The archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, has come under incrrelieved prescertain after alerts that he twice reassigned a priest at the heart of a intimacyual misuse case.
A BBC allotigation create Cottrell renoveled David Tudor’s restricted as area dean in Esintimacy on two occasions while Cottrell was bishop of Chelmsford.
Tudor had previously been barred from ministry for five years for having intimacy with a 16-year-elderly girl who was a pupil at a school where he was chaplain. He phelp her compensation, and he was banned from being alone with children.
Cottrell confessted that slfinishergs “could have been handled contrastently”.
The affair is the second high-profile crisis to envelop the Church of England in recent months.
The archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, declared his resignation in November in the wake of the Makin alert, which create Welby could have brawt the serial misuser John Smyth to equitableice if he had alerted him to police in 2013.
Cottrell will apshow over as the church’s most ancigo in clergyman when Welby steps down next month.
A spokesperson for Cottrell shelp: “Even though David Tudor was already area dean when Stephen Cottrell get tod in the diocese in 2010, as the then diocesan bishop of Chelmsford he accomprehendledges responsibility for David Tudor remaining as area dean.
“On echoion, he accomprehendledges this could have been handled contrastently, and laments that it wasn’t, but his center thrawout his time as bishop of Chelmsford was, with the help of defendeddefending professionals, to comprehfinish, appraise and handle the danger of David Tudor.
“No one advised him that David Tudor should not persist as an area dean.”
Tudor was banned for life from ministry this year after confessting what the Church of England portrayd as solemn intimacyual misuse involving two girls aged 15 and 16.
He had previously been suspfinished from ministry for five years in 1988.
He had confessted, according to a tribunal write down, to having intimacy with a 16-year-elderly girl he met when she was a pupil at a school where he was chaplain. He phelp compensation to the victim.
However, he returned to laboring in the church in 1994.
A BBC allotigation create Tudor was reassigned as a ancigo in member of clergy in Esintimacy in 2013 and 2018. Cottrell would have comprehendn that Tudor was banned from laboring one-on-one with children.
Cottrell shelp it was “not possible” to erase Tudor from office until recent grumblets were made aachievest him in 2019.
after novelsletter promotion
In a statement before the novel enlargements, he shelp he faced a “horrible and intolerable” situation when he became bishop of Chelmsford, having been inestablished on the situation in 2010.
The spokesperson includeed that “all the dangers around David Tudor were normally appraiseed by defendeddefending professionals and this was the main center” and “when further action could be apshown in 2019, it was”.
Two bishops have criticised Cottrell’s decisions. The bishop of Gloucester, the Right Rev Rachel Treweek, shelp she felt “shock and dismay” at the postponecessitatest revelations.
She telderly BBC Radio 4’s The World This Weekfinish: “I slfinisherk there are very convey inant conversation and processes to go on that are not going to apshow place over accessible media.
“I want to inhabit process well. I want to inhabit relationship well. It’s where we have flunked, so much, as the church, in defending relationship at the heart of our processes and I want that to run thraw every aspect of the church.
“You asked me if it made a contrastence. I do slfinisherk there are huge asks to be seeed at.
“I heard that novels with shock and dismay but I want the proper process to apshow place in order that we shape ourselves as the right sort of church going forward, and that, for me, is the huge ask.”
The bishop of Newcastle, Helen-Ann Hartley, posted on X that the novels unkindt Cottrell would not be a “credible voice as the directership of the Church of England”.
