The Long Shadow of Iwerne*

The Makin Review states: "It is likely that there were culture and organisational factors within Iwerne and the camps that may have assisted or contributed to John Smyth’s abuse..."

Schooled to run an Empire that no longer had want of them, their energies would be expended on an even nobler cause - an empire on which the sun really did never set - the eternal kingdom of the King of Kings.

The best boys from the best schools trained in pseudo-military “camps”, with officers, not leaders, to be the spiritual (or actual) Generals and Field Marshalls who would win the nation for Christ. Proper Muscular Christians who would storm the effete liberal ramparts of the Church of England and the Permissive Society with the unstoppable forces of social elitism, hierarchy, loyalty, impeccable manners, an Oxbridge degree, loud cut glass accents, simple orders, withering distain for others, with the beatific example of saintly (small “s”) J.C. Ryle, on their Standard and the Bible as their Queen’s Regulations.

They were “The Iwerne Boys”.

Lesser ranks, after some basic training in a limited canon of Scripture and other books, would fall in with unquestioning submission to rank and discipline as their estate between castle and gate merited. And, seeing in the grandeur and restored status of the established Church, the powerlessness of the unrespectability of lowly Chapel life, would turn their backs on the undignified tradition of local “Arminian”, unlettered enthusiasts and all things shabbily “non-conformist”.

Men now in their dotage, or deceased, became revered figures for the younger generation. They were the stars of the conservative evangelical firmament, the demi-gods of all things “sound” in Anglicanism. The lineal descendants of Eric “Bash” Nash himself, the heirs of Foxe’s martyrs; they were the Cambridge Seven of the next generation.

Except they weren’t. With notable exceptions (Revds Dick Lucas, John Stott, David Watson etc), one after another, they have been revealed by the Makin Review as the, “powerful evangelical clergy”, who in the words of the late Revd David Fletcher, thought, “…it would do the work of God immense damage if this [wicked abuse] were public.” 

An inability to distinguish between their work and God’s work, the assumption being that the two are always and absolutely coterminous is, perhaps the defining mark of Iwerne culture. To be anything other than totally loyal at all times and in all places to “their work”, normally known as, “the Work”, is to be on the “wrong side” of eternal “history”. It is damnable.

Three, or more, generations of clergy for whom the culture of “Camp” defined their Christianity, their ecclesiology, their relationships, and indeed their lives and loves. Three, or more, generations who were told to model themselves on, to “imitate”, their pedestalled great and godly Iwerne leaders.

It is the culture that not only made the abuse possible by teaching unquestioning deference and the inestimable value of being in on the secrets of the “inner rings”, but then ensured it was covered-up in these islands with great effectiveness for 50 years, not least by facilitating it carrying on amongst boys in Southern Africa.

And while, inevitably, some will still have little but praise for all the benefits Iwerne gave them, those benefits came at great cost, not only to the immediate victims of Smyth, Doggart, Fletcher and others, but so many others who had their lives blighted in lesser ways by all things Iwerne.

The Makin Review reveals the raw horror of the suffering of Smyth's direct victims, but it also lifts more of the fog around what happened - the culture of the Iwerne Camps  (later Titus Trust). In a small, but significant, segment of the Church of England, Iwerne culture has been dominant for decades. The destructive impact of the culture, seen most clearly in the extreme abuses of boys and young men, was in no way limited to the sheds of John Smyth, or to one man. To the contrary, it rippled out.

Some were caused to simply abandon the faith, but many others lived with the shadow of Iwerne over their Christian lives. The latter are the lesser victims.

Bizarrely, to have never been subject to the verbal brutalities of the infamous Iwerne “Leaders’ Room” became an irredeemable blot on a man’s character as a Christian leader. For it was from the chrysalis of the “training” and “covering/personal work” of “Camp” and the “Leaders Room” that men emerged in their early 20’s, not just as all but fully formed ministers, but as the elite of them. To then need to go through the irrelevant indignities of the Church of England selection process, together with the potential theological corruption of seminary was, at one time, regarded as something of a joke. That being said, it did provide two, or three, years to prioritise “the Work” over study, while being funded by the Church. Men could be proud of a third-class degree - it proved an ability to cleverly jump through the hoops, while not wasting time on academia, before getting back to the real “Work” of Iwernising the Church of England.

But, of course, if a man had not been sent to one of about thirty boarding schools at some time, by the age of sixteen at the latest, all this was outside their reach. As soon as they arrived at university, and naturally those not attending university had already fallen by the wayside, they would realise there was a world that they knew nothing about and which had little time for them. Without the old boys card they knew and were even, out of a strange form of “kindness”, told, that the prime early leadership roles and later the “best” jobs, the greatest influence and the most prominent ministries would almost always go to the literal and spiritual scions of Iwerne. That was merely logical, and necessary, if the Iwerne project, which was the priority, was to roll on. The best the rejected could do was to try, and fail, to fully imitate the outcome of a place and process that they could now never know, while becoming devout public supporters of it.

It goes without saying that there is no place for women in any of this, unless you were a Rushmore girl, in which case you might become the ticket, by marriage, into this golden world for a non-Iwerne boy.

It is utterly antithetical to the gospel for any believer to be judged as second rate in any way because of their class, school or background, but that is the reality of how Iwerne culture works - at the earliest possible opportunity - it defines itself by exclusion, then resists ruthlessly any attempt to undermine the privileges created. In its inherent dishonesty it denies the fundamental contradiction at its heart.

That remains the case today as much as it was in the early 1980’s. A startling thing about the Makin Review is not just how many older clergy knew in that decade, but that it is clear that many of the next generation had their own knowledge of the abuse already or, if sufficiently “important” to the future, were briefed about it. And that is in addition to all those who just heard it from their fathers, friends, training incumbents, church leaders and so on. Over the years since Smyth was exiled, scores, but more likely well over a hundred clergy, have, despite Iwerne’s minimisation of the abuse and its lies about what victims wanted, had a good working knowledge of the abuse.

One of the reasons they said so little is that is always the easiest thing to do, but given the gravity of the abuses the truer explanation is that they are marinated in the culture of Iwerne; the values as expressed by David Fletcher and the instinct to perpetuate the privileges from which they so greatly benefited. Naturally, no one knew everything, but this was a culture that rejected any form of curiosity. If it had been a culture that encouraged openness, rather than opacity, it would have allowed a very full picture of the abuse to be assembled very quickly.

Instead, at least two generations of serving clergy have been perfectly happy to continue to laud all things Iwerne - to commend their own authentication by it to churches; to encourage parents to send their kids; to ask PCC’s to employ its products; to invite people to “lead” at Iwerne; and to offer their financial support. Given its fundamental dishonesty, that was never acceptable but the endorsement became even less appropraiate to the extent they suspected anything more seriously amiss or elected to be “uncurious”.

This is “the Work” that, outright abuse apart, literally and happily divided church youth groups; some young people were eligible to go to Iwerne, others only to lesser camps, all depending on whether Iwerne approved of the school they went to. It sounds so mad that it is hard to credit and yet for years clergy promoted such an appalling divide as warranted, and even good (at least for the Iwernites).

Likewise, Iwerne, through those clergy, has institutionalised elitism, boarding school life (and Syndrome), and inter-generational privilege in a section of the life of the Church and permitted it to be justified more widely.

Those who, however mildly pushed-back were “chippy”, “inverted snobs”, “envious” or “aggrieved” and condemned out of their own mouths as just the “types” who didn’t “get it”; they were “enemies of the gospel” or doing the Devil’s work”. To put it more simply, they had proved themselves to be just the sort of unsophisticated, uneducated, “minor public school” (MPS) people, or worse, who the gospel only needed, if at all, as cannon-fodder. That is the type of shadow Iwerne cast over so many for so long.

Quite rightly, there were no lack of calls for the resignation of the Archbishop of Canterbury - not only did he fail personally and morally, the institutional buck stops with him. But that is to potentially distract from what really needs to be.

Those who have ministered in ways that have promoted and/or protected Iwerne must now publicly repent, publicly repudiate Iwerne and all its works, and do what they can to repair the untold damage done. Those who will not should join the Archbishop in a premature departure from ministry.

*In this blog “Iwerne” is used to describe the senior camps of the Titus Trust network at any one time - Iwerne, Gloddeath (Glod), LDN, Lymington/Rushmore

With thanks to Ryoji Owata from Unsplash for the image

---

Anglican Futures is committed to a safer Anglican future.

Find out more at anglicanfutures.org

Donate