The Rev'd Peter Mullen (born 11 January 1942) is the current Rector of St Michael, Cornhill and St Sepulchre-without-Newgate in the City of London. Dr Mullen is also Chaplain to the Guild of Air Pilots and Air Navigators, one of the Livery Companies of the City of London and the Anglican Chaplain to the London Stock Exchange, a largely honorific and historical post.[1]
Mullen graduated from the University of Liverpool with the degree of BA, before obtaining a PhD from Middlesex University.
He was ordained into the Church of England in 1970. He became Chaplain and Head of Religious Education (RE) at Whitecroft School, Bolton in 1974. In 1977 he was appointed Vicar of Tockwith and Bilton-in-Ainsty with Bickerton, Diocese of York, where he remained until 1989.
Mullen was censured in 1989 by the Church for committing adultery with a parishioner, and as a consequence had to resign from this incumbency in Yorkshire.[2] He returned to the ministry as a priest in 1997. Mullen was granted Permission to Officiate, York 1989-98. He became Priest-in-Charge of St Michael's Cornhill & St Sepulchre-without-Newgate and Chaplain to the Stock Exchange in 1998. He later was confirmed as Rector of St Michael, Cornhill. He is due to retire on his seventieth birthday in January 2012.
Mullen is noted for his criticism of homosexuality.[3] Writing on his online blog, he stated that homosexuals should carry health warnings, for instance, "Sodomy may seriously damage your health". He later explained that his comments were 'satirical', and went further by saying that he has homosexual friends. Nonetheless, a spokesman for the Diocese of London made an announcement distancing the Bishop and fellow clergy from Mullen's statements, following which these comments were removed from his blog.[4] He later apologized.[5] Mullen has also called for tax-payer funded homosexual parades to be banned, describing them as "obscene". [6]
A few members of his congregation left his parish in protest to worship elsewhere, among them Douglas Murray, the Old Etonian Neoconservative who had previously been a regular in the church choir.
Mullen is Eurosceptic and does not hide his views; for instance, in March 2010, he spoke at a United Kingdom Independence Party event in Chichester, where he denounced the European Union and Islam.[7] He has mocked Muslims, saying there could be an "agreeable carnage" at the start of the annual Hajj in Mecca: "They usually manage to stampede and slaughter quite a few hundred of their co-religionists. Just imagine for a moment what a field day the BBC and the left-wing press in England would have if anything even remotely as bad as that happened in Vatican Square at Christmas or Easter". He added that Muslims "lend themselves to ridicule: sticking their arses in the air five times a day. How about a few little choruses, 'Randy Muslims when they die/Find 70 virgins in the sky'?"[6]
Mullen is a frequent contributor to the Wall Street Journal[8][9][10] He has also written, in typically forthright fashion, for the Daily Telegraph [11] in support of preserving traditional forms of Anglican worship.
Dr Mullen's sermons can be seen at the St Michael's Cornhill website.