Have you or your kids been to Soul Survivor?

[Coffeeandcards]

You might want to read this if so:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/04/12/mike-pilavachi-soul-survivor-charity-watchdog/

I would like to carry on this thread please and don’t mind where.

I like that this Premier article has given credit to New Frontiers for making a statement. At least they have showed up.
https://premierchristian.news/en/news/article/the-evangelical-church-in-the-uk-must-do-better-evangelical-alliance-reacts-to-mike-pilavachi-investigation-findings?utm_source=Premier%20Christian%20Media&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=14097006_Voice%20of%20hope%2008.09.23&dm_i=16DQ,8E5BI,DDQXG0,YMHXL,1

Hopefully other organisations that provided a platform to Mike Pilavachi over the years, decades indeed, including New Wine and Spring Harvest, get a grip of this and now manage to acknowledge what is in the public domain and has been in the public domain for months.

It’s a slow trickle so far of organisations that are a showing up so far.

The game of hiding behind the initial investigation as a reason to deny and stonewall is over. Now the excuses for the silence have run out.

Come on church and related organisations, get a grip, what are you doing about this in your church and organisational structure to address this?

This Telegraph are reporting that the survivors are calling for the report to be published, at https://archive.ph/9rxYN

Not sure when this thread runs out but I think it’s soon. I have made a new one here:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/philosophy_religion_spirituality/4892353-soul-survivor-thread-2

Has any thread in the philosophy/religion section ever filled up before???

@BadSkiingMum thank you for setting up a new link, I didn’t realise we were at 980 posts (so approaching what I think is the 1000 post limit) and there is clearly some way to go with this including the terms of the independent review and it’s findings and report.
@Coffeeandcards - as you set up the original thread and may like to know it has generated the need for another one :)

Someone wrote on the last thread that things are often dealt with in the sense that the perpetrator is forgiven by God - but that the forgiveness from the victims, or the hurt caused to victims, is overlooked. This really resonated with me. It is all very well being told that God has forgiven someone but when when you are the one that has been "offended against" and are just told to get on it with because "God has forgiven them" and therefore you have to too, it is a bitter pill to swallow.

I sincerely think that the doctrine of divine forgiveness and 'justification by faith' is a massive problem with Christianity. Apart from this issue, there really are some people who (consciously or not) seem to use the idea they're sinners but god will forgive them as an excuse for doing bad stuff.

That's odd... I thought I was on the new thread, I quoted a bit from a post there.

I think people confuse what forgiveness means. It doesn't mean there aren't earthly consequences. It may mean that a person has been forgiven ( ie, their sin not held against them for harm) but there are consequences ( they are no longer trusted with x and y, the person injured by them no longer wants to be in the same room as them). For me, forgiveness just means that you let go of the desire for revenge.

I think this comes up a bit in Rev - there are a couple of occasions when Adam
is keen to forgive a couple of people and bring them back into the church fold, but I think the ‘objectors’ (who are portrayed as being unreasonable) probably have better instincts…

In my experience of the Evangelical circles, massaging and wrestling is very normalized. So to me it's not surprising. The news is that people have come out and said that it's a problem, which of course it is. The whole institution/organization/lifestyle/circle. Whatever you want to call it, is seeped in toxicity despite some goodness and it needs a change but unfortunately I don't see how that can happen.

"massaging and wrestling is very normalized"!? What on earth are you talking about @crostini ?@crostini ?

I’d never come across it before and have been to several more ‘charismatic’ churches, mostly within the Church of England - many that go to New Wine. (Possibly depends which “church” you go to). I still think it’s disgusting and totally inappropriate!

It certainly wasn't a thing back in the Nineties. I do remember the occasional massage between people of similar ages but the heathen seemed just as keen on them.

Of course it is disgusting and inappropriate. I wasn't excusing it, I was saying how in my experience, there is a culture of crossing physical boundaries like that. Sex before marriage between peers is obviously banned, so everybody seems to engage in weird 'non sexual' acts in order to be physically intimate with each other. Poking, wrestling, etc, it's like a strange normalized joke in these circles, obviously this predator, used the fact that it is normalized, to get away with abusing teenagers in plain sight.

Yes, I agree, it is an interesting point. I have seen a single male youth worker being far too physical and encouraging that type of behaviour. I had finished uni so in my early 20’s and seeing it from a distance. I can’t say it was all youth workers, as you tend to see the youth worker(s) in the church you’re attending at the time. It was definitely accepted behaviour and it was pretty grim.

They are going to get away with it. Unless the charity commission comes down hard on them. Nothing will change.

For anyone on the first thread, I've posted this on the second thread; the terms of reference about the independent review are now available at: https://www.soulsurvivorwatford.co.uk/review
Fiona Scolding KC makes a personal request for anyone with information to speak to her.
Landmark Chambers is a well regarded set.