{"id":415317,"date":"2026-05-06T23:47:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-06T23:47:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/415317\/"},"modified":"2026-05-06T23:47:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T23:47:14","slug":"police-recover-body-near-remote-scottish-monastery-where-missing-kiwi-monk-justin-evans-disappeared","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/415317\/","title":{"rendered":"Police recover body near remote Scottish monastery where missing Kiwi monk Justin Evans disappeared"},"content":{"rendered":"

The death is being treated as unexplained, and inquiries are ongoing.<\/p>\n

A report would be submitted to the Procurator Fiscal (a public prosecutor responsible for investigating sudden or suspicious deaths) in due course, police said. <\/p>\n

Papa Stronsay, where Evans went missing, and Stronsay, where the body was found, are less than 500m apart. <\/p>\n

Evans is from Christchurch, where he grew up and attended local schools.<\/p>\n

He was a student at St Bede\u2019s College in the late 2010s, where he played for the school\u2019s 1st XV.<\/p>\n

A statement from Police Scotland after Evans\u2019 disappearance described him as around 6ft (1.82m) tall, with short hair and a dark beard.<\/p>\n

He spoke with a New Zealand accent and was last seen wearing a white robe, police said.<\/p>\n

Evans, known as Brother Ignatius at the island monastery, was most recently pictured reading scripture during a service marking the feast of the Presentation of the Lord<\/a>, known colloquially as Candlemas, at the beginning of February. <\/p>\n

\"NewNew Zealand monk Justin Evans, 24, was originally from Christchurch. Photo \/ Insula Papey Minor<\/p>\n

The monastery was established by the traditionalist Catholic order Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer, which has New Zealand links.<\/p>\n

Founded in the late 1980s, the order has faced controversy in Christchurch, where it established a second monastery in the 2000s.<\/p>\n

After allegations of unauthorised exorcisms and spiritual and psychological abuse were exposed in a 2023 Newshub report<\/a>, the Vatican flew Australian Bishop Robert McGuckin to New Zealand to conduct its own investigation into the order.<\/p>\n

\"JustinJustin Evans disappeared from the Golgotha Monastery on Papa Stronsay just before midnight on April 11. Photo \/ Transalpine Redemptorists<\/p>\n

During the investigation, 17 members raised concerns about the group\u2019s leaders, Father Michael Mary and Father Anthony Mary, accusing them of engaging in controlling and manipulating behaviour and interfering in the lives of present and former members.<\/p>\n

Bishop Michael Gielen subsequently stripped both priests of their religious faculties and told the order\u2019s members to leave the Diocese of Christchurch following advice from the Vatican, the Herald revealed in July 2024.<\/a><\/p>\n

The order appealed the ban, but in a letter sent to his diocese in August last year, Bishop Gielen confirmed the Vatican had \u201crejected in its entirety\u201d the appeal. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The death is being treated as unexplained, and inquiries are ongoing. A report would be submitted to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":415318,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1558,7800,44972,100772,1874,42,2514,17468,194,685,6501,125610,168890,4486,3180,43,675,59780,13913,49926,40,38,41,39,376,2201,540,80],"class_list":["post-415317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-been","tag-body","tag-disappeared","tag-evans","tag-found","tag-headlines","tag-island","tag-justin","tag-kiwi","tag-last","tag-missing","tag-monastery","tag-monk","tag-month","tag-near","tag-news","tag-police","tag-recover","tag-remote","tag-scottish","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-water","tag-went","tag-where","tag-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=415317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415317\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/415318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=415317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=415317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=415317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}