UNITED KINGDOM
Christian Today
[with video]
Harry Farley JOURNALIST
01 June 2017
The Archbishop of Canterbury is being challenged over his links to a Christian camp at the heart of a police investigation for abusing children.
Justin Welby previously said he helped at Iwerne Christian camps in the mid 1970s but moved to Paris in 1978 and after that had ‘no contact’ with the organisation and in particular John Smyth – the former chairman who groomed and beat more than 20 boys and young men – during the time the abuse allegedly took place.
But new documents show Welby gave a talk at one summer camp in 1979, also attended by Smyth.
He told Channel 4 News with dozens of talks across different camps throughout the summer, it was ‘not an unusual occurrence’ for people to return to speak.
‘A talk on reading the Bible, which I did as a one-off in 1979, does not make anyone a member of an “inner circle”,’ he insisted.
But the papers shown to the TV channel challenge Welby’s previous account that he had no contact with the camp at the time of the abuse. Another document shows Welby’s address in Paris, suggesting he may have been in regular contact with the camp.
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