Biographical

I’M THE VICAR (Anglican Parish Priest) of Bramhall – a large, welcoming and energising parish in the suburbs of Stockport, Cheshire, UK. I love theology, reading generally, writing, and discourse on pretty much any subject under the sun.

Open to people, open to learning something new every day, I find my life as a priest as challenging, absorbing and life-enhancing after 28 years as I did when I set out on this adventure with God. I’m especially keen to encourage any and all to “apply their minds” to matters of faith.

The Bible has long been “living and active” for me and as I dig ever deeper so the rewards – and ever new understandings – are greater. I have been deeply moved by time spent in the “Bible Lands”, and will remain grateful all my days for the particularly rich opportunity of a mini-sabbatical at the Tantur Ecumenical Institute for Theological Studies in Jerusalem in 2000. Accessible learning opportunities in the arts, peace studies, philosophy, the sciences and world faiths are some of the building blocks, I’m sure, for realising and recognising what Jesus called “the Kingdom of God”.

I’m especially – and eclectically – inspired by James Alison, Marcus Borg, Walter Brueggemann, Carlo Carretto, John Dominic Crossan, Vincent Donovan, Austin Farrer, René Girard, Stanley Hauerwas, Alan Jones, William Loader, Jurgen Moltmann, Parker J Palmer, Eugene Peterson, John Polkinghorne, Timothy Radcliffe, Richard Rohr, Barbara Brown Taylor, Miroslav Volf, Keith Ward and Rowan Williams – and I bend low before the wonders of the poetry of Maya Angelou, Ruth Bidgood, Mary Oliver, Rainer Maria Rilke, May Sarton, William Stafford, R S Thomas and Gwenallt (David James Jones).

One of my favourite books for as long as I can remember has been the children’s classic The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams and I have more recently been glad to read – and to give to others – The Velveteen Principles: A Guide to Becoming Real by Toni Raiten-D’Antonio

Favourite preacher? – without a shadow of a doubt, Bishop Michael Marshall, former Bishop of Woolwich, Archbishops’ Springboard Missioner, and lover of all God’s people. Bishop Michael’s books, preaching, prayer and person are all of a piece, and utterly “Real” ….

one can no more become a Christian by sitting inside a church all day than one can become an automobile by sitting all day in a garage

I love the Church dearly and have been privileged to serve as parish priest in 5 very different parishes, and in the 1980s as Chaplain to an extraordinarily creative Diocesan Bishop. I am a great believer in the healing power of contemplation, “de-cluttering”, care-full liturgy, silence,  stillness and sacred space  – and a great deal of my time is happily involved with Church life; but I spend a healthy proportion of my life in the “wider world”, too, breathing God’s good fresh air out there, absorbed in photography, love of good conversation, love of good coffee and food, love of people generally, and family and friends particularly, and I stand in awe and wonder before the majesty of God’s creation.

Rainer Maria Rilke famously wrote in “Letters to a Young Poet”:.

“Love consists in this, that two solitudes protect and border and salute each other.” 

I can think of no higher aspiration for church communities or for my own personal community.

In Church-speak I’m a Liberal Catholic – please see Affirming Liberalism – most at home in inclusive and open-minded environments, who wants to celebrate, every day, the open-armed and open-hearted generosity of God. I also share a great many of the usual human frailties. My life is littered with contradictions and questions, doubts and assurances, regrets and delights. A life lived “uphill and down dale” and frequently too fast for my natural tendencies really to keep up with.  My patient wife Jilly and I share interest in family, friends, home, garden, canoeing and holidays – in the English Lake District, France and Spain – and plenty of time together.