and the School of Film and Television.

“They started bargaining with us — actively negotiating with us — in December of 2024,” explained Greenberg. 

Until Sept. 12, 2025 — when negotiations stopped. 

On that date, LMU invoked a religious exemption from federal statutes governing collective bargaining for private sector employees. 

Since then, both sides have been at a stalemate.

“They still are claiming the religious exemption and that it is fully, legally supportable,” Greenberg said. “And they are still refusing to deal with our union or to acknowledge its existence directly.”

LMU invokes Catholic mission, defending decision

On the pages LMU published profiling the dispute, the institution defends its action by stating  “invocation of the religious exemption is lawful, grounded in the U.S. Constitution, and consistent with Supreme Court and NLRB precedent. This right cannot be waived and may be exercised at any point.”

“The Board reached this decision to protect LMU’s Catholic mission, its students, and its long-term sustainability,” Griff McNerney, LMU’s senior director of media and public relations, told OSV News in an e-mailed statement. “After months of discernment, trustees concluded that direct partnership with faculty — without SEIU’s involvement — would enable faster, more mission-aligned progress toward shared goals.”

 McNerney noted, “From December 2024 to Summer 2025, LMU reviewed 39 proposals and made counterproposals, none of which were accepted by the union.”

In November, LMU published a plan outlining “key actions” to be implemented for the 2026 academic year: more full-time positions; multi-year curricular planning; multi-year term faculty contracts; and year-long part-time faculty contracts.

“Their demands — not just the initial proposals but likely settled amounts — would have required the equivalent of an 18% tuition hike, 300 layoffs, and cuts to core student programs,” McNerney’s reply to OSV News continued. 

“Such outcomes would erode affordability, diminish academic quality, and jeopardize LMU’s Catholic educational mission. Faced with this, the Board discerned that invoking the religious exemption and engaging faculty directly was the responsible and mission-faithful path forward.”

LMU projections disputed 

But Greenberg rejected that conclusion and the basis of LMU’s projections.

“They had a PowerPoint presentation detailing what it would cost if they were to give us everything in our economic proposal … and it was really riddled with errors,” he said.

Greenberg said numbers were inflated by a larger bargaining unit than exists, as well as the use of requested benefits by every member of the unit.

“One of the older members of our bargaining unit joked, ‘I’m going to take fertility treatments now every year, at the age of 75?'” shared Greenberg. “So it was preposterous, the kind of numbers they’d put together — which in their mind, justified the claim it would have signaled an 18% increase in student tuition; triggered hundreds of layoffs; and bankrupted the school.”

Los Angeles is an expensive locale. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) considered $84,850 per year for a one-person household as the “low income” threshold, or 80% of the area median income, in 2025.

“In the past, I know of at least one (non-tenure track) faculty member who was on food stamps and sold her blood plasma twice a week,” Greenberg recalled. “That was during our first union efforts back in 2013.”

Unions a minority in US Catholic institutions

The Catholic Labor Network identified more than 600 Catholic institutions that bargain with unions representing some or most of their employees.

Among American Catholic institutions, however, there are 181 colleges; 600 hospitals and 1,600 long-term care or other care facilities; 196 particular churches (dioceses, eparchies and ordinariates); and 5,832 secondary schools. 

Thus — just counting those sectors — less than 10% are unionized, a figure reflective of American labor overall. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported the proportion of American wage and salary workers belonging to unions was 9.9% in 2024. 

Chuck Hendricks, president of the Catholic Labor Network and director of National Contracts and Internal Support for Unite Here International Union, said he was “amazed” by LMU’s response. 

“Particularly from the Jesuits, as their reaction was not so much one of taking a look at it from a Catholic social doctrine point of view, and was much more one from a business perspective. The reaction and the emails we received basically all reference they understood Catholic social teachings,” Hendricks continued, “but that the proposals from the staff were economically untenable.”

Jesuits West defend LMU direct engagement

Jesuit Father Sean Carroll, provincial of the Jesuits West Province, said in a statement to OSV News that, “While Catholic social teaching has consistently affirmed the rights of workers to organize, the Church also acknowledges the importance of prudence in applying these principles. Loyola Marymount University has determined the best way forward is through direct engagement.”

“Like any institution,” he continued, “LMU must balance many priorities, including its responsibility to remain financially viable so that it can continue to serve students and provide jobs for several thousand employees. I am consoled to know that the LMU Board, which includes among its leadership eleven religious members, together with President Poon, is committed to working with faculty and staff. My hope,” Father Carroll concluded, “is that direct dialogue can lead to a resolution that upholds the dignity of workers while ensuring that LMU’s mission will continue for years to come.”

The right to unionize and seek workplace equity — and to strike, if necessary — is fundamental to Catholic social teaching. Popes since Pope Leo XIII, who recommended a revival of associations for workers to “unite their forces” in “Rerum Novarum,” have strongly expounded on unionized labor topics, in both official and unofficial pronouncements.

Catholic teaching on labor and right to unions

In his 1991 encyclical, “Centesimus Annus,” commemorating the 100th anniversary of “Rerum Novarum,” St. John Paul II taught that trade unions and other workers’ organizations “defend workers’ rights and protect their interests as persons, while fulfilling a vital cultural role, so as to enable workers to participate more fully and honorably in the life of their nation and to assist them along the path of development.”

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops‘ 1986 teaching “Economic Justice for All: Pastoral Letter on Catholic Social Teaching and the U.S. Economy” also states: “The church fully supports the right of workers to form unions or other associations to secure their rights to fair wages and working conditions.”

In 2022, Pope Francis succinctly declared “there are no free workers without trade unions.”

In October, Pope Leo XIV met a delegation of Chicago labor leaders, telling them, “This delegation represents thousands of workers, whose skills enhance the common good and help to create a society where all can flourish. It is important work and I commend all you for your contributions in this regard.”

Dialogue with any labor union not envisioned

“I was surprised that — instead of engaging in dialogue with members of their community — LMU chose to say, ‘We can’t afford this proposal. So we are going to take away your rights,'” said Hendricks, referring to the religious exemption from collective bargaining. “That’s not Catholic. That’s also not community-minded. That’s not in the spirit of the Jesuits — an order that does so much publicly around supporting the oppressed and the marginalized and those on the periphery.”

But LMU characterizes the situation differently.

“(Catholic social teaching) is not a mandate to bargain at all costs nor with SEIU; it emphasizes how we pursue justice as much as what we pursue,” continued McNerney’s statement. “LMU chooses direct partnership with faculty over ongoing conflict because it better reflects our mission, our Ignatian commitment to cura personalis (personal care) and our responsibility to students, families, and the broader community. Other Catholic universities, including Marquette, Boston College, Duquesne, St. Leo, and others have made similar discernments and invoked their religious exemption.”

Asked if LMU would view the situation differently if they were dealing with an exclusively Catholic labor union, McNerney replied, “LMU does not comment on speculative scenarios. LMU has already made commitments to our faculty that are backed with real action, including improving compensation with immediate raises. LMU deeply values the contributions of our faculty and remains committed to supporting an environment where academic excellence and student success thrive.”

Labor strike still possible

Greenberg, who was frustrated by expenses for the Dec. 9 inauguration of LMU President Thomas Poon — arguing, “They spent millions” on what “seemed like a coronation” — said the faculty do not want to strike, but may.

“I would say the nuclear option is a strike — and we do not want to strike, for a variety of reasons. We care about the student’s well-being, which the administration keeps saying we don’t,” he said. “Why are we working at this school for peanuts, if not for the love of our students? Yet, you have these upper-level administrators making six-figure to seven-figure salaries, claiming they love the students more than we do.”

If a strike is launched, however, it’s unclear whether they will have the same level of labor protections as prior to the second Trump administration. 

“We are not certain we will have protection from being fired if we were to engage in an unfair labor practice strike, which previously would have been a protected activity,” Greenberg explained. “The (LMU) administration has indicated through a variety of channels that, if we do go on strike, they will start firing people. So we definitely are afraid.”

Ultimately, Hendricks said, he hopes negotiations can resume.

“There’s no document from the Church that says, ‘You must meet X, Y, and Z proposal to be a just employer,'” Hendricks observed. “The question is: ‘Do you recognize the inherent rights of people to bargain?’ If you do … then you don’t stop talking to find a solution. And that’s what I would say is the most disappointing thing of all.”

Now that Anglicans are in the reparations game, should Catholics and Jews demand recompense too? (Opinion)

Some Caribbean nations have been touring European capitals demanding reparations for slavery. 

Almost everywhere they are given short shrift. 

But in the leadership of the Church of England they may have found people gullible enough to fall for it. 

Will the newly-confirmed Dame Sarah Mullally, 106th Archbishop of Canterbury, be one of them?

In a virtue-signalling move the Church Commissioners plan to give away £100m from their charity funds to this cause, instead of using the money to support parish churches. 

A group of 27 parliamentarians led by Katie Lam MP has written to the incoming Archbishop of Canterbury calling the proposal “legally dubious” as it diverts Church funds from their original purpose. 

The fact that hundreds of English churches are in need of funds for structural repair seems lost on the Church of England.

Of course profiting from slavery is abhorrent. But those who advocate for reparations to be paid by the UK seem to be ignoring a long list of costs on the other side of the ledger. If Britain had dues to pay, those debts are settled.

Firstly, Britain recognised slavery was repugnant as early as 1772 when a court case called Somerset famously ruled that slaves could not be held in England.

Secondly this country was amongst the very first to abolish the slave trade, in 1807 (only Denmark was before us in 1803). 

But unlike Denmark, the UK was a global superpower at the time and our abolition sent a powerful message worldwide. We were also one of the first world powers to abolish slavery itself, in 1833.

Compare the Ottoman Empire which only banned the African slave trade in 1857 and their last slaves were not actually emancipated until the Turkish Republic was formed in 1924. Saudi Arabia maintained slaves as chattel until King Faisal abolished the practice in 1962. Mauritania only legally abolished slavery in 1981.

But Great Britain, and later the UK, made a huge difference actively fighting the evil slave trade world wide. The West Africa Squadron of the Royal Navy lost up to 2,000 men fighting the slave trade. This loss of life was often due to disease and illness. 

The Squadron lost so many people it was considered a graveyard posting by its personnel at the time.

Some African leaders fiercely opposed attempts to stifle the trade. But the Royal Navy rescued upwards of 150,000 Africans from slavery. There are photographic examples from as late as 1906 of the Royal Navy intercepting slave ships.

The nation of Sierra Leone was started as a settlement created by the British in 1787 for formerly enslaved people and became a British colony in 1808 and British protectorate in 1896.

Britain took out an enormous loan in 1833 to pay compensation to stop slavery. Worth tens of billions of pounds in today’s money it took 182 years to pay off this debt and current day British taxpayers only cleared the debt on the interest some ten years ago, in 2015.

If we are tallying up reparations then it would only be fair to deduct the value of thousands of British lives, the countless millions in expense and loss and the payment for protecting countries and shipping lanes for decades. Any court performing this exercise fairly may find that the UK has well and truly paid its debt.

As for the Church of England, they should be careful about being too eager to offer reparations. 

There are several minorities for whom the Anglican Church has far fewer points of mitigation.

What about anti-Catholic Recusancy Acts between 1558 and 1888? And what about the Jews?

Although predating the Anglican Church, Archbishop Welby apologised to the Jewish community in 2022 for the anti-Jewish laws of 1222 which paved the way for the expulsion of the Jews from England in 1290, an exile that lasted for 360 years. 

How much compensation is due for that? And thanks to recent pontifications current relations between the Church and the Jewish community have seen better days. One cannot help doubting that the Church Commissioners would be so eager to make reparations in that direction.

Churches urged to be ready amid reports of growing Bible curiosity among young adults

A sharp rise in Bible sales and reports of growing spiritual curiosity among young adults in the UK has prompted calls for church leaders to be ready to respond. 

Missiologist and executive director of Hope Together, Rachel Jordan-Wolf, said the Church in the UK is facing a “pivotal moment” amid reports of increasing numbers of younger people actively seeking out Scripture - often with little prior connection to church.

Her comments follow reports that Bible sales surged by 134% in 2025, reaching £6.3 million in the UK, according to industry figures widely reported earlier this year.

Ms Jordan-Wolf says the trend challenges long-held assumptions about inevitable decline.

“For years, we have lived under a narrative of decline, and now we have to readjust our thinking and practice to live in this new, hopeful world of growth," she said. 

Her assessment is echoed by the author of the recent Belief in Britain report by Christopher Gasson that has also fuelled discussion about changing religious attitudes. 

The poll of 10,000 people, conducted by OnePoll, found a noticeable rise in belief in God and spiritual openness among questions among the youth.

Almost two-thirds (64%) of Gen Z respondents described themselves as spiritual, compared with just over a third (35%) of baby boomers, while those in midlife were most likely to identify as atheists.

According to the report, 54% of respondents identified as Christian, an increase from the 2021 census figure, which placed the proportion below half of the population.

Mr Gasson said: “I expected the data to confirm what has been assumed for a long time: Britain is steadily becoming a more atheist country. The results are the reverse of what I was expecting.”

Some researchers have urged caution in interpreting recent survey data. A new analysis published by the Pew Research Center has questioned claims of a widespread revival in the UK, arguing that several high-profile findings rely on opt-in surveys rather than random population samples, which Pew considers more methodologically robust.

That critique has been levelled in particular at The Quiet Revival, a 2025 report commissioned by the Bible Society, which found a marked increase in churchgoing and belief among 18 to 34 year olds in England and Wales. The Bible Society defended its research against Pew's claims. 

While Ms Jordan-Wolf acknowledged that the pace of change has been startling: “Faith has become more important to these generations in just the last five years”.

However she rejected claims that the Church is in decline.

“The Church in the UK is not in decline - I repeat, the Church in the UK is not in decline," she said. 

Ms Jordan-Wolf also pointed to the scale of recent practical engagement by churches, noting that more than 140,000 Gospels were distributed across the UK by Hope Together last year through its Great Gospel Giveaway initiative.

The initiative, which is expected to run again this year, encourages churches to place free copies of the Gospels into public spaces such as high streets, cafés, schools, food banks and community centres, removing both cost and social pressure for those exploring Christianity for the first time.

“A Gospel — the life of Jesus — is the perfect place to start,” Mrs Jordan-Wolf said. “We want to make people’s journey to Jesus as easy as possible, and the Great Gospel Giveaway helps churches do exactly that.”

Christian booksellers have reported evidence of that curiosity.

Staff at GLO Bookshop in Glasgow have described a growing number of customers – many of them young - coming in after searching online or trying to visit churches, some simply saying they were unsure what they were looking for but felt a strong need to read Scripture.

Ms Jordan-Wolf said such encounters underline the importance of churches being visibly prepared.

“Let’s be ready when someone says, ‘I don’t really know what I’m looking for … but I need a Bible,’” she said. 

Hope Together is now preparing churches for a renewed phase of the Great Gospel Giveaway, with a focus on equipping local congregations to respond confidently and practically to spiritual curiosity in their communities.

An online webinar, Reaching and Responding to an Open Generation, is scheduled for March 2, where Ms Jordan-Wolf alongside Director of Elim Evangelism Mark Greenwood will discuss what the current moment means for mission and how churches can take part in the next phase of Gospel distribution.

For Ms Jordan-Wolf, the priority is the Church recognising the opportunity before it: “God is doing something new, and we are being invited to respond.

“How can we help every young adult and young person we know — or everyone our church might come into contact with — receive a Gospel?”

Family wins fight to keep pizza van outside south London church after ‘disrespect’ row

A family business has won permission to keep selling pizza from a van outside a South London church, after concerns were raised its location was “disrespectful”.

Kingston Council has granted Vesuvio on the Road a 12-month street trading licence to sell food and soft drinks from a van outside St Pius X Roman Catholic Church, in Norbiton, which it had been doing under a six-month temporary licence.

Objectors argued it was unsuitable to park a pizza van across two parking bays outside the church, at a licensing hearing on Tuesday (January 27). 

The plans, which are only for the evenings, received 22 written objections from residents.

Richard Smith, representing members of the church, including Father Alfred Ebalu, said they did not want to stop the business trading and were only concerned about the location of the van and disturbance this caused.

He said: “The church building and its immediate surroundings provide an area of peace and calm appropriate to the long-established traditions of a place of worship. Trading from a pizza van at the gates of the church in such a location is demonstrably unsuitable – even, some say, disrespectful.”

Mr Smith told the meeting the location of the van caused “disturbance and inconvenience” for visitors trying to get into the church, particularly disabled and elderly people. He said the rules of the parking bays had been negotiated years ago to help people access the church.

He added: “We’ve reviewed these concerns over the last few weeks and asked ourselves if we’re being unreasonable, are we being too protective of the church and its environment, but we conclude that our concerns are reasonable and fair.

“A place of worship at an established church, indeed any faith group, should be allowed to continue its long-standing worship and practise without intrusion or disturbance.”

Younes Hamade, the council’s principal engineer, also wrote to the authority stating he could not support the application due to the “significant demand for on-street parking” in the area.

Alessandra Rea, who runs Vesuvio on the Road with her husband Vincenzo, told the hearing they understood parking was a sensitive issue but the bays were for the public, not reserved for the church, and there were usually spaces nearby as the business only traded in the evenings.

She said: “We fully respect that this location is beside a place of worship and that there are sensitive occasions such as funerals and weddings. We already don’t trade on Holy Days of Obligation and… when a funeral is in place, if seven days of notice [has been] given.”

Alessandra said they had shown they could operate responsibly from the six months they had traded so far. She said: “Our business is food only. We do not sell alcohol. We do not attract late-night crowds. Our customers are mainly local residents and families, respectful people who come to buy dinner and go home.

“Many of our customers also pre-order their food and come only to collect it. This means there are no long queues, no gathering and no disturbance.”

She added: “This business is not a hobby or extra income. This is our only source of income. We have four children and we rely on this business to feed our family and cover essential living costs.”

Alessandra claimed a small group of people had tried to stop the business trading by sending repeated complaints to the council, encouraging other businesses to oppose them and creating problems so it was harder to work.

She added the business was only asking “for a fair chance to continue working legally and responsibly”.

Independent Councillor James Giles claimed he had received emails about a handful of people who he believed had been “very abusive and actually quite detrimental to a family that is just trying, in this challenging economic environment, to make a living and make a go of it”.

The committee decided to grant the 12-month licence, allowing the pizza van to operate from 5pm to 10pm on Tuesdays to Saturdays. Conditions on the licence mean the business can’t trade on Holy Days of Obligation and when funerals take place inside the church, if it gives seven days’ notice.

Protest Against an Archbishop of Canterbury that calls the future of the Church into Question

Counting Archbishops and Counting Authority

The Church of England claims that Sarah Mullally is the 105th Archbishop of Canterbury. 

At first sight, the Catholic objection to this numbering — which insists that she is in fact only the 36th Protestant archbishop, following the 69 Catholic Archbishops of Canterbury from St Augustine to Cardinal Reginald Pole — might look like little more than historical pedantry, or a reflexively angry protest against a Protestant revisionist account that functions as state propaganda rather than accurate history.

In fact, the difference between these two ways of counting exposes the deepest structural and spiritual weakness of the Church of England. This is not simply a Catholic criticism wounded by the expulsion of the Western Church from this island and the persecution that followed it, but also an attempt to explain the protest that erupted at Sarah Mullally’s election service in St Paul’s Cathedral.

The initial argument runs like this. The Church of England numbers its archbishops from Augustine, sent by Pope Gregory the Great in 597, yet it formally repudiated papal authority at the Reformation. 

There were therefore only sixty-nine Archbishops of Canterbury in communion with Rome, ending with Cardinal Reginald Pole. 

Thomas Cranmer, the architect of the English Reformation, therefore becomes the seventieth — the first of a new Protestant succession.

Theological Rupture, Not Administrative Continuity

The changes ran very deep. The nature of Christian ministry was radically changed. The nature of the Mass was repudiated and replaced. The sacrificing priesthood became a preaching presbytership. Bishops became managers rather than successors to the apostles, since the succession had been both broken and repudiated. The Church became an uneasy balance between congregational autonomy and managerial episcopacy.

The understanding of who the clergy were and what they were for changed radically. The offices of minister, bishop, and archbishop became something so different that it was not merely the repudiation of papal allegiance that broke continuity, but an irreparable fracture in theological coherence.

By continuing to use Augustinian numbering, Anglicanism maintains a fictive claim to historical continuity while simultaneously denying the sacramental and magisterial authority that alone gave that continuity its meaning. This is not a harmless inconsistency; it is an inherent contradiction — and contradictions have consequences.

The result is an office rich in inherited prestige, which explains why continuity is so fiercely claimed, but increasingly thin and fragile in its capacity to exercise any binding authority.  

The crisis the Church of England now faces is, at root, a crisis of authority. Where does authority lie? Who possesses it? Who recognises it? How is it practised?

The Anglican answers collapse into political pragmatism — a pragmatism that now appears to have failed. When pressure is applied — when questions are asked about safeguarding, episcopal competence, or justice for victims — it becomes clear that there is no authority to which appeal can reliably be made. The Anglican conscience has nowhere authoritative to turn.

It is this absence of real authority that produced the protest at the election service in St Paul’s Cathedral. The objection was not merely eccentric or personal; it was political and philosophical. It was a protest conducted in a vacuum created by the absence of any binding magisterium capable of adjudicating questions of doctrine, moral responsibility, episcopal competence, or justice.

In Catholicism such protests are intelligible because there exists an authority to which appeal may be made — even if that authority is resisted, criticised, or at times misused. By contrast, the Church of England possesses no teaching office capable of commanding widespread assent, settling disputes, or issuing rulings that require obedience rather than negotiation.

The Church of England is therefore a political institution that lacks a founding philosophy. More seriously still, it lacks any agreed metaphysic. It was constructed out of an unstable coalition between sacramentally nostalgic High Anglicanism and pragmatic, pugnacious Puritanism.

What this produces in the office of Archbishop of Canterbury is an office that claims inherited dignity but possesses diminishing moral coherence, intellectual consistency, and inadequate — or non-existent — authority. When authority collapses into managerial process and leadership becomes purely symbolic, dissent has nowhere to go except into public protest.

The absence of a Protestant magisterium, created by the unbridgeable rupture of the Reformation, has generated a crisis of doctrinal clarity and spiritual authority that has now broken the surface — in a way for which the Church of England has no obvious remedy.

What the Protest at St Paul’s Really Signified

The lone heckler protesting against the appointment of Sarah Mullally as Archbishop of Canterbury may have appeared to be an isolated, rude interruption by an eccentric protester. In fact, it was far more significant than that and needs to be taken seriously — both in terms of what the protest was directed at, and what it represents.

The protester was an eccentric retired Anglican clergyman called Paul Williamson, who has protested before against what he perceives to be the imposition of a feminist agenda that illegitimately changes the nature of the Church of England.

Although he was one lone voice and was quickly removed from the premises, his views are far more widely shared than is immediately apparent. Many Anglicans who once held them have since become Roman Catholic, concluding that the Church they had inherited was essentially Catholic in vision, and that the political battle to save the Church of England from progressive ideological capture — feminism in particular — had been lost.

But Paul Williamson was not only protesting against ideological capture. He was also protesting against institutional corruption arising from failures to deal adequately with safeguarding issues involving clerical sexual abuse.

This was not simply a protest against ideas, but against a system that appeared incapable of accountability.

He was protesting against an institutional arrogance that now runs the Church of England — an arrogance that appears to have decided it could proceed with its latest protégé for the Archbishopric of Canterbury without practising any real accountability, either to victims of sexual abuse or to those who believe the Church should transparently follow its own procedures with honesty and integrity.

Safeguarding, Competence, and Survivor N

Let us look first at the criticism of Sarah Mullally’s competence.

A man publicly identified only as Survivor N claims that he was sexually abused by a priest in the Diocese of London, for which Sarah Mullally was responsible. The allegations included groping, sexualised comments, and requests that he perform a sexual act.

Survivor N claims that when he made a formal complaint under the Church’s disciplinary system — the Clergy Discipline Measure (CDM) — the handling of the complaint was deeply flawed and misleading.

He claims that Mullally forwarded his confidential emails to the priest he was accusing, constituting a fundamental breach of safeguarding protocol. He further claims that she publicly stated the case had been fully dealt with, although the complaint was never properly concluded, communicated, or resolved in any way that involved him.

As a consequence, he argues that the Church’s incompetent and corrupt response compounded his deteriorating mental health. He subsequently lodged a further complaint against Mullally herself under the same disciplinary process.

This complaint was investigated by the Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, and dismissed — as is the case with the overwhelming majority of CDMs brought against bishops, who now constitute the Church’s managerial class. Survivor N has stated that he intends to continue appealing against that dismissal.

Institutionally, the Church of England has since acknowledged that the complaint against Mullally was not properly handled and that the matter is now being revisited by what it describes as “appropriate authorities”.

A Double Standard After Welby

The obvious difficulty is that Archbishop Justin Welby was forced to resign for a very similar failure to deal properly with a safeguarding complaint. It is therefore extraordinary that the Church of England chose to proceed with the appointment of a bishop whose own competence, transparency, and integrity are clouded by unresolved safeguarding failures.

Once again, it looks like institutional self-protection — first shielding predatory clergy, and then defending incompetent managerial bishops who appear to prioritise institutional reputation over pastoral care, and over the fundamental requirement that justice must not only be done but be seen to be done.

Not One Voice, But Many

Paul Williamson’s heckling was not an isolated protest. His objections were shared not only by Survivor N, but also by other representatives of survivors of clerical sexual abuse — including a public critic known as Gilo.

More broadly still, resistance to the feminisation of the Church is shared by the overwhelming majority of Anglicans worldwide. Roughly 85 per cent of the estimated 85 million Anglicans globally are represented by GAFCON and allied provinces. They have repeatedly protested against the way the Church of England’s appointments process privileges a narrow liberal-progressive ideology.

The capture of Christianity by feminism — itself a manifestation of neo-Marxist egalitarianism — has produced a deepening and seemingly irreparable schism within global Anglicanism. The appointments process increasingly resembles a broader cultural takeover of Christianity within English, American, and Western Anglican life.

Institutional Capture and Cultural Collapse

The disparity between the vast numbers of Anglicans in the global South who protest against what Mullally’s appointment represents, and the pretence that the Church of England’s internal processes embody democratic accountability, gravely damages episcopal credibility.

The tragedy of the protest at St Paul’s Cathedral is that it was not a disruptive voice for its own sake, but a lament against institutional abuse of power. This has emerged in two forms. 

The cover up of sexual abuse and the managerial incompetence or corruption that caused it; and the repudiation of the political deal struck to allow the Church of England to maintain the width of contradictory views after the experiment with the ordination of women. Inevitably once they had gained institutional power, they sought to repudiate the agreement.

Moscow’s Only Anglican Church Is Divided, and Headed to Court

A long-simmering power struggle inside St. Andrew’s Anglican Church in Moscow burst into public view this week after parishioners arriving for Sunday worship were blocked from entering the church by a rival group of members accused of trying to seize control of the congregation.

Founded in the early 19th century, St. Andrew’s occupies a rare place in Russia’s religious landscape. 

The church, the only one of its kind in Moscow, was confiscated by Soviet authorities and returned to the Anglican community only in 1994.

It has since served as a spiritual and social hub for foreign residents and English-speaking worshippers in the Russian capital, largely free of serious internal disputes — until now.

The first signs of trouble surfaced in September, when the church said its website and WhatsApp channel had been “hacked” without naming who was responsible.

Soon after, the church’s chaplain, the Rev. Canon Dr. Arun John, accused a “handful of members” of using “intimidation and threats” in an effort to illegally take control of the church’s administration and finances.

The dispute, he said, had also interfered with his ability to secure a visa to return to Russia. Rev. John, who was appointed chaplain in 2024, had now found himself back in his native India and unable to return to his congregation.

Not long afterward, a new Telegram channel claiming to represent St. Andrew’s began publishing updates and commentary. But the church’s long-established Telegram channel, with more than 2,000 subscribers, continued to operate, an outward sign of a growing internal split.

Tensions escalated in December, when church warden Nicolette Kirk filed a civil suit in a Moscow court challenging the appointment of another church member, Sarah Harris, as head of the St. Andrew’s legal entity, RO Anglican Church in Moscow.

In a public notice signed on Dec. 11, Kirk argued the church meeting that appointed Harris lacked a proper quorum and called on other parishioners to join the suit.

The Diocese in Europe, which oversees Anglican congregations across the continent, confirmed the dispute in a statement to The Moscow Times. Spokesperson Ruth Blanco said a “very small number” of parish members had disrupted church operations and was witholding visa support needed for Rev. John to return to Russia.

Blanco confirmed the chaplain remains in India because of the visa impasse.

In comments to the newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta this week, Kirk accused Harris and “a small group of disgruntled individuals” of using Rev. John’s absence to “illegally seize control of the Russian legal entity that allows us to operate in the country.”

“Despite Father Arun being duly selected and appointed by both our church authorities and the Russian legal entity, Ms. Harris’s group unilaterally decided to cancel Father Arun’s visa application without consulting the parishioners, thereby preventing his return to Russia,” Kirk was quoted as saying.

Rev. John did not respond to requests for comment sent to his social media accounts.

The dispute came to a head over the weekend, when St. Andrew’s administration announced that services had been suspended “due to the absence of persons authorized to conduct them in accordance with Russian law.” 

Shortly afterward, the church’s long-standing Telegram channel reported that parishioners had been physically locked out of the building.

“Dear all, unfortunately, we have been locked out of the church this morning,” the message, posted on Sunday morning, read. “The 11 a.m. service will be taking place in the Art Court Hotel opposite.”

The incident was confirmed by a current church member who asked not to be named as well as a spokesperson for the Anglican Church in England. The spokesperson said the church was “shocked” by developments and called the suspension of services “an unfortunate escalation in tensions faced by the chaplaincy in recent months.”

In a statement issued soon after the news that services at St. Andrew’s were suspended, the Bishop of the Diocese in Europe, the Rt. Rev. Dr. Robert Innes, accused the group aligned with Harris of subjecting other church members to “harassment and threats,” including through the use of a “private security company.” 

More pointedly, Bishop Innes said the Russian legal entity now led by Harris no longer recognized the authority of the Anglican Church. That, he said, had made it impossible to continue holding services.

“Such harassment and intimidating behavior is unacceptable in any context, let alone at church,” he said.

That statement prompted a sharp rebuttal posted on St. Andrew’s website, which appears to be controlled by the group backing Harris. In it, the church administration accused the Diocese of ignoring complaints lodged against Rev. John, including allegations of “bullying” and “misogyny.”

“Bishop Innes continues to support Rev. Arun John, who is now disrupting the community from abroad through proxies who slander and lie to the media and claim to have leadership roles in St. Andrew’s Russian legal entity when they do not have such roles,” the statement said.

It also claimed that Rev. John had failed to follow through on an agreement to obtain a work permit and labor contract with the church’s Russian legal entity after arriving in Moscow in December 2024.

“When he arrived in Moscow in December 2024, he... started a campaign to disrupt and cause chaos within our community,” it said.

In a statement sent to The Moscow Times on Friday, St. Andrew’s administration repeated its allegations against Rev. John, but stressed that the church remains open to visitors and that other activities “continue as usual” despite the suspension in religious services.

Although the church falls under the Diocese in Europe, Rev. John’s license to preach does not automatically extend to Russia. Since 2016, foreign clergy have been required to obtain special accreditation to conduct religious services or missionary activities in the country, a law that human rights groups have criticized as restrictive. Still, the Diocese of Europe recognizes Rev. John as the chaplain of St. Andrew’s.

At the same time, those involved say the current dispute does not appear to involve Russian authorities directly.

The Anglican Church said the Russian Orthodox Church has offered support, though it did not specify what form that support has taken. A former parishioner still in contact with church members, who requested anonymity, described the situation as  “internal” and having “nothing to do with the state.”

A current member of St. Andrew’s told The Moscow Times he believes those claiming to represent the church’s administration under Harris “have no legitimacy.” He declined to comment on the lawsuit filed by Kirk, citing the ongoing court proceedings.

For the time being, parishioners, deprived of their physical church, say they will continue weekly services by livestreaming them on YouTube.

'I gave last 46p': Young people tell how they felt pressure to donate to church

Jodie was surrounded by smiling faces at her 21st birthday party, but most were people she had not known for more than a month.

The party had been organised for her by the London International Christian Church - a Bible-based non-denominational church, according to their website - into which she had recently been baptised.

She was told by her "discipler", or church mentor, she says, that she could not invite any friends from outside the church - only a handful of family members.

Looking back, this was the point where she feels members of the church began encouraging her to choose them over family and friends, leading to her becoming more distant from others in her life.

Other students we spoke to also told us of similar feelings of isolation after moving into "Brother" and "Sister" households with other church members.

The website of the London ICC describes it as being part of a global movement of more than 130 churches worldwide.

The London church is one of the churches which the London ICC website says has been "planted", along with others in Birmingham, Manchester, Edinburgh and Dublin. There are smaller operations in Oxford and Essex.

In sermons seen by the BBC, the London ICC - which is the largest - said it was aiming for 400 "disciples" by the end of 2025.

It claims to be "not your average church", and its student-focused Instagram features slickly edited testimonies from young faces, along with vlogs and vox-pop interviews near university campuses.

People we have spoken to, who were all students when they became involved with the ICC, have raised allegations with the BBC about the London ICC and the Edinburgh ICC.

These include feeling pressured into making donations they could not afford, church members asking for their private financial information and the church encouraging them to recruit other students into the church.

Both churches should follow the Code of Fundraising Practice, which lays out how charities should behave. This includes not putting people under undue pressure to donate and not unreasonably intruding on their privacy.

The London International Christian Church told the BBC the allegation that undue pressure was put on the students for donations was untrue.

It said its doctrine was that giving must be "voluntary, in keeping with one's means and never coerced or demanded".

'I believed not donating was a sin'

The people we spoke to were aged between 19 and 22 when they became involved with the church, at a time when they say they were feeling vulnerable at university.

One says he was approached by a church member while he was in a park. Another told the BBC she was in a cafe on a university campus. Two say they found the church online.

They say they suddenly found much-needed community in the church, with one describing the early days as "beyond love-bombing" from members.

But for Jodie, who was 20 at the time, the conversation quickly turned to how much she was prepared to give financially, she tells the BBC.

"The day before my baptism, they asked me how much money I was making and I told them," she says.

"We picked a price, an amount of money that I should be giving to the church weekly."

When she joined the church, she was using her overdraft, which she says three church members knew about.

She was working to pay it off, but she says the church advised her to leave her job as she was missing services to work on Sundays.

Jodie says she believed donations were mandatory, and she had the impression that if she did not donate, it would be viewed by the church as "falling back into sin".

Jodie showed us her bank statements, and told us that when struggling to keep up with donations, she started giving the church money from her student loan.

In publicly available footage of the London ICC's services, one speaker delivered a sermon including the line: "If you don't love God, don't give. If you do love God, you'll give to help the churches grow."

The London ICC told the BBC that any claim that donors were told it was "a sin" not to give "especially in circumstances where they lacked funds is rejected in entirety as being utterly false and baseless".

They say they offer financial aid if a member encounters financial difficulty.

It was around this time that members of the church started to ask Jodie for private financial information, she says.

She showed us what she describes as an unprompted message from a member of the church asking her to fill in a budget planner, which asked for her total monthly income, expenses, savings and cash balance. And they needed it "ASAP".

Despite repeated requests, Jodie refused, saying that what the church had asked for felt "super invasive".

The London ICC told the BBC that "asking members for financial information is not our practice or policy".

The church added it offered workshops on budgeting and financial skills, where members "may provide information voluntarily".

'I printed off bank statements and showed them to church members'

Jodie's was not an isolated experience. Hanu, who knew Jodie through the church, says he was also asked for private financial information.

"They really got invasive where they started going through my bank statements seeing how much I earned.

"That's where I went wrong. I let them," he says.

Hanu says, in his view, the church's use of scripture "embed it into your head that you are robbing from God every time you don't give".

In bank statements seen by the BBC, Hanu sends the last 46p he had in one bank account to the church.

The London ICC told the BBC "no person is instructed to request bank statements, income details, or private financial documents from others".

It said "such conduct would be contrary to [the LICC's] teachings and governance".

Persuaded to live with 'disciples'

Like many students, Hanu says he had been partying too hard and was looking for spiritual guidance.

He was invited to a Bible study where people he had never met before were giving him hugs and complimenting him. He describes this now as "more than love-bombing".

Hanu says he was later persuaded to move out of his family home into a house with other male "disciples".

He says the impression he received was that for him to "advance" in the church, he would need to live with "disciples" to "keep you accountable".

Despite paying rent to a church member, he says that for the first two months, he was sleeping on a sofa where he was often woken up to pray by his housemates.

He could only invite friends over, he says, if they were planning on joining the church.

The London ICC told the BBC any suggestion that members were discouraged from relationships with non-members is directly contrary to its practices.

Like Hanu, Arabella - not her real name - says she was convinced to move out of her family home.

In her 20s at the time, she thought living with other members of the church made "it easier for you to be spiritual".

This was years before Hanu joined, but Arabella also says there was a lack of privacy at the house she moved into.

And she says the number of people in the household regularly fluctuated, meaning sometimes people had to share a bed.

She says members of the house had to wake up at the same time, and were told they could not leave the house after 10pm.

The London ICC told the BBC members may choose to live together for mutual support.

It said living arrangements between members were private and the church did not impose curfews, social isolation or restrictions on friendships.

Those we spoke to said they were actively encouraged to recruit on university campuses.

Hanu says the impression he received was that students were seen by the church as the "easiest to manipulate".

The London ICC told the BBC that it did not "target", prey upon or manipulate students.

It said "evangelism among students is conducted openly and respectfully".

'I thought she was another student, but she was a member of a church'

Madalaine was 19 when she says a woman approached her in a cafe on one of Edinburgh University's campuses.

The pair became friendly and Madalaine was invited to Bible study sessions at the Edinburgh ICC.

It was not until months later that Madalaine discovered her new friend was not, in fact, a student.

Like other students we spoke to, Madalaine recalls one Bible study session where participants were asked to reveal their biggest sins to each other.

"People were sharing some really dark, extremely emotional things and then expecting me to do the same," she says.

Like Hanu and Jodie, she says it wasn't long before she was invited to provide her financial information.

The final straw was when she was told by two members to break up with her boyfriend, who was not a member of the church.

"I remember this, like, rising feeling of dread, and I just started crying."

She says she broke off contact with the group before she became a formal member.

The Edinburgh ICC told the BBC that "misrepresentation of identity, directing personal relationship decisions, or reviewing personal financial information for the purpose of influencing donations, do not reflect the policies or authorised practices of the church and are not condoned".

Madalaine reported the group to the Edinburgh University Christian Union, which said it was aware of the group.

Last year, the Dublin branch of the ICC was banned from Trinity College campuses.

The university told the BBC the group was inviting students to "social events that were in fact designed to bring them into a religious group" but said there was "no issue with religious groups on campus" more broadly.

The BBC contacted the Dublin ICC, but it did not respond.

Jodie, Hanu and Arabella say leaving the church was made harder by the belief that being part of it was the only way to get into heaven, and that they did not want to risk their salvation.

Jodie says she was very low after leaving the church, and was left believing that God did not love her, that she did not have any friends and that she had "done something bad".

The London ICC told the BBC the allegation that it teaches that leaving the church results in forfeiture of salvation is "utterly false".

It said that members are taught that "salvation cannot be purchased".

But it added "deliberately abandoning God and persisting in unrepentant sin has spiritual consequences. That doctrine is not linked to donations, nor is it coercive."

'A donation needs to be a voluntary act'

The London ICC is a registered charity, and has obligations to the Charity Commission and Fundraising Regulator.

According to its own charity filings, for each of the past four years, it received an annual total gross income of between £966,693 and £999,521.

The Code of Fundraising Practice stipulates that charities should not unreasonably intrude on a person's privacy, put undue pressure on a person to donate, or use unreasonably persistent approaches.

We discussed the accounts of the ex-members we spoke to with Nathalie Jacoby-Danesh, a charity law expert and partner at Browne Jacobson LLP.

"A donation needs to be a voluntary act, and that's the basic definition under law, under charity law, and under regulations, a donation is something that you do freely without any undue pressure," she said.

The Fundraising Regulator does not have powers to formally sanction organisations found to be non-compliant with the Code of Fundraising Practice, but works closely with statutory regulators including the Charity Commission where enforcement is needed.

The Charity Commission say they would become involved only if a breach of another regulator's rules indicated a wider failure of governance.

When asked about the regulations around faith-based charities in general, the Fundraising Regulator said some had not always been aware that their activities constitute fundraising, which must be carried out in accordance with the code.

It added it was an area where it was seeing "increased misunderstanding and inconsistent practice".

Italy investigates church painting of angel restored to look like Meloni

An angel in a church in central Rome has been restored to look like Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, a national newspaper reported on Saturday, prompting the culture ministry to investigate and Meloni to laugh off the affair.

In a front-page story, la Repubblica daily was the first to note that one of two angels in a chapel of the Basilica of St Lawrence in Lucina had been altered to resemble the 49-year-old conservative, Italy's first female prime minister.

The article ran with before-and-after pictures of the painting. It said the angel had previously looked like a "generic cherub".

The culture ministry said it had instructed Rome's top art heritage official to carry out a same-day inspection of the restored painting before "deciding what to do next".

The opposition Five Star Movement complained: "We cannot allow art and culture to risk becoming a tool for propaganda or anything else, regardless of whether the face depicted is that of the prime minister."

The parish priest, Daniele Micheletti, told ANSA news agency that the decorations in the chapel had recently been touched up following water damage. The originals dated only to 2000, so were not under any heritage protection.

The restoration was carried out by the same artist who created the original painting, Bruno Valentinetti. He disputed the suggestion he had altered the image, telling reporters: "I restored what was there before... 25 years ago".

As for Meloni, she posted a picture of the disputed painting on Instagram, with the caption "No, I definitely don't look like an angel", with a laughing emoji.

Some church teaching is 'rancid' and must be updated, says Mary McAleese

Some Catholic church teaching is "rancid" and "has gone off", Mary McAleese has said.

The former president said that teaching "needs to be updated", adding that "it's not going to be... by a bunch of, tiny and increasingly small number of celibate male ordained bishops."

The former president was speaking on a podcast with students at her former school, St Dominic's in Belfast, Mollie Rodgers (18) and Kathryn Reynolds (17).

McAleese said that Pope Leo is "no champion of women, unfortunately", and lamented what is happening in the Catholic Church with the "pushback against the ordination of women, whether it's as deacons or as priests".

She said that women look at the pope's stance on women and say "you've got a problem of relevance here. You've got a problem of credibility here. And you don't see it, you know, because they're just not in that field."

In December, a report from a Vatican commission confirmed the ban on women deacons in the church. A deacon can perform all the functions of a priest except hear confessions or celebrate the Eucharist.

McAleese said that "There are lots of wonderful young women who would make a great job of priesthood and of diaconate."

She added that "there are lots of ideas from women" and "lots of intellectual energy that could really inform church teaching, in particular church teaching that is rancid and has gone off".

Referring to a document presented to church representatives attending a Synod on Synodality in Kilkenny last October, she said: "I just find it so boring and depressing and trite and Pollyanna-ish and not really related to the world of faith that I live in.

"The dynamism wasn't there... I would love to see the energy that... could galvanise the church. But it's not going to... probably not during Leo's lifetime anyway."

McAleese told the Irish Times on Friday that what she meant by "rancid" teachings was, in particular, its teachings on human sexuality, the ban on artificial means of contraception in its 1968 “Humanae Vitae” document, and the ban on women deacons and women priests.

Anglican clergy in London to be asked to promote antiracism in sermons

Church of England clergy will be encouraged to promote antiracism in sermons as senior figures unlock thousands of pounds in funding to promote diversity initiatives in London.

Church Commissioners, the body that manages C of E assets, is funding the Diocese of London, which covers more than 400 parishes and 18 boroughs north of the River Thames, to boost inclusion work as part of the three-year Racial Justice Priority (RJP) project.

RJP is separate from the £100m that the C of E has vowed to put aside for Project Spire, a commitment to create a “fund for healing, repair and justice” to address its historic links to the enslavement of African peoples.

But the £730,000 funding for RJP represents a significant statement of intent from the church at a time when conservative figures have claimed Project Spire diverts from “core obligations”.

The Right Rev Dr Anderson Jeremiah, the Bishop of Edmonton and the Diocese of London’s lead bishop on racial justice, said diverse congregations reflected the Anglican presence in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean as a colonial legacy, and the church had to create a “sense of belonging for all”.

He said of RJP: “We want racial justice to inform our missional, theological and church practices – treating each other as created in the image of God is central to our wider Christian faith.

“Whether it’s Bible studies, baptismal preparations, confirmation preparations or sermons, what we would like to actively promote is racial justice as one of the ways of engaging with the challenges of the church, through resources that can be used in these spaces.”

RJP funding will be used to support educational initiatives, in churches and C of E schools, about church buildings’ links to transatlantic slavery.

Churches will also be funded to support refugees and asylum seekers, and be expected to promote diversity in leadership, while unconscious bias training for parochial parish councils will be “theologically informed”, Lisa Adjei, the head of RJP for the diocese, said.

Insiders say RJP is designed to fund community cohesion work while “always respecting parishes’ autonomy”. It follows 2021’s From Lament to Action report, which called for urgent “culture change” to tackle “racial sin”.

Adjei said antiracist practices in education, representation, structures and governance had been identified as key areas for RJP, alongside advocacy, which meant the church “speaking and standing in solidarity” on issues such as youth safety, health inequalities and migration.

“This comes back to our theology, to who we are as the church, which is about loving our neighbour,” Adjei said.

“Whether the far right were present or not, we would still have an intention to care for the asylum seeker, the refugee and the migrant. What we want to do is allow people to see that faith and racial justice live side by side.”

Last week, the new archbishop of Canterbury, Sarah Mullally, defended Project Spire as being “rooted in the Christian call to repentance, reconciliation and, above all, hope”, after Conservative party critics claimed the fund would divert cash away from local parishes.

Mullally said the church was inspired by the example of anti-slavery campaigners, such as Olaudah Equiano, adding: “Project Spire does not diminish the church’s support of or investment in parish ministry or clergy … Church Commissioners’ support for dioceses and parishes continues to increase.”

Jeremiah said it was hoped RJP would be a catalyst for other funding bids for racial justice work, adding: “Our faith in Jesus Christ compels us to work towards equity and fairness for all. It’s about how we counter the far-right narrative and create a sense of belonging for everyone.”

Adjei added: “If we were to set our focus on potential pushback and dissatisfaction we probably wouldn’t start, but, because we’re compelled by the love of God, even in the face of resistance, we press on. What we want to do is make sure we continue to have conversations with people who disagree with us.”