Responding to an article from Uniting Church Queensland ModeratorAndrew Gunton, Hedley Fihaki has listed the significant charges against him. Fihaki, formerly the minister at Mooloolaba Christian church was removed from ministry by the Synod’s Committee of Discipline. Fihaki recorded these charges on The Other Cheek writer/editor John Sandeman’s Facebook page comments section. The Other Cheek has copied them into this story to keep them accessible.
This is Hedley Fihaki’s list of the charges. The UCA might present them differently, but The Other Cheek is aware the UCA rules on confidentiality mean they won’t make them public. This means that the picture of what the 23 charges found sufficient for removing Fihaki from the ministry is incomplete. The Other Cheek understands that none of them relates to heresy or moral failure.
They revolve around making public statements as the leader of a dissident movement within the UCA. The last in the list – about a “Replacement Assembly” – concerns a tactic employed by the Assembly of Confessing Congregations, the dissident group Fihaki headed setting up parallel structures to the UCA councils. There was an instance where the ABC mistakenly reported the ACC as an official UCA body and Fihaki made sure that was corrected. Fihaki had inherited the name “Assembly of Confessing Congregations” which appears to have grieved the UCA leadership from an earlier generation of leaders including Max Champion and Peter Bentley, notable conservative activists in the UCA.
One breach of code for co-signing this letter to PM on religious freedom https://www.baptist.org.au/…/Open_Letter_Prime_Minister…
Breach for making comments on Media! Noting other ministers are commenting also but no complaints against them https://amp.abc.net.au/article/11082926
Breach for speaking on Tonga TV about https://www.rnz.co.nz/…/tongan-church-conference-avoids…
Breach of code for co-signing letter on religious freedom to opposition leader at the time https://www.baptist.org.au/…/Open_Letter_Opposition…
Breach for commenting on FB on the moderator’s musings saying “Does the moderator know we cannot live within the false diversity endorsed by R64? Or will the church force evangelicals to accept it anyway?”https://journeyonline.com.au/…/moderators-musing-14…/
“If Israel is not free to express his religious beliefs, which are taken directly from scripture, then the implications for preachers like myself is that we too will be shut down and our contracts are also under threat,” Mr Fihaki told the Herald. https://amp.smh.com.au/…/christian-leaders-challenge…
Breach of Code for a sermon on “The Cost of Discipleship” https://youtu.be/nICBmlfzz8E
Pastoral Letter to President of UCA Re: replacement assembly which was taken out of context and subject of numerous breaches of code https://drive.google.com/…/1XarqHynvON31GhpEMUy…/view…
Statement of interest. John Sandeman edited the assembly of Confessing congregations magazine for five years.