A former Angus minister who resigned in the wake of a sex scandal which rocked the Church of Scotland and her community will reveal a personal account of her life in print.
This week will see the release of Scandalous, Immoral And Improper, in which former glens associate minister Helen Douglas (46) will tell her side of a story which split the local congregation and led all the way to the House of Lords as she battled to clear her name.
In the book she opens her heart to reveal a childhood scarred by abuse and claims she underwent an abortion after the alleged incident which ultimately led to her resignation from the church.
As the associate minister to the rural parishes of Glenisla, Kilry, Lintrathen, Airlie, Ruthven and Kingoldrum, Miss Douglas, then known as Helen Percy, became embroiled in controversy over an alleged affair with a married elder.
Suspended by the kirk over the matter, she had been due to become the first ever woman minister to face a church trial by libel, but that was avoided when she demitted her status in the wake of the 1997 scandal.
She then embarked on a legal fight, which over almost a decade involved the Court of Session and the House of Lords before agreeing a £10,000 out-of-court settlement ahead of an employment tribunal.’Nuisance value’Miss Douglas had been seeking £300,000 and the payment was described at the time by the Church of Scotland as a “nuisance value” settlement.
She spent time in South Africa before returning to Angus, and has remained in Tayside.
Miss Douglas hit the headlines again earlier this year when she was placed on probation at Perth Sheriff Court after admitting benefit fraud.
She has only once previously spoken out about the glens controversy, telling The Courier in 2006 of her gratitude to parishioners who stood by her and the regret of having to resort to the judicial process in a bid to clear her name.
The book tells of her growing up at the hands of what she claims was an abusive father, before her 1994 move to rural Angus and the appointment which ended in disgrace.