The Church The Church of the Papal Mainframe , later known as the Church of the Silence or simply as the Church , was a religious and military organisation in the 51st and 52nd centuries . It was responsible for interstellar security , protection of human populations and special covert operations , and acted as the military force of the Papal Mainframe . Ranks in the Church included Mother Superious , Priest , Bishop , Cleric , and Colonel . Members of this organisation were sometimes called " the Clerics . " The Church also included Confessional Priest s , genetically engineered by the Church to allow people to confess their sins without remembering doing so , accomplished by fashioning the Priests so anyone looking at them would forget their encounter when they looked away . There were Anglicans in the Church , some of whom were marines . ( TV : " A Good Man Goes to War " ) Some planets were " heaven - neutral , " like the Gamma Forests . It was considered unusual to find their inhabitants in the church military force . ( TV : " A Good Man Goes to War " ) History . The Eleventh Doctor suggested that the Church was an evolution of the churches of Earth . ( TV : " The Time of Angels " ) In the 51st century , the Church recruited River Song for a covert mission in which she infiltrated the Galaxy class Starliner " Byzantium " , which contained a Weeping Angel . She called in the Eleventh Doctor , who rescued her and accompanied her to Alfava Metraxis , where the " Byzantium " had crashed . There they met with Octavian ' s unit . Octavian led his men into the Maze of the Dead below the " Byzantium " . Cleric s Christian , Angelo and Bob were soon killed by the Angels . The Doctor assured him they could not have been saved , but Octavian told him that he would be the one to tell their families while the Doctor flew off in his blue box . Nonetheless , he still told the Doctor he had faith in him when they were surrounded by Angels . ( TV : " The Time of Angels " ) A crack in space and time was discovered in the forest of the " Byzantium " . The Doctor , Amy and River survived and sent the Weeping Angels falling into the crack , erasing them from space and time . Octavian was killed by a Weeping Angel and the remainder of the Clerics were erased by the crack . ( TV : " Flesh and Stone " ) When a mysterious message that filled " half the universe " with fear spread to every corner of space and time , the Papal Mainframe was the first ship to arrive at Trenzalore , the source of the message , and shielded it so that nobody could land . However , unknown to the church , the Weeping Angel s had already arrived on planet . Mother Superious Tasha Lem at some point summoned the Eleventh Doctor and Clara Oswald to the Mainframe in response to the message . Claiming ignorance as to its contents , she sent them down to the planet to discover the truth themselves . After she discovered that the message was the First Question , sent by the Time Lords from their pocket universe , Tasha communicated to the Doctor that if he took action to save the Time Lords , he would cause the fleets above to destroy them . The Doctor refused to allow the Mainframe to destroy the planet and spent the next 300 years defending it . The Papal Mainframe also busied themselves with keeping the peace amongst the various species that remained in orbit . Tasha officially changed the core tenets of the Papal Mainframe ' s constituent chapters so that they became dedicated to ensuring that silence would fall in response to the question , turning the Papal Mainframe into the Church of the Silence . By the time of the Doctor and Clara ' s next visit to the Mainframe , it had been largely overrun by the Dalek s , who converted most of the crew , including Tasha herself , into puppets . However , with the Doctor ' s assistance , Tasha managed to resist the Daleks ' control and take back the Church , and spend the remainder of conflict coordinating the Papal Mainframe and the Silence against the Daleks . ( TV : " The Time of the Doctor " ) In the 52nd century , a Church regiment and the Headless Monks were working together as part of the Silence ' s operation to capture the infant Melody Pond to use as a weapon against the Doctor ; by this time the Church considered him a threat ( TV : " A Good Man Goes to War " ) because of the Doctor ' s ability to release the Time Lords from their pocket universe and start a new Time War along his personal future , which the Silence tried to prevent . ( TV : " The Time of the Doctor " ) The Eleventh Doctor neutralised the entire force at their Demons Run base without personally killing anyone ( though he tricked the Clerics and the Headless Monks into shooting each other ) . However , the defeat of the Church was part of the Silence ' s trap . ( TV : " A Good Man Goes to War " ) The Clerics later helped the Silence capture River Song and place her in the astronaut suit . ( TV : " Closing Time " ) ( TV : " The Time of Angels " , " Flesh and Stone " ) ( TV : " A Good Man Goes to War " ) ( TV : " The Time of the Doctor " )