Rev. Dan Claire’s Petition Denied
ACNA Provincial Tribunal Rules Against Christ Our Hope Diocese Rev. Dan Claire’s Request to Halt Judicial Proceedings
On April 5, 2022, ACNAtoo published an open letter written by a group of survivors and advocates in the Diocese of Christ Our Hope (COH). The letter alleged that COH, under the leadership of Bp. Steven Breedlove, continued to mishandle allegations against the Rev. Dan Claire, rector at Church of the Resurrection in Washington, DC.
Here is a brief timeline of major events in the case, concluding with a ruling released on November 6, 2023 by the ACNA Provincial Tribunal.
The first investigation
According to the April 2022 open letter, parishioners brought multiple uncoordinated complaints of spiritual abuse and pastoral misconduct by Rev. Claire to the Diocese starting in 2020, and in early 2021 COH quietly commissioned an investigation into these reports. The Diocese limited the scope of the investigation, conducting interviews only with Rev. Claire and the 10 parties who had already reported complaints, despite more allegations surfacing in the wake of the investigation.
The investigation, conducted by Bob and Judy Pardon, concluded in September 2021 and produced an 83-page final report, of which 52 pages were shared with the COH Diocesan Council. Participants were not shown the report, although Bp. Breedlove allowed certain survivors to read the sections of the report pertaining specifically to their allegations.
The Diocesan Council purportedly distilled the investigation findings into seven admonitions, which were delivered to Rev. Claire in November 2021. According to the survivors’ open letter, Rev. Claire subsequently argued that the investigation was unfair due to it not including his character witnesses. In February 2022, Bp. Breedlove declared the Pardon investigation and resulting admonitions canonically invalid.
The second investigation
In response to an outcry by survivors and advocates, the Diocese commissioned Grand River Solutions (GRS) to conduct a review of the Pardon investigation. This review led to a further investigation, also by GRS, into COH’s overall handling of the situation, with COH paying $50,000 for the investigation and attendant costs.
In April 2022, while the GRS investigation was ongoing, the aforementioned group of survivors and advocates wrote their open letter to the Diocese. The letter describes the timeline of events going into the GRS investigation and details the survivors’ key complaints concerning the diocesan handling of their case:
The letter goes on to make four requests of COH going forward:
The GRS investigation concluded in October 2022, and COH issued a response to GRS’s report and recommendations in January 2023. The report and recommendations were not made public or made available privately to survivors.
Bp. Breedlove claimed in his response that GRS found him without bias, although email documentation shared with ACNAtoo shows that GRS asserted to survivors that the question of Breedlove’s bias was never investigated. Additionally, although Bp. Breedlove claimed that key participants were interviewed by GRS, none of the survivors in contact with ACNAtoo were offered an interview with GRS. Survivors also allege that Bp. Alan Hawkins and GRS stonewalled them when they sought clarity in the situation.
The third investigation
Bp. Breedlove advised survivors that the Diocese would initiate a third investigation, which, as with the first, now-dismissed 2021 investigation, would examine the complaints against Rev. Claire. As of this writing, the third investigation is ongoing.
Some survivors have told ACNAtoo they declined to be involved in this third investigation in part because the Diocese required all reporting parties to sign a functional NDA in order to participate. The Confidentiality Commitment requires participants to agree that “verbal communication of investigative details and process must be kept private and will not be shared publicly in oral or written form or through any form of social media.” It goes on to admonish participants that harm could come to other survivors if they violate the Commitment, saying, “violation may put other complainants at risk and hinder the investigation process.”
The Provincial Tribunal ruling
On November 6, 2023, the ACNA released a document from the Provincial Tribunal which shows that in April 2023 Rev. Claire petitioned the Tribunal for an “end to all judicial proceedings related to the complaints raised in 2020 and 2021 or claims similar thereto.”
The Tribunal has denied Rev. Claire’s request, stating that they are unable to halt judicial proceedings because there are no judicial proceedings underway and that, because the entire affair is an intra-diocesan matter, the Diocese must resolve it at the diocesan level.
The Tribunal’s ruling also denies Rev. Claire’s petition for an “award of attorney fees and costs,” which it states is not within its power to grant.
Four years and counting
According to the Tribunal’s statement, the first complaints against Rev. Claire were brought to the Diocese in 2019, meaning the case is still far from resolved as it enters its fifth year and third third-party investigation.
Multiple reported survivors in the Diocese of Christ Our Hope have reached out to ACNAtoo alleging wrongful behavior by Rev. Dan Claire at Church of the Resurrection in Washington, DC. As with any situation in which we platform survivors’ voices, we recognize that survivors have a range of positions on public accountability; this update reflects information from survivors who have requested our advocacy and representation.