By Kathryn Knight
Daily Mail
November 14, 2008
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1085865/The-Vicar-Dibley-aint-Shes-beer- drinking-Church-England-minister-week-exposed-swinger.html
The parishioners of Daventry can see in retrospect that the first, rather unorthodox sermon delivered by their new vicar would set the tone for her residency.
As the curvaceous blonde stepped into the pulpit two years ago clutching a can of Guinness, it was clear this was going to be no ordinary pulpit address.
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| Passionate preacher: Teresa Davies in a cleavage-revealing dress |
As one attendee at that Sunday service recalls: 'The vicar cracked open the can in front of the congregation, then compared the can to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit - with the widget in the can being the Holy Spirit,' he says.
The analogy went on to focus on the battle between good and evil, illustrated by the black and white colours of the drink.
A little laboured, perhaps, but the point was certainly made: 37-year-old Reverend Teresa Davies would be doing things differently.
Quite how differently, however, has only just come to light: this week it emerged that Reverend Davies had been suspended from the Church for 12 years following allegations of alcohol abuse and sexual misconduct.
More specifically, it emerged during a series of allegations presented to a bishops' disciplinary tribunal that she had appeared drunk at a string of church services, among them an Advent service, and spent her leisure time taking part in swingers' holidays in the south of France with her husband Michael.
Quite how many years Mr and Mrs Davies, who have two daughters aged 11 and seven, have been enjoying this French 'hospitality' is unclear.
But it also emerged that under the rather more prosaic moniker of 'Tess and Mick from Daventry' they had been registered on at least one internet swingers site - with a 12-page profile sharing intimate details about their vital statistics and enthusiasms.
Nor was it too long after the couple had settled in their four-bedroom house on a cul-de-sac in Daventry in the summer of 2006 that colourful rumours began circulating in the neighbourhood about their 'open marriage'.
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| Unorthodox: Teresa and her husband Mick Davies enjoy swinging holidays |
Unbelievably, it was Reverend Davies who confided in a couple of startled parishioners that she and her husband were 'swingers' who enjoyed the companionship of others to keep the spark alive in their marriage.
No one, it seems, quite believed it at the time - it is not, after all, the sort of behaviour you might expect from a female vicar, even one who arrived in the tiny village of Welton dressed in leathers on the back of a motorbike, and whose first gesture was, in the recollection of one parishioner, 'to take off her motorbike helmet, light a cigarette and ask for a pint'.
Newly qualified after studying theology for three years at St Stephen's House in Oxford, Mrs Davies had spent her 20s following her husband Michael, who was in the RAF, from post to post, moving to Sardinia after their marriage in 1989 and later to Norfolk.
Contemporaries at St Stephen's recall Mrs Davies as an 'unorthodox' student, who enjoyed attending music gigs in the local Oxford pubs.
And from the moment she arrived in Welton as part of the community ministry team, it was clear that parish business was to be conducted in her own unique way: some of it in the White Horse - the village pub where Reverend Davies often held church meetings dressed in her trademark cleavage-enhancing tops.
'She did it because she wanted to bring the village together. But she was just too modern and scary for the older folk,' says the pub landlady Jo Elmore.
'She would come into the pub to socialise, which is more than you could say for any of the other vicars.'
What also cannot be said for most other vicars, however, is that they appeared drunk at some of their services.
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| Pleasure mecca: Teresa and Mick like to holiday at this naturist resort in Cap d'Agde in France |
According to records seen by the Mail, colleagues in the Daventry diocese reported that Reverend Davies appeared drunk or hungover during at least four church services over a three-month period.
On the first occasion, on September 17, 2006, she had, it was alleged, arrived late and smelling of alcohol for a baptism service at the Holy Cross Church in Daventry, stating that it was from the wine at the Eucharist service at Welton.
Later the same day, she had arrived at choral evensong at Holy Cross looking dishevelled and smelling heavily of alcohol.
Unable to direct the choir the evening was, in the words of the Reverend Canon Owen Page: 'Musically chaotic and deeply embarrassing.'
This was not the least of it: two months later, at an evening church service in Welton, Reverend Davies did not appear to know the order of the service she was taking, and could be heard repeatedly asking for help.
Then two weeks later, she again smelled strongly of alcohol while leading the church Advent service.
She was, the tribunal was told, 'unsteady on her feet, sitting in the congregation, at times with her head in her hands and clearly unwell'. She had, she later admitted to Canon Page, been suffering from a hangover.
Mrs Davies has since admitted that a drinking problem had developed during the course of her ministry, and it certainly seems that drink played an unfortunate part in sealing her fate in other quarters, too: at one of her regular pub get-togethers, perhaps feeling a little lubricated, she intimated openly that she and her husband had something of an 'open' relationship.
As one local, who was present that night in the autumn of 2006, recalls: 'A few of us were enjoying a few drinks.
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| Unassuming: Teresa, centre, pictured at her ordination at Worcester Cathedral |
'Teresa was there on her own without her husband and we were chatting about relationships.
'She said she and her husband had married young - I think they were both only 19 or so, and that you have to work at it to keep it exciting. She then winked and said that there were ways and means of doing that.
'At the time, I didn't think much of it, except that it was unusual for a vicar to be open in this way. Now, of course, I know exactly what she meant.'
Little wonder tongues started wagging in the village. It emerged that even the local church warden, 38-year-old Mark Lane, had been made aware of these 'ways and means' courtesy of his wife Claire, who had heard a number of rumours about the vicar's sexual proclivities.
And by Christmas of 2006, just six months after her arrival, Reverend Davies chose to lift the lid on her secret life in the unlikely company of two of her fellow clergy, Reverend Peter Davies and Reverend Page.
She had, she told them over a Christmas lunch, enjoyed a number of holidays in the south of France at a resort noted for the casual exchange of sexual partners. Both she and her husband sought sexual gratification this way, she said, and felt no guilt because both partners had agreed to take part.
There is, it must be said, no shortage of resorts in the south of France dedicated to the pursuit of 'l'echangisme', as it is more poetically known across the Channel.
But inquiries by the Mail suggest that the preferred destination of Mr and Mrs Davies was Cap d'Agde, a naturist resort in the beautiful Languedoc-Roussillon region, to which tens of thousands of sexual adventurers migrate every summer for weeks of sunbathing and sex.
Among them are thousands of Brits, who constitute at least 20 per cent - and growing - of the sex tourists in the area.
Cap d'Agde does not immediately strike you as a mecca of orgiastic pleasure.
A purpose-built Seventies Mediterranean resort, it looks more like a university campus than a swingers' paradise. Nonetheless, with its own naturist village, which can accommodate up to 50,000 visitors in summer, it revels in its reputation as a libertarian paradise.
Given that its prospective 'pleasures' are easily found on the internet (one website helpfully posts a comprehensive English language Beginners' Guide, complete with maps, nightclub diagrams and etiquette for picking up a new partner), it is becoming a destination of choice for many middle-class British couples - just like 'Tess and Mick from Daventry'.
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| Lust for life: From the moment Teresa roared into the quiet village of Welton on her motorbike, the vicar caused quite a stir |
These Brits, say the locals, are easy to spot because they mispronounce d'Agde as 'Darj' or 'Dag' (it is pronounced dagd, with the emphasis on both the d and g).
Such semantic concerns are, of course, marginal to the legions of visitors, many of whom come to sunbathe by day and engage in feverish sexual activity by night (some do both during the day, too, thanks to the helpful location of nudist beaches and sand dunes where frenetic couplings frequently take place).
Among their number are teachers, accountants and businessmen, as well as a smattering of well-known faces, as one Englishwoman who visited over the summer testifies.
'What makes them so extraordinary is that they are incredibly seedy places, yet presented as if they were in an upmarket Club Med resort. You see all kinds of British couples wandering around, most looking as though butter wouldn't melt in their mouths.
'I've seen a host of celebrities, from daytime television presenters to footballers. Everybody tries to act as if they're just enjoying a holiday in the sun, but the priority is to have as much kinky sex as possible.'
She adds: 'The key is that everyone feels safe - cameras are banned, so there is no possibility of being snapped, and there is a kind of "honour among thieves" code which means people do not tell tales on fellow swingers.'
It is, certainly, by night that 'the Cap' comes into its own. While by day the dress code is 'no dress' (although etiquette states that everyone should carry a towel to sit on) by night it is a fetishistic fashion parade: bondage gear, leather, straps, chains, Lycra and PVC creations, worn with exhibitionist pride at one of the eight establishments which openly advertise themselves as swingers' clubs.
All of them have much the same get-up - a dance floor and a separate 'play area' to which couples can retire.
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| Rebel: Teresa arrives at her new home in Birmingham - and she's still riding a motorbike |
At Le Glamour (entry e35 with two free drinks), a darkened passage winds through other 'pleasure cubicles' offering whipping frames or other S&M equipment.
One can only wonder whether Mr and Mrs Davies availed themselves of such delights. Certainly, it is a world away from the parish of Welton, where Reverend Davies had made such a dramatic impact before being suspended from duty in early 2007.
This week, she was to be found in the rather more suburban environment of a comfortable terrace in the rundown Birmingham suburb of Longbridge.
When the Mail called on them, she and her husband refused to comment further on their lifestyle.
By day, Mrs Davies is teaching maths at Baxter College in Kidderminster, a post she obtained four months ago - before the results of the disciplinary tribunal were made public - still commuting on that racy motorbike.
Her behaviour has caused a scandal within the ecclesiastical community. But back in Welton, she is at least still remembered fondly by some.
Nick Isles, 47, a management consultant and school governor, who attended meetings with Reverend Davies at the local primary school (as vicar, Reverend Davies was automatically a governor at the primary school), told me: 'I think opinion was split on Teresa among the regular churchgoers - some parishioners were very happy with her, and some were not.
'She had a very fresh approach and wanted to do things differently and less conventionally. She certainly did not come across as a normal vicar, but she had energy.' And then some.
Whether that 'energy' will continue to inspire her to make the journey across the Channel to the seedy, mind-boggling temptations of Cap d'Agde remains a matter for Reverend Davies and her husband.
At least it's not something her bemused parishioners have to think about any more.
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