At university, I embraced student life until the final year, when I started going to church again with a Christian friend. My faith returned and I greeted it in a slightly begrudging way. I was almost annoyed that the gospel was true.
I moved to London and started working in marketing, attending church every Sunday. I climbed the ranks in the branding and strategy world, eventually becoming a management consultant. I always had the inner sense that one day I might become a vicar. It was a constant tap on my shoulder from the age of 22 until I finally went for it at 33 years old.
One New Year, I decided: “OK, God, if you are real and you want me to do this, I will at least go through the process of applying.”
I thought perhaps my application would be rejected, but of course, I was accepted and the process of becoming a vicar began. I gave up my six-figure salary, sold my Porsche and left my nice house in Wimbledon for a cramped student room in a city in the south-west of England where I studied theology for two years.
Climbing a conventional career ladder had been a big part of my identity and it was strange to be without that. I missed being able to buy people a round in a pub and having nice meals out in London. But I consider becoming a vicar the best thing that ever happened to me. I’ve found that in life we sometimes resist the very things that will actually bring us the most joy.
‘No, the money’s really bad’
Some of my clients were desperate to know why I was giving it all up to become a clergyman. One said: “Why are you doing this? Is the money good?”
“No, it’s really bad,” I replied. “I’m doing it because of God – it’s because I feel called to do this.”
Fifteen years later, I’m the vicar of a church in south-west London and I find that I use those strategic skills from my previous career.
We are in a post-Christian world in the UK. Hardly anybody goes to church; around 5pc of people regularly attend. I can write the most brilliant sermon and plan the most inspiring service, but if people don’t walk through the doors and listen, well, what’s the point?
‘You have to go where the people are’
I think modern-day vicars have to be entrepreneurial. You have to meet people where they are and try to add value to their lives.
In 2019, we started a coffee shop in the church. We get about 1,000 people a week walking into the church thanks to the café. These people would never have crossed the threshold if not for the café.
We explain that we have different community groups going on – a debt centre where people can get free debt advice, a clothes swap where refugees can come during the week and get free clothes, a homeless shelter at night – and, of course, church services.
We have doubled our congregation in recent years from about 125 to 250 people. But you can’t just open your doors on a Sunday and hope people will come; you have to find ways of engaging people and, in this leafy part of London, a flat white in a nice café is a way of doing that.
‘I have no faith in my pension’
As a vicar, I get around £28,000 a year as a stipend and I also am given a house to live in. I obviously didn’t become a vicar for the money – no one wants to moan, I was called to this and I want to do it – but it can be difficult. I have a wife and two children and receive around £1,895 a month. Out of that money, £500 went on my gas and electricity bill last winter. You do think: “This is tight”. You have to budget and watch the pennies.
But the real problem is the pension. I haven’t had a crisis of faith in Jesus, but I have had a crisis of faith in the pension.
It does not err on the side of generosity. If someone spent 42 years as a vicar, from the age of 26 to 68, devoted their entire working lives to the church and joined the church after 2011, they would receive £13,397 a year as a pension – that’s far below what a nurse or a teacher would receive. You can’t live on £13,397.
Once you are retired, you’re not entitled to live in a vicarage. The church does have homes for retired clergy but you still have to pay rent – it is slightly subsidised rent but it is still rent.
I preach sermons telling people not to be anxious, but I do worry about retirement. A lot of clergy feel as though we gave our lives to this. Being a vicar isn’t a job. You don’t really get days off. I do feel that the Church should look after their retired clergy. We can do better than a pension of £13,000 a year, when the Church of England is sitting on £10bn in assets.
There can be a sense among the clergy that they can’t raise the issue of the pension. You don’t want to be seen as ungrateful or lacking in faith – we believe that God will look after us. So you almost feel guilty saying anything.
I do think change is coming, though. At the general synod, the church’s parliament in February, a couple of people spoke very powerfully on this issue.
‘There are high ‘Vicar of Dibley’ expectations’
You have to wear many hats as a vicar. The public has this conception that we are similar to the Vicar of Dibley and hold funerals, take weddings and are generally nice people. But there’s so much more to it than that. As a vicar, I’m an entrepreneur, manager, events manager and fundraiser – and more.
On a Sunday, I arrive at the church at 8am. I’ve spent the whole of Thursday writing the sermon. I help with getting all the chairs out, the coffee, overseeing the team – effectively, I am running an event as well as preaching a sermon and taking a service.
Throughout the week, I’m helping with our community programmes. That might be reading nursery rhymes with biblical input to children, serving free hot chocolate and doughnuts to local sixth formers as part of our youth programme, holding a midweek communion service, helping with the clothes swap and the homeless shelter.
I’m managing my team of six, meeting with them and encouraging them. I meet with my parishioners to support them as they go through life – that might be praying with a recent widower, or my wife and I having lunch with a woman whose relationship just ended.
There’s also the upkeep of the late-19th-century church. When I first arrived, the heating didn’t work. No one wants to come into a cold church, so we had to fix it. I got a load of quotes and the best one was £100,000 to install central heating. We didn’t have that money.
I stood up on Sunday and explained that we needed to raise £100,000. One week later – and I believe as an answer to prayer – I received a letter from a solicitor on behalf of a deceased parishioner who had left the church £100,000 in her will. I ran around the church screaming with joy and then I had a little cry. I felt: God, you’re in this. And then I spent the summer managing the installation, turning up in trackie bottoms, wearing a hard hat, and meeting with workmen.
The very best part of being a vicar is seeing lives transformed by the love of Jesus. There’s no better thing than seeing someone who, in some part of their life, was dead and is now alive again. Being able to help someone who is struggling, not through your own strength, but through God’s strength, pointing them towards someone bigger and more loving and seeing them come through their troubles – it’s the best thing ever.
The hardest part of the role is that there are no work boundaries, unless you put them in. If a congregant goes into hospital and it’s your day off, you need to go and visit them.
There’s a lot of burnout among the clergy. You are giving to people and you need to make sure you are being filled up. It is critical that I take time in the morning to pray, rest, meditate and read the Bible, because you can’t give out what you don’t have.