Children see adults as predators, says Church of Ireland primate

A generation of children is in danger of being deprived of normal interaction with adults because of the child protection “industry”, Church of Ireland primate Archbishop Richard Clarke has said.

While emphasising the necessity for strong child protection measures, he said children can “see adults as predators”. “It is almost abusing children in a different way to deprive them of normal interaction [with adults],” he said. Archbishop Clarke was speaking at the Church of Ireland General Synod in Dún Laoghaire yesterday.

“The first thing is we have got to protect children. We know what dreadful things happened when we do not protect children, so that’s a given,” he said.

Children know about the “dangers” of adults and adults are “often scared” that children might “misunderstand” normal interaction, he added.

However, children had learned “almost as their default position” to “mistrust every adult” . He said it may be “safer” but “is it necessarily something that will create healthy relationship between those of different generations?

“If it means we’ve got to keep safeguarding anyway we have to do it,” he said. But he asked “is there any way in which we can mitigate what are the unintended consequences of us holding children at arm’s length, metaphorically?”

At a fringe meeting to the general synod, Church of England evangelical Jayne Ozanne, who came out as gay last year, called on all the churches to acknowledge and apologise to LGBT people for all the pain they have caused them.

She spoke of “a lot of anger” among LGBT people towards the churches. It was, she said “very hard to have a conversation with someone who has caused you so much pain.”

She also advised, “Don’t talk about us. Include us.” Discovering her orientation “nearly cost me my life, twice,” she said. “It was the price of silence.”