Gloriavale’s Overseeing Shepherd, Howard Temple, pleads guilty to Indecent Assault Charges (Part 1/3)
Opinion piece: Liz Gregory.
(Thoughts, opinions and views expressed here belong to Liz Gregory and may or may not represent the views of the Gloriavale Leavers’ Support Trust, former or current members of Gloriavale.).
Part One:
I’m pretty sure much of New Zealand was aware that recently the Overseeing Shepherd of Gloriavale, Howard Temple, pled “guilty” two days into a 10-day court trial around allegations of indecent assault spanning decades and right up to 2022.
Howard’s early guilty plea left people wondering why. Why did he plead guilty two days into a week-long trial after pleading his innocence for the past two years? Why didn’t he plead guilty earlier? Did he really mean “I’m guilty”? How might leavers interpret his guilty pleas? How might current members of Gloriavale interpret the guilty pleas? What advantage was there to him pleading guilty? And given his guilty plea will Howard stand down as the main Overseeing Shepherd of Gloriavale?
We have heard that some people in Gloriavale are downplaying this, and have even suggested he might be technically guilty of these things, but he’s not actually guilty of these things… (figure that one out).
This blog post is not going to traverse the evidence in detail that was put before the courts over the two days. You can read all about that on the extensive news coverage found on the news archives of the Gloriavale Leavers’ Support Trust website.
or simply google Howard Temple.
Read this excellent article by the Press to understand the nature of the offending: https://www.thepress.co.nz/nz-news/360773246/gloriavale-leader-howard-temple-caressed-and-kissed-girls-serving-food
And this article for a summary of the case and the guilty plea: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/568442/gloriavale-leader-howard-temple-pleads-guilty-to-indecency-charges
Instead I want to focus on the reaction from former members and current members to the guilty plea. Thanks to all of those who connected with me in the days following the court case to help me understand what you’ve been thinking. I hope I have summed up your views accurately in this post.
Firstly some education around indecent assault might be helpful.
What is Indecent Assault?
In short indecent assault is occurs when a person intentionally assaults another person in a way that is indecent, without that person’s consent. Indecent” means offensive to commonly accepted standards of decency and usually involves some sexual element or context (touching private parts, groping, kissing without consent, etc.), but it doesn’t have to involve nudity or sexual intercourse. The courts decide what is “indecent” based on what society considers offensive. It’s also without consent – the victim did not agree to it freely, or invalid consent was given under pressure, threats, or manipulation. The offender must have intended to assault, but they don’t need to have a sexual motive.
It’s not controversial to state categorically that Howard did the things that he was accused of (hugging from behind, rubbing legs, thighs, back and bottoms, perching his chin on girls’ shoulders, kissing of neck, undoing girl’s belts, tapping bottoms, sending gushy letters, or asking to talk about sex…). There was plenty of evidence these things occurred and much of it was in public places with people watching.
But Howard had a defence. Media reported his lawyer telling the court that, “He described the gestures as demonstrations of gratitude and support that were acceptable conduct in the day to day life of the community.”
Right there is a MASSIVE problem! These weren’t acceptable demonstrations at all for everyone in the community.
A current member privately shared a reflection after reading that on the news saying, “Strangely though, if someone saw me doing exactly the same thing, on the exactly the same day to exactly the same girls, I would have been dragged into an SS (Servant and Shepherd) meeting for being a creepy pervert, and Howard Temple would have gladly sat there and judged me for it.”
They make a good point. Not everyone in the community was allowed to have physical contact with young or single girls. But Howard could. Because of his position in the community.
Howard would have known (and should have known) that wasn’t acceptable behaviour. You see, he wasn’t born in Gloriavale. He served in the US Navy, had married and had children before joining the community in his 30’s. He knew it wasn’t a normal social convention to behave this way towards girls.
And if for some reason Howard did think it was normal he was re-educated by Police in 2018. The Police prosecution told the court that Police went to Howard and warned him after Hopeful’s death in 2018, that former members had spoken to them about people who touched them and that they didn’t like it. Police told Howard his name had been mentioned. They told him to stop it.
We also wrote a letter to the Gloriavale leadership in 2019 and told Howard to keep his hands to himself…
And yet he ignored those warnings.
Is this behaviour Grandfatherly? Or a Pastoral Dynamic?
Howard’s witnesses were going to testify saying that his actions were “grandfatherly”. But one complainant said that argument fails because he didn’t do these things to his grandchildren.
Additionally, I think it would be fair to say there aren’t many people reading this blog who know of grandfathers who behave this way.
Howard’s lawyers tried to say it was because the “leaders were involved in the personal, spiritual and emotional lives of those living in the community” and “expressions of hugs, an arm around the waist or comments of care were common and often encouraged as ‘part of the pastoral dynamic’”.
Well, that argument falls pretty flat. I’ve been attending churches my whole life and have NEVER seen that pastoral dynamic in play. And the charges laid against him went way beyond the kind of hug his lawyers tried to suggest.
In fact, spinning his actions into the spiritual dimension (ie a pastoral dynamic) is just another way to blame victims. Only those who are in a bad spiritual state (the complainants and leavers) would dare to think that Howard’s actions were inappropriate. They are clearly not submitted to the leadership.
What was the Community told about Howard’s court case and guilty plea?
The community knew of Howard’s charges, as he had been kept on bail on a Gloriavale farm for the past two years. He had restrictions and was not able to join in the usual community activities. He was still running Gloriavale and then church services, contributing by Zoom.
The day before the court case Peter Righteous sent out an email to everyone at Gloriavale, reminding them of the court case. The subject line was, “the trial of our faith”. And the content included “We have the Lord on our side, and we are in his hands.”
The morning of the court case people spoke at the breakfast table and the narrative was along the lines of “these people accusing Howard are evil doers, doing the work of the devil.” They mentioned “spiritual wickedness in high places, and those that would use the things of this world in a wicked way against the people of God. And that they fight that on many fronts….”
It was the typical Us versus Them narrative and persecution complex that these kinds of groups thrive on.
But at the end of the second day of the trial, it was clear the trial wasn’t going so well for Howard. Five witnesses had testified, and had combated the lawyers’ lines of questioning with ease.
Media commented on the judge “castigating” Howard’s lawyers about their line of questioning being very dangerous and perhaps might give answers that wouldn’t assist their case. The judge then called a conference between the Police and Defence and suggested they should come to an arrangement (it’s called a plea bargain). The judge gave some guidelines about what he deemed to be indecent assault, and the kinds of charges that might be difficult to prove. After that the Police dropped some lower charges of hugging and stroking legs etc, and kept the higher charges. Howard then agreed and pled guilty.
At that point it starts to hurt the head. So what are the people inside Gloriavale supposed to make of this? Howard said he wasn’t guilty, and they believe he wouldn’t lie. But now he said he is guilty. Is he lying now? was he lying then? Is he guilty of indecent assault? Were his actions indeed indecent?
How did they resolve this cognitive dissonance?
Stephen Standfast to the rescue. At the breakfast table the day after Howard’s guilty plea, Stephen matter of factly updated the people about Howard’s guilty plea. He made comments along the line of “according to the letter of the law a person could claim a different motivation for what he did.” (ie you can plead guilty for something, but not actually be guilty of that thing because it wasn’t your intent.) ie Howard pled guilty for indecent assault, but it wasn’t actually indecent assault or sex abuse.
But Stephen then added a really unusual spin. In the Bible (Matthew 5:25) there is a passage that says, “Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him; lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison.”
It’s very clearly a passage that is suggesting people should acknowledge their wrongdoing and confess it before it needs to get to court. (In fact it is believed this verse is not even referring to crimes but rather civil disputes). But Stephen spun this verse saying that it was the scriptural thing for Howard to “agree with the judge” and plead guilty.
In that short misquote of scripture, Howard is catapulted into being a martyr and a hero of the faith.
Stephen then went on to spend most of the breakfast time uplifting the spirits of the people reminding them they are in God’s care…Stephen apparently never went on to speak about Howards’ position as Overseeing Shepherd and whether he would be standing down as Overseeing Shepherd.
Read Part Two to find out some more views of people in Gloriavale, whether Howard is just the fall guy for Howard, how cults corrupt morality, consent, slavery and servitude.