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This week’s blog is written by Dr Clare Dowding, the new Diocesan Warden of Readers.Clare will be commissioned this Sunday during the Admission and Licensing service of Lay Ministers at Southwark Cathedral. |
Five years ago, if someone had told me that right now, I’d be preparing to take on the role of Warden of Readers for our Diocese, I would have been very surprised. In autumn 2018, I had just started training for Reader Ministry at St Augustine’s College of Theology, I was getting to grips with regular weekly classes, and I wasn’t really thinking beyond the first essay deadline (if I’m completely honest). Although I’d been exploring the possibility of Reader Ministry for about 18 months by then, starting training was probably the point at which it began to feel that this really was what God wanted me to be doing at this time.
The idea that I might end up in formal ministry of some kind was itself a bit of a surprise – even if only to me! When I started telling people that I was thinking about it, more than one person replied, “About time!”. I grew up in south Wales, where my dad was a Parish Priest in the Diocese of Llandaff – he’s now happily retired. I moved to London in the mid 1990s after university, and I soon found a home at All Saints’ Blackheath. Over the years, I’ve been involved in the life of the church in lots of ways: the choir, the serving team, the listening team, the PCC, Deanery Synod, Churches Together, reading, leading and coordinating prayers, to name just some. Yet as far as I was concerned, all of that was just what I did as part of the All Saints’ congregation, rather than viewing it as some form of ‘ministry’.
But – as is so often the case – God had other ideas. In October 2020, after two years of training, I, with others was Licensed by the Bishop Christopher and Admitted as a Reader. What I do now at All Saints’ is very similar to what I did before, with the addition of preaching and leading some services, but the difference is that I am now much more visible, as a Licensed Lay Minister. In my professional life I work in administration – currently at King’s College London, previously at a small charity – and am usually the person supporting others who lead rather than being the one leading. However, being more visible and taking on more aspects of leadership feels like the right thing to be doing at this time.
At the same time as settling into Reader Ministry, I have also become a Vocations Adviser, one of those from across the Diocese (lay and ordained) who form part of the wider Vocations Team, encouraging and supporting people who are exploring and discerning their own possible calls to ministry in some form. I slightly surprised myself in having the confidence to enquire about this when I heard that more Vocations Advisers were being recruited, because I’d gone through the discernment process myself so recently. But what I keep learning is that God has much more confidence in our skills and abilities than we can sometimes have in ourselves – which is as it should be, since those skills and abilities are God-given.
Which has all led up to this summer, when I had a phone call to say that the Bishop would like me to consider becoming Warden of Readers, taking over from Ray Wheeler who has served the Readers of the Diocese well for the last four years. This was a very big surprise – but more and more I am coming to understanding that God’s surprises have reason and purpose, even if that’s not necessarily clear immediately. It’s an honour to be stepping into this role, with all its responsibilities, and by God’s grace I hope to be and to do the best I can as Warden over the coming years – whatever further surprises there may be along the way.
