Call for Paedophile's Artwork to Be Removed from Dumbarton Church
Daily Record
A call has been made for a valuable sculpture in a Dumbarton church to be removed because it was made by a paedophile. The demand is for the removal from St Patrick’s Catholic Church of a statue of St Michael the Archangel, which includes fonts for holy water. It was created by sculptor Eric Gill, whose works are also on display at such high-profile locations as Westminster Cathedral in London, the BBC’s Broadcasting House and the European HQ of the United Nations in Geneva. However, he was also a sexual deviant who was known to have had intimate relations with two of his daughters and his sisters. Dumbarton man Stuart Coleman told the Lennox Herald: “I find it detestable that art by such a man can be happily displayed publicly. I can’t imagine a piece of artwork by Rolf Harris would be so keenly exhibited within a church. “This isn’t an attack on the church or the wider Catholic faith, I want to make that clear. I just find it at least inappropriate and at most absolutely shocking and appalling that children will be regularly touching this statue to take from it holy water. “It makes the skin crawl to think it was hand-crafted by a publicly known paedophile and put on display in such a prominent way.” St Patrick’s parish priest, Canon Gerry Conroy, said the statue would stay in place. “I don’t approve of what Eric Gill did,” he said, “but if you were to remove this piece you’d have to do the same all over. And it’s also a war memorial.” And a spokesman for the Catholic Church in Scotland said: “Eric Gill has many works of art in public buildings throughout Britain such as the BBC in London as well as churches. “The allegations made against him are distressing. All works of art in churches are there for their religious significance and artistic merit and are judged as such. “The position of the statue in St Patrick’s Church, donated by a family in memory of their son who was killed in World War One, is not currently under review.” Mr Coleman’s call follows a similar demand some years ago by Margaret Kennedy, who campaigns for a website called Minister and Clergy Sexual Abuse Survivors. She urged the Catholic Church to get rid of some of the most popular devotional art of Gill’s era, such as the Stations of the Cross in Westminster Cathedral. Ms Kennedy said: “Survivors couldn’t pray at the Stations of the Cross. They were done by a paedophile. The very hands that carved the stations were the hands that abused. He was a very deranged man sexually.” The statue of St Michael the Archangel with the holy water fonts (at the entrance to the middle aisle) was donated by the Gordon family in memory of Father Michael Gordon, who was killed at Coxyde in Belgium in 1917 while serving as an army chaplain. The memorial is the work of Gill, who had been received into the church in 1913. It consists of a statue of St Michael the Archangel, sword in hand, preparing to strike the serpent coiled around his feet. The pedestal has the prayer to St Michael on the front panel and the commemoration of Father Michael on the back. The serpent is painted in black, yellow and red – according to local tradition the most diabolical combination of colours – but also in reality the national colours of Belgium where Father Michael was killed.
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