A CHURCH of Scotland minister is to face accusations of immorality.
Last year he was publicly exposed as a participant in gay orgies at a
swimming baths.
Tapes and transcripts which have been sent to senior Kirk figures,
including the Principal Clerk of the General Assembly, are understood to
support the allegations.
The minister has continued to serve on a Kirk study group on
homosexuality. The development came just as the study group finished its
report, which is understood to endorse same-sex relationships in some
circumstances. The report is now likely to come under intense scrutiny
from the General Assembly board which commissioned it.
The Rev. Angus Wells, 32, associate minister at St Mungo's,
Cumbernauld, was the centre of a double-page feature in the News of the
World last June headed Scandal of Pervert Preacher at Whiteinch Pool.
It described how a reporter had watched sex play between other men and
Mr Wells, who had allegedly boasted that he was a Church of Scotland
minister. He later phoned the undercover reporter and asked him for the
phone number of a rent boy.
His subsequent meeting with the rent boy was tape-recorded.
Transcripts were made of what went on between them. Last week these were
hand-delivered to Kirk officials. It is understood that they could have
fallen foul of obscenity laws if they had been sent through the mail.
When the disclosures were first made, Mr Wells was interviewed by a
group from the Presbytery of Falkirk including its clerk, the Rev.
Duncan McClements, who is convener of the 10-strong study group on
sexuality set up by the Board of Social Responsibility upon which Mr
Wells serves.
Mr McClements said yesterday that no further action had been proposed
after the group met with Mr Wells ''because no complaint was registered,
no evidence was brought forward, and therefore there was no case to
answer''. At that meeting Mr Wells was accompanied by a lawyer and said
nothing in answer to the allegations.
Asked why he had not taken up an offer from the News of the World
reporter to provide evidence in support of its allegations, Mr
McClements said that the offer had not been made. When pressed, he
agreed that he had been offered help by the reporter. On the question of
a cover-up he replied: ''People are responsible for what they say and do
and what they read and understand.''
Asked if it was unwise for someone at the centre of such allegations
to continue on the study group, Mr McClements said: ''There is still in
this country a principle which I am aware applies to the Church -- that
people are innocent until proved guilty.''
He confirmed that, as a result of a complaint made by a Glasgow
minister, the Rev. Jim Robertson, and the receipt of the transcripts by
himself and the Rev. Dr Robert McGhee, the presbytery's superintendence
committee convener, that a meeting would be held on Wednesday which
would recommend action to the next prebytery meeting on January 25.
When it was suggested to Mr McClements that the newspaper article
itself constituted a fama clamosa (a term in Kirk law for a public
scandal) he replied that the presbytery had decided that it did not.
However, The Herald understands that when the presbytery was told about
the case last year no names were mentioned.
At a subsequent presbytery meeting last October Mr Wells gave up his
job at Cumbernauld in order to pursue further study at Oxford University
and was granted a full ministerial practising certificate. Although
since then he has taken no part in the work of the study group, he has
remained a member of it.
The final report was drafted last week and will now go to the Board of
Social Responsibility at its meeting in Crieff Hydro next month for
endorsement before being printed in the book of reports to this year's
General Assembly.
Other members of the study group of 10 include the former Church and
Nation convener, the Rev. Norman Shanks, and the former Moderator, the
Very Rev. Professor Robert Davidson, both of whom are known to favour a
more liberal stance on moral questions. Mr Wells was added to the number
when he spoke in favour of looking afresh at sexuality issues at the
1992 General Assembly.
However, the board is likely to view the study group's report with
some hostility and conservative evangelicals, already irritated by the
present Moderator's recent comments on the Virgin Birth and strongly
represented on the board, will see it as a chance to assert their
concern.
The Rev. Bill Wallace, convener of the Board of Social Responsibility,
confirmed that he was aware of the development over Mr Wells and that
the study group's report would be vetted on February 10.
He has turned down an offer from the Arrangements Committee to have
the sexuality report considered alongside one from the Panel on Doctrine
on marriage during a ''conference session'' which would allow the
General Assembly to debate sexual issues without being tied to specific
positions.
The two reports are likely to be the subject of heated debate long
before they reach the General Assembly. This debate is likely to be even
more acrimonious than the recent difference between conservatives and
liberals over the Virgin Birth.
Questions will be asked about why Mr Wells was not asked to consider
his position on the study group when the allegations about his private
life were made. Last night he could not be contacted and his twin
brother, the Rev. John Wells of Morningside, Edinburgh, was on a
fortnight's holiday from his parish.
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