Trinity United Reformed Church Wimbledon

The United Reformed Church (URC) is deeply saddened by the death of Professor Jason Arday, who was found unresponsive at an address in London on Friday.

Professor Arday, 41, became the University of Cambridge’s youngest Black professor in 2023 before resigning from his position as Professor of Sociology of Education last week following unrelenting public allegations of plagiarism about his work.

The Revd Neil Thorogood, Moderator of General Assembly, writes:

“Congregations across the United Reformed Church will be holding the family and friends of Jason Arday in our hearts and prayers. We share the shock and sadness of so many at news of his death. His all too brief life was an inspiration in so many ways, even as recent events begged so many questions and leave so much to face now. 
 
“My fifteen years as tutor and then Principal at Westminster College, Cambridge, introduced me to amazing and good people, dedicated to helping others flourish and learn. But, as Jason Arday himself reflected, academia must also be a place of searching questions. Critical thinking and seeking to get to the truth are fundamentals to our God-given desire to discover and learn. Many will need to understand how fair such scrutiny of Jason Arday’s work was. When does reasonable questioning become something brutal and cruel?
 
“I am deeply aware of just how few UK academics come from Black and Global Majority communities; how hard it is to celebrate the rich diversity of experience and backgrounds and to hear every voice at our universities. It seems that too many hopes, forces and demands became focussed upon just one appointment and one person.
 
“I pray for those who mourn and for those whose lives are shattered by this news. I pray for the wider Cambridge and academic community as the soul searching and questioning continues. I pray for our communities where too many people are denied possibility and hope through discrimination and bias.”

Karen Campbell, Head of Global and Intercultural Church, adds:

I am grieved beyond words at Professor Arday’s death.
I grieve for the needless loss of a young life.
I grieve for Professor Arday’s family and loved ones, who will be devastated by this loss.
I grieve for countless others, who never knew Professor Arday personally, but who are shocked by the news of his death and angered by the circumstances. 
Whether or not Professor Arday made mistakes, could any mistake justify the relentless pursuit he faced in the weeks before his death? 
And would a white colleague in a similar position ever be subject to the same level of pursuit?
I grieve for the people, of all cultural backgrounds, who are asking these questions,
and whose hearts are broken by the answers they perceive.
I pray that the questioning will mean that Professor Arday’s death was not in vain.  

And I offer this prayer which people might find useful in public and private worship:

 Do Black lives matter, Lord?
Really?

Well I suppose the lives of those in jobs we find useful matter; 
where would we be without the Black lives we find convenient, after all?  

But Black academic lives, Lord?  
Do they matter?

Black academic excellence, 
working class academic excellence, 
refugee academic excellence, 
neurodivergent academic excellence – 
these are all resented; even hated;
hounded to death by jealousy, ignorance, and racism.
Honest mistakes are worked up into a moral panic designed to keep black lives in their place.

In our anger Lord, be with us 
and give us the determination to change;
in our sadness comfort us 
and those who mourn;
and, in our hearts Lord, 
remind us that Black lives matter.
Amen.