Guest Post: Overturn The Tables

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This guest post has been written by two individuals who reported their experiences with Mike Pilavachi into the Church of England investigation.

Overturn your tables, pour out your coins,

Stop making these temples marketplaces!

Almost 150 people, with varying degrees of power and status in relation to Christian communities, have now stepped forward to share personal experiences of abuse at the hands of Mike Pilavachi and Soul Survivor. The public response from those considered to be ‘leaders’ within these communities has been mixed. Some have chosen to remain silent; others have spoken a little here and there, being careful not to appear overly critical of their friends or those in high places; still others have expressed support for Mike Pilavachi. Those vocal in their support of victims and others impacted by events have been in the minority.

Until the release of Matt and Beth Redmans’ documentary this week.

At the root of this week’s sudden flurry of activity among ‘leaders’, and underlying their response to the public revelation of Mike Pilavachi’s abuse more generally, seems to us to be the market logic that permeates our Christian communities. This logic is geared towards generating capital, as well as sustaining institutions and maintaining the power and status of the individuals within them. It provides both motivation and justification for the pursuit of these things. And under this logic, all bodies – including the bodies of the abused – appear not as temples of the Holy Spirit, but as commodities to be valued or disposed of. The market logic is unable to recognise their humanity and inherent dignity and worth, and cannot register their suffering on its own terms. It simply assesses them according to their marketability and treats them accordingly, weighing up the potential brand-related impact of any response to their pain.

One need only look at Holy Trinity Brompton’s (HTB) public response since news of the Church of England’s investigation was announced in April 2023. Having platformed Mike Pilavachi and maintained a close relationship with Soul Survivor that brought mutual benefit to both ministries, HTB have chosen to remain silent over the past year (see here for a detailed timeline of key events). This is despite many people, including victims, repeatedly asking for a public response, not least during HTB’s 2023 Leadership Conference (see here, for example). Following the release of the Redmans’ documentary this week, however, HTB released an opinion piece on leadership and accountability that referred to Soul Survivor, the Redmans, and the ‘scandals and failings within church leadership,’ while also plugging their 2024 Leadership Conference (see here for a thread about this).

While we recognise that the lure of the market logic is both subtle and powerful, its action in this situation needs to be brought into the light and challenged. Because it is perpetuating the abuse we ourselves experienced through Soul Survivor, where we were not treated with dignity and worth, and where our suffering – which is now being used by others for personal and institutional gain – was not seen as being of equal importance to sustaining Mike’s ‘ministry’.

In John 2:14-16, Jesus drives people out of the temple. Overturning the tables of the money changers and pouring out their coins, his words to those selling doves are: ‘Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!’ Jesus later refers to his own body as a temple, so we could take these words as relating both to our churches and Christian communities, and to the people within them.

To those who have used this situation as an opportunity to capitalise on the abuse others have experienced, or who are benefitting from the status quo and therefore continue to choose silence:

Overturn your tables, pour out your coins,

Stop making these temples marketplaces!