There are a few things going on that people who have been following this forum might be interested in.
The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator published their next phase of schools due to be inspected to ensure they provide sufficient public benefit and, suddenly, Struthers Memorial Church is right at the front of the list. This is possibly because they are very likely the only school/organisation on the list about which OSCR will have also received complaints.
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www.oscr.org.uk]
On the back of that they will be very likely getting inspected right now, or very soon, or possibly even on an ongoing basis as answers they provide lead to more questions. If so it is very unlikely Struthers would be making the fact that they are being both inspected and investigated public but the reports will follow in a few months and will be published on the OSCR website. OSCR will report on whether the whole charity (presumably not just the school as the church and the school are parts of the same charity) meets the tests of delivering public benefit. OSCR will also report on their findings re any complaints. They usually publish them on their website to let the public know what the outcomes of their investigations into specific complaints are.
There is an example of a complaint investigation report online for another charity and it is an excellent and thorough document covering some issues not entirely different to some of the Struthers problems. It is a very interesting and encouraging read if you are someone who wants the charity sector to display more accountability and behave with higher standards.
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www.oscr.org.uk]
So all we can do is hang on happy that, possibly for the first time ever, Struthers Memorial Church are being asked to account for at least some of their decisions, their actions and their treatment of people. Not much we can do at his point to hurry that along - we'll just have to wait for the outcomes. But it is important to realise this is gong on.
The Struthers charitable company is facing a range of problems at the moment:
financial decline,
people leaving,
an ageing leadership with no succession plans as yet shared with their supporters,
loss making businesses,
debt
questions about recruitment
inability to explain (or successfully sweep under the carpet) the years of unfulfilled prophecy
a monumental collapse of their public reputation given
the testimonies and questions for their organisation now online
the utter failure of the leadership to address the online criticisms in any effective way
the likelihood over the next few years of still more branch churches declining and closing
the exhaustion of their people as the revival and church growth the leaders continually promise remain as far off as ever.The changing of some of the Saturday night Glasgow meetings to outreaches shows how much the Struthers leaders are now aware they need to reverse their decline. For as long as most of us can remember Saturday night was always for “deepening” and it is unlikely Ms Taylor would ever have agreed to it becoming a family friendly outreach. Yet on several recent occasions it has, as has been reported on the Cumbernauld website.
There is a conflict obvious to anyone between the mystical, "holiness by following rules” no compromise church set up by Ms Taylor, and the complete incompatibility of that with running a school where every document and CSofE web page strains to pretend that Struthers is just another mainstream church that believes and teaches more or less what all the others do; and is a church where all children are (and always have been) valued and loved and treated with all sensitivity and care.
Over 40 people have now testified on this forum to how little sensitive tender care they were subjected to; and many of these people have also indicated as young people they were allowed to be in situations where children should never have been.
But perhaps that is no longer the case. Perhaps the Struthers leaders have finally, genuinely, seen that some of the the things they have been preaching and teaching have no value and no biblical basis and stem from the dark controlling failed dogmas of 1930s Brethrenism. In that case many people are waiting for some sign of repentance from them and some sign of regret that they subjected people to this nonsense for so long. Yet, apparently, these teachings that caused so much anguish and suffering could be easily abandoned when the chance for school fees income came along.
Or do Struthers leaders not apologise even when they are wrong?
Or perhaps if these teachings are still believed and members of the churches are still subjected to them, perhaps hiding that side of the church from the school families is enough. Perhaps then carrying on in a hypocritical position is easier that apologising and putting things right with people they have hurt.