The Bishop of Warrington has called for the Church of England to take an ‘honest’ look at its processes in the wake of the Bishop of Liverpool’s resignation.

In an open letter to the Diocese of Liverpool, Rt Rev Beverly Mason said she was one of two women who complained about alleged inappropriate behaviour by Rt Rev Dr John Perumbalath who resigned yesterday. She said she had been informed in March 2023 that a complaint against him had been made and a subsequent investigation by the National Safeguarding Team, had raised what she believed to be ‘significant concerns, which included my own disclosure.’

Bishop Perumbalath has consistently denied all allegations against him.

Bishop Mason has been on study leave since making the complaint of sexual harassment, while Bishop Perumbalath continued in his role. She writes that ‘throughout these past 510 days I have remained consistent and persistent in my pursuit of proper and appropriate ecclesiastical judicial process. A bishop cannot be above the law. A bishop cannot be dealt differently from a priest. If anything, a bishop must be held to greater scrutiny. This is a biblical imperative.’

Bishop Mason’s complaint was not processed by the Church of England as it fell outside the CDM (Clergy Discipline Measure) one-year time limit, a rule which is being heavily criticised across the Church. Bishop Mason added:

‘I regret we as a church have not properly and satisfactorily addressed concerns that have been raised. My prayer is that now things have been brought into the light, there will be no more defendedness but an honest scrutiny of what we are doing, how we are doing it, where the gaps sit and how we address them. Our aim as an institutional church should be to work together across disciplines and departments to ensure our church is a safe, grace-filled, Christ-centred, flourishing environment/workplace for all.’

The bishop is distancing herself from media activity as she said she doesn’t ‘hold to the media serving as prosecutor, jury and judge’ but hopes this will be a ‘kairos moment for the church – a time of honesty, humility, repentance, unity, hope and blessing – a time when we can tear down the idols that have disoriented us and raise up again the incarnate God, who was crucified, is glorified and who is the Lord of the Church – the Lord of all.’

Church of England priest Peter Ould told Premier there needs to be a new investigation into Bishop Mason’s allegations: “Well, if it doesn't happen, it will be a scandal. It needs to happen. The big story in the church over the past few months has been how appallingly we have treated victims of all kinds. And here we have a female cleric making a serious accusation of sexual harassment, and it's just not dealt with.

“There hasn’t been proper process and there needs to be.”