ENGLAND
The Daily Mail
October 7, 2017
– Official review will criticise Church investigation into Bishop George Bell
– Bishop Bell was praised for speaking out against Hitler in the 1930s
– But Church said he has sexually assaulted a child on the ‘balance of probabilities’
A celebrated bishop whose reputation was destroyed when the Church of England labelled him a paedophile is set to have his good name restored, The Mail on Sunday has learned.
An official review of the handling of abuse allegations against the late Bishop George Bell will criticise the original Church investigation as flawed and unfair, it is understood.
Bishop Bell the wartime Bishop of Chichester who died in 1958, was praised for speaking out against Hitler in the 1930s – and he was granted the Anglican equivalent of a Saint’s Day, an annual commemoration.
But to the fury of devotees, his character was blackened when the Church declared two years ago that ‘on the balance of probabilities’ he had sexually assaulted a child in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
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