Churches and Christian organisations have spoken of their sadness and pain as the official report into well-known charismatic leader Mike Pilavachi said he displayed coercive and controlling behaviour at the church and had inappropriate relationships.
His actions included massaging young male interns and wrestling young men as he used his ‘spiritual authority to control people’.
The Church of England investigation was conducted by the National Safeguarding Team (NST) and the Diocese of St Albans. It concluded: ‘The overall substantiated concerns are described as an abuse of power relating to his ministry, and spiritual abuse; described as ‘a form of emotional and psychological abuse characterised by a systematic pattern of coercive and controlling behaviour in a religious context’.
