A church choir and its organist are looking for a new home after being dismissed by their vicar over a disagreement about criminal records checks.
The dispute began when two elderly male choristers at the St Michael and All Angels Church in Yeovil, Somerset, were asked to complete forms to prove that they did not have any criminal convictions.
The choristers, both aged 83, who have more than a century of service in the choir between them, were dismissed when they objected, saying that there was no requirement for choristers to have CRB checks.
Unrest at the dismissals then led the vicar, the Rev James Baker, to suspend the entire choir.
The church organist and musical director, Jenny Hansford, 70, has since quit in support of the choristers.
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Mrs Hansford, who completed her own CRB check two years ago when she became musical director, said the row started in January when the vicar handed out CRB forms to all members of the choir after a Sunday service.
She immediately went home and searched online for the requirements of CRB checks. She discovered that only she, in her capacity as musical director, was required to complete the form because her work brings her into contact with children.
“At the end of a Sunday morning service the vicar asked them to complete the forms and they stood firm and said they were not required,” she said. “Mr Baker replied: ‘In that case you are immediately sacked from the choir’.
“We were absolutely shocked by this. They told me they have spent more than 100 years between them singing in the choir and they knew they were not required to complete the CRB check. I have two new, talented children who came into the choir — and within two weeks there was no choir for them to sing with. They’re devastated.”
A spokesman for the Diocese of Bath and Wells confirmed that the choir had been asked to stand down, even though the vicar now accepts he was wrong to ask for CRB checks. He claimed that some choir members were already in a “cooling off period” because they had disagreed with the introduction of “Taizé chanting”, from the Christian community in France. Chanting was taking place during one Sunday service each month in an attempt to “modernise” services and attract more worshippers.
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“The church are re-examining all of the music in services and the choir has been asked to stand down as this goes on,” he said. “We don’t know when this will change.” He added: “The CRB checks were a misunderstanding, which the vicar has apologised for. He thought that all members of the choir needed a CRB check. I don’t know whether he immediately sacked the two members on the spot but it doesn’t seem the sort of thing a vicar would do.”
Mrs Hansford added: “Since Mr Baker came to St Michael’s, the choir has included Taizé music and would have had no objection to it being incorporated in a monthly service. There was no meeting with the choir to inform them of these plans, so I disagree with suggestions that they were met with resistance. We are all left in the dark. The choir has such a history of music. I’ve tried very hard to uphold that tradition.”
Mr Baker, who joined the church in May 2010, was not available for comment yesterday.