Transcript Detail
| Transcript Title | Cutmore, Simon (O2025.3) |
| Interviewee | Rev’d Simon Cutmore (SC) |
| Interviewer | Frances Green (FGG) |
| Date | 10/03/2025 |
| Transcriber by | Freda Joshua (using Otter.AI for initial transcript) |
Transcript
Hertford Oral History Group
Recording no: O2025.3
Interviewee: Rev’d Simon Cutmore (SC)
Venue: All Saints’ Vicarage
Date: 10th March 2025
Interviewer: Frances Green (FGG)
Transcribed by: Freda Joshua (using Otter.AI for initial transcript)
************** unclear recording
[discussion] untranscribed material
italics editor’s notes
FGG: So it's Monday the 10th of March, 2025. We're here in the All Saints’ vicarage with the Reverend Simon Cutmore. And Simon is not a native of the parish, he arrived in Hertford about six months ago.
And so, within the Hertford Oral History Group, we thought it would be a good opportunity to talk to someone who's new to the town and get their sense of what Hertford is like for someone coming in and working very much within the community, and to give us a fresh sense of what it looks like through adult eyes arriving in the town and integrating very firmly into what Hertford is.
So, Simon, welcome, and if I can ask you to start just by giving us a bit of your back story - growing up and life before Hertford, really. If you can start with your family background and say what got you into the church?
SC: Sure. Born in London, early years were in Teddington Lock in Middlesex, and we moved from there when I was nearly five, to Preston in Lancashire, where all my formative years were spent, primary school in Fullwood in Preston, and secondary school in Lytham St Annes. I spectacularly failed my A’levels while I was at school, really not helped by the fact my parents had moved south at the end of my lower sixth year, and so I had an option of either staying in Lancashire to finish my As or move with them down to the South West, where they still now live, and start sixth form again, and I decided I'd stay with my best friend. Well, of course, I was free to play then, and didn't really pull my finger out, that's the technical term, and so ended up with a smattering of low grades and N’s and U's, which was not great, really.
FGG: The wrong end of the alphabet!
SC: I know! But I planned to have a year out between ‘A’ levels and university anyway, and all my summer holiday jobs had been spent working and saving money towards that year. While I was in my mid-teens, while we were living in Lancashire, my parents - let's go back a step, my parents, when we moved to Lancashire, were not church goers at all. Moving to a totally new part of the country, not knowing a single person, they thought, ‘Ok, where do we go to meet new people? Well, you can join clubs and societies, actually, this one's free, let's go to the local church’, which they duly did, and actually found themselves to actually quite enjoy what was going on there. So me and my sister, who's four years younger than me, were entered in the Sunday School, hundreds strong, and went through that, and the youth group and so on. And so church became an important part of our lives. Aged 15, I decided I wanted to be baptised because my parents had decided that they'd leave it up to me, but I'd be baptised and confirmed, which I duly did. And so faith was kind of increasingly real to me in my teenage years.
In my later years, I did the teenage rebellion thing and decided that being a member of the band that I was in was far more important than A: listening to my parents, B: going to church, C, D, E: anyway, and, yeah, I think that probably links up to failing ‘A’ levels and so on. But where this is going was that the year out was actually really important. Decided to have it anyway, even, you know, not knowing what I was going to do next, because I’d paid for it, and my parents and my grandparents thought the year would be a good opportunity to kind of reflect on what next. So travelled to the US, and spent 3 months there, travelling, staying with friends, etc, etc, etc, and then on to New Zealand.
I left the UK with my best friend at the time and his older brother. My best friend got homesick after 6 weeks, so he returned to the UK and I did the next stage to the rest of the US and New Zealand with his older brother. And it was really while I was in New Zealand, spending time there with one of my aunts and uncles, I’d got aunts and uncles on both sides living there at the time, who were very committed Christians, who kind of took me a bit under their wing and looked after me, maybe asked some more fundamental questions about life and faith, and then do the rest of that year on my own, because my best friend's old brother and I parted ways in New Zealand. It really made me reflect what life was about and what my values were, what drove me and so on. And I came back really clear, actually, that faith mattered to me. And so that was really kind of the step on the road as it were
FGG: Yes, very interesting. And so you obviously, then decided to make a professional life out of it?
SC: Yeah. So, needed to get some qualifications. So joined my parents living in the South West, and decided I wanted to explore learning about theology, basically. Wanted to take things about faith seriously, but without ‘A’ levels, couldn't do a degree, so managed to go and speak to one of the smaller colleges connected to Bristol University. And they enabled me to do a foundation course in theology on the understanding that, if I did well enough in that, I'd transfer onto the degree course. Hey presto! So after three years, I got a theology degree, - it's great having a theology degree.
The college in question is one of the anglican training colleges for ministry. So we've got lots of people training to be vicars, and a few of us going, ‘Well, I'm here, and this is really interesting, but where does this go?’ So aged 22 not really sure what I was doing and where I was going with a theology degree and a faith that mattered, and someone noticed an interesting job, working in youth work for a church just outside Paris, a place called Maison-Laffitte. It's, if you imagine the Paris basin as a kind of circle, Maison-Laffitte is the top left-hand side, if you can find that side and head north, you hit it. And there's an English speaking church there, has been there for well over 100 years, and they were looking to employ a youth worker, children's worker, admin assistant, general dogsbody, you name it, and it was a great place to test vocation, to use formal language, to be very independent, away from home and to be in a completely different context, because obviously an English speaking community in a French speaking country, you know, totally different animal.
Served my first year there, thoroughly enjoyed it, decided to stay on for a second, and towards the end of my second year, was beginning to kind of go, ‘OK, what happens now?’ The church in question had a parish priest, a chaplain who ran the Chaplaincy, and they had an assistant, a curate, who was going to be ordained to the priesthood, working there. And so one of the two bishops of the diocese came to ordain her, and he wanted to meet me. This is in the February of 1995, no, 1997 sorry. And so he sat me down in the chaplain's kitchen and went, ‘Ok, Simon, so, you know, here we are, February, 97, what do you want to do now? What happens next?’ And I said, ‘Dunno, you know, go back to the UK. Got a theology degree, do a PGC, go and teach RE, that kind of thing’. Shrugged the shoulders. Last thing I wanted to do was to be ordained. Well, the bishop in question was six foot five, a very serious bloke, and he looked sternly over his glasses at me and said, ‘I'd like you to think about being ordained’. Well, the thing you probably shouldn't do to a bishop, I laughed at him, and he's like, ‘No, seriously’. So to cut the story short, I went to see the kind of personnel manager of the diocese, the Diocese and Director of Ordinands, a swanky name, and he seemed to think I was a good thing. Went to see another member of the clergy in the UK, again, to kind of talk and see whether they felt I was the sort of thing they were looking for, and again, green lighted. So I was then sent to the National Selection Conference, which happens several times a year, where people who have potentially been put forward to be trained, to be ordained, go to. I went to that in Wellingborough, had three days there of intense interviews and other bits and bobs, and at the end of it, I was selected for ordination training.
FGG: And what do you think, looking back now, they saw in you that you weren't seeing in yourself at the time?
SC: I think they saw someone who was in their mid-20s, who was enthusiastic and very committed, wanted to see the Church to being a different place to where it was at the time, where it maybe still is. I think they saw someone who hadn't got final formed views on stuff and so would continue to reflect and grow. Because, heck, if you can't do that in any aspect of life, let's not even bother. I think those things really, to be honest with you, there's something about formation, to use, again the formal language that the Church quite likes, and I think if you're prepared to grow generally it’s a good thing.
FGG: Interesting. So you're now on a very specific path towards ordination and then a life as a vicar. So, I mean, could you give us a whistle stop tour, really, through your parishes to take you up to Rickmansworth, prior to coming here?
SC: Of course. So I was an Ordinand, technical term, someone preparing to be ordained, sent from the diocese in Europe. Yes, the Church of England has a diocese that covers the whole of Europe. It runs from Northwestern France to Moscow. The Pope was once heard to say to the Bishop in Europe at one point in time, ‘I believe I'm one of your parishioners’, a true story. Anyway, I was the first European Ordinand for 15 years, and there wasn't a post that was appropriate for me to go back and serving. So I was released from the diocese and was able to go look at other opportunities back in the UK towards the end of my training and so spent a long time looking at possible posts, possible jobs. Nothing really landed. And I can remember vividly one day towards the end of the spring term of my final year, so getting a bit squeaky, the principal of the college wandering through the corridors of the college with A4 pieces of paper in his hand, yelling, ‘Where's Simon? Where's Simon?’ because this was a job that he felt was right. And so I was released, and was free to then look at other places, and ended up serving my curacy in Biggleswade in Bedfordshire, where I served for 4 and a half years. I then got my first post as a vicar serving in Hemel Hempstead, in Leverstock Green, and then we took on working with the parish of Kings Langley as well. So I spent two thirds with Leverstock Green, one third with Kings Langley. Then moved to Rickmansworth in 2011 and have served, or had served, there for 13 years.
FGG: And because it was the launch pad to coming here, what was Rickmansworth like as a church and a parish?
SC: So, I was serving in the parish of Mill End and Heronsgate with West Hyde. Why they couldn't have thought of a more dynamic name, I don't know. But it's the 3 communities on that side of Rickmansworth. It's the working-class side of Rickmansworth, the Mill End side, literally, historically, where the workers for the mill at Croxley Green would be resident and walk up the hill to it. And so, in those sort of contexts, in the 17- and 1800s, the non-conformist traditions, the Baptists, the Methodist and so on would often be in those communities serving the poor. When the Anglicans arrived, they'd often come in their Anglo-Catholic form. And so I was there serving in Mill End, not so much working class anymore. It nestles into the bosom of Chorleywood, you can draw your own conclusions about that. So it was where we were was really interesting. I mean, Mill End doesn't have a centre. Lots of people, historically, moved out to those communities, to Mill End, you know, post war with the promise of a new job, in the 50s, a new house, some of which they actually, literally, built themselves, large gardens, which they could, you know, plant vegetables and all that kind of thing, allotments, etc. So it almost had a kind of new town feel to it, post Second World War. And then the Maple Cross estate, which was one of the communities I served, began in the 40s as the village, in inverted commas, and was built on in the 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s to become 1800 houses, some of whom were originally council owned, but obviously now social housing, some privately occupied with all the joys and sorrows of an estate like that, a primary school, a corner shop, a hairdresser, a fish and chip shop, and a kind of community hall.
Nothing else, no kind of centre, Mill End, lots of cafes, restaurants, takeaways, that kind of thing, lots of residential but again, no centre. And then the third community was Heronsgate, which was a failed Chartist community. Started out as a Connorsville and became Herringsgate, and then Heronsgate, and the 70-something houses, some of which were Chartist cottages, still exist up there, a gated community, an extraordinary place. So, yeah, very, very diverse communities. Estate ministry, in inverted commas, suburban ministry, in inverted commas, and then, well, an extremely big spectrum. So, yeah, very interesting. Largest parish in the Rickmansworth deanery, about 13 and a half thousand people.
FGG: So what is it that prompts then, contemplation of your move?
SC: I think, I think move comes in all sorts of different ways for people, and it's the same in any job, to be honest with you, you know. I think for some of us, it's being asked, for some it's about having skills useful somewhere else. For me, it was having served, by the time I started to think about it, 12 years somewhere, and we'd navigated some significant and important change as a parish. Had planted two church communities outside of church buildings in the community, one aimed at young parents and toddlers, one aimed at families, which met outside of a Sunday context. So it was busy, lots going on, but there's a point I kind of felt like done everything that I could do, and I think, I think the wise person says that when you get to that point, the communities you're serving, the company you work for, in a certain context, you recognise that actually they need something different, and you need to use your gifts and skills differently somewhere else. So I had a vocational conversation with one of the bishops in the diocese, and said, ‘This is how I'm feeling, you know, they need something different, I need to use my skills differently. I need to be somewhere different, perhaps, you know. what's coming up’. And so there was a conversation about opportunities and possibilities at other parishes to serve in. One of those parishes was Hertford All Saints, and here we are.
FGG: Yes. So when Hertford All Saints was raised, was it a part of the landscape you were already familiar with?
SC: I mean obviously I knew where Hertford was geographically. I'd been to All Saints Church on two previous occasions, one for a study day a number of years ago, and then one occasion a couple of years ago, when the current Bishop of Hertford, Jane Mainwaring, was welcomed into the diocese. Her welcome service happened at All Saints. So I knew the building, knew where it was, but had no real sense of the church, of its life, of its place within the community, of its place within the county either, until the opportunity was raised. And Bishop Jane knows me very, very well and knows the kind of things I bring, as it were, in terms of experience, I've been ordained for 25 years. So she felt that, if this felt right, and the process of exploration and discernment could have happened correctly, this would be a good match.
FGG: That's very interesting. So there's obviously a good bit of thought and personal consideration that goes into that. So that process of discernment and working out what, what does that involve?
SC: So when a parish is moving to vacancy they have to produce what's called a parish profile. It's basically an enlarged job description. It says a little bit about the demographics of the town that the parish serves in. It says something about the geographical landscape, you know, what's the community like. It says something about what the church is like in terms of its makeup, in terms of its people that is, and its life, what does it do. But then it also starts to talk about some of its hopes and dreams and what it feels like it would like to be. Parish profiles often talk a bit about, to some degree, about person spec and what they hope their new incoming, their new vicar might bring, and the sort of skills they might be looking for. So it's a mixture, a melting pot of all of that.
FGG: And so we're now in March 2025. At what, how long ago then were you looking at the parish spec for Hertford as a possible contender?
SC: So back in April of [20]24, well, it must have been slightly before that, in the early spring of 2024.
FGG: Yes, so about a year ago then, it’s quite recent then? So can you remember, as you read the parish spec for Hertford what your sort of personal reaction was?
SC: I liked what I read, because the way that Hertford, the way that All Saints is as a worshipping community, it's the way that these services feel, the sort of thing that it offers currently is very much, I guess, where my heart lies, and, you know, I like the style of church, let's put it that way, that All Saints is.
FGG: So just unpack that a little bit. What does that look like from your perspective?
SC: So that, it's one of those, All Saints is one of those wonderful Anglican churches that is neither of the extremes of the Church of England. It is neither Anglo-Catholic, with all the bells and smells and all the rest of it, and it's not also the kind of lower end of the spectrum, very protestant or charismatic or evangelical in terms of its expression of worship.
All Saints is wonderfully in the kind of warm middle you know, it loves having communion, the Eucharist, and also for the mass, whatever language you want to use. At its heart, its worshipping style is largely choral, which is again, a very strongly Anglican tradition. There's some formality and yet informality in the way that services happen and because of its place. And I mean that in terms of the town, its Civic Society and the county, All Saints, for me, in some ways, epitomises what it means for us to be a parish church. And what I mean by that is, that it's a place where we can facilitate all sorts of interesting conversations with wider society. We can, if we're invited to, contribute to those conversations and also play a part in, hopefully, making Hertford to be an even better community than it is, and a lot of that can happen in seen and unseen kind of ways.
FGG: So would it be correct to say that when you were reading the parish spec you were thinking, yes, I see here somewhere, I could feel at home. But also, actually, I can see a launch pad for lots of stuff that I could do?
SC: Absolutely, absolutely.
FGG: And also, these decisions are not just professional, they're personal and family as well. Could you just maybe explain where you were family-wise at the time you were making this decision?
SC: Sure and that's, it's important you raised that because, I mean, obviously this isn't just a new job, you know, it requires upheaval, moving house, relocating the home, so it is a big undertaking. From a family point of view, I have three young adult children. The youngest is at university and was about to go off to university as we were reaching the conclusion of this discernment process, since I’d been appointed. So actually, from a point of view of moving, it was a good time to at least begin to look, if not actually, as we then did, you know, move. The other two, one of them lives and works away in Oxfordshire, and our oldest is currently with us at home, but they're about to relocate with their partner. So yes, it does, It does involve upheaval.
FGG: Yes, and your wife as well.
SC: Yes, and so, obviously, making decisions about this doesn't fall to me. So, obviously, I talked about it quite a lot with Alex, my wife, and we had a sneaky visit over to Hertford one Sunday, when I had a Sunday off, and drove across here and had a mooch around, had a pub lunch in the Woolpack, and just a general mooch about the town, and the thing that really struck us, was, it was the late spring so nice and warm, was actually how busy Hertford was on a Sunday. How many, particularly young families, young people, were out and about and enjoying the town, and we were really struck by that. And also about how self-contained Hertford is, in the sense that, you know, living in Rickmansworth, if you wanted to buy stuff, we would have to go out into Rickmansworth or to Watford to go shopping. Hertford, I can walk into town, you know, and that really struck us that, actually, it's a really self- contained community, and there's something really wonderful about that.
FGG: And so, yes, and so that self-containment from your point of view, when you say it's wonderful, again, you're, are you saying because you can reach out into it, because it is there, or is there more to that sense of it being wonderful from your perspective?
SC: I think because, because, as a parish priest, you know, we parish priests are called to be available and to serve their community. That's the bottom line. And as I mentioned before, some of that is unseen, but actually about being part and parcel of a community. In some senses, serving three communities in my last parish, it was very difficult to do that, particularly when there wasn't a sense of community in at least one of those. Whereas here, by the nature of the town as it is, plus also the proximity of All Saints to some of that, at the moment, in these early weeks and months, it feels much easier to be part and parcel of some of that. Not least of all because there's only one place that I'm responsible for, not three church communities where I was previously. So when I say, yes, it feels wonderful, it's in part because there is that sense of community already here, because the nature of the makeup of the town.
FGG: Yes, that makes sense. So obviously you're liking the look and the feel of Hertford, and you've come undercover on a Sunday and you're checking us out. But there's more to getting the position, isn't there? You've got to go through a process of applying and in competition, possibly, you've got to be chosen. Can you just really give a little insight into what that process is and how you came out the other end of it?
SC: Yes, so an application, in the sense you would for any job, and so a process of trying to answer the question for the application form, using the parish profile, the spec, as the guide, so trying to say what they want and tell them why you've got the experience to do that. But then, having been shortlisted, yes, there was a day interview. So that involved a tour around the parish geographically. That involved going to Morgans school and being grilled by an interesting array of children from year one to year 6, all sorts of questions. Coming back, having an opportunity to meet with potential colleagues, some of whom I have known quite well, because I've served in the diocese for 25 years, Having some lunch and then quite a rigorous interview where, yeah, there are specific questions that the interview panel then are asking in relation to some of the hopes and dreams from a profile, some of the desires and hopes of the wider diocese, and then also taking very seriously, and rightly so, questions about safeguarding, which are part and parcel of things.
FGG: Yes, exactly, ok. And so it is quite an intensive process.
SC: Yes. I mean, the day began at 9 o'clock, and I was driving home at 4 so, yes.
FGG: Okay, yes. And how, what's the process by which you're then given the results of that?
SC: So the way that it works is that there's usually one of the bishops of the Diocese on the interview panel, and so you're assured that you will hear hopefully at the end of the day, if not the beginning of the following day. So I left the car park at All Saints at about 4, got home at about 5, cup of tea, the phone went, Bishop Jane, would you like to -----
FGG: Oh, fantastic. It was very quick. Had you come out of the day thinking, I really hope I get this or thinking, oh, I don't know.
SC: I really liked, I really liked what I'd seen in the profile. I really liked what I'd seen in the town. I had felt the process of the day had gone as well as it possibly could have done, and was able to translate experiences over 25 years into what they were hoping their new parish priest would bring. So yeah, came away feeling as at peace as you could. So when Bishop Jane phoned and said, we would you like to offer you the post, legal requirements needed to happen of course, would your answer be yes or no, it was an emphatic yes, because -----
FGG: Sometimes you know there's a good fit.
SC: Yes, absolutely, and it feels, still feels like it's a good fit.
FGG: Yes, well, pleased to hear that.
SC: Me too! [laughter]
FGG: So, ok, and so then you've got to go through the process of preparing to leave the parishes in Rickmansworth and to come here, and you arrived here last September. So had you seen the vicarage before you arrived?
SC: So yes, we'd, I'd had the opportunity to see inside the vicarage on the interview day. Yes, I had, but Alex, my wife, hadn't, so we wanted to try and organise that as quickly as we could after I'd been, I mean, once I'd had a look around and taken pictures and so on, we knew that it had the opportunity and the possibility to be a really great home. So yes, in the weeks between accepting at the end of April and leaving Mill End and Heronsgate with West Hyde in the June, there were opportunities to come across and talk about the house and the hopes and dreams for it, so yes,
FGG: Fantastic. And so you arrived last September, and what are your first experiences of actually being in the job at last?
SC: It’s really interesting. I mean, we'd been living here, we moved here at the beginning of August, and I started work here on the 4th September. And we have two cockapoos, and so they require a walk daily. So in those weeks when we weren’t away, actually, physically on holiday, one of the things I enjoyed was leaving the vicarage here in Hertford and walking dogs and finding places to walk and meeting people, but doing it incognito. So there was a chap who I met most days over those first few weeks walking his dog home again. And so we got talking about all sorts of things, you know, the band t-shirt I was wearing, the fact that I had hearing aids and he did too, or whatever it was, anyway. And then the following day after my licencing on the 4th of September, so on the 5th of September, I'm doing the same thing as I do, I'm walking the dogs through the churchyard, out into the town, but with my clericals on. And he stopped me and went, but, you know, he hadn't realised that I was the new parish priest. So it was lovely to make that connection. And I actually saw him again yesterday, having not seen him for a number of weeks. But we just picked up where we left off.
FGG: He’d recovered from the shock!
SC: But you know, I mean, I've… in those first few weeks, I had some priorities that I really wanted to try and nail. I really wanted to try and get known in the community in those first few weeks, as quickly as I could. So in the boundary of the parish are a number of schools, Simon Ball school, Richard Hale school, Morgans school, Wheatcroft school and Abel Smith. I wrote to all their teachers and tried to organise opportunities to go and visit the schools as soon as I could, which I did, which was great. Try to meet as many of my colleagues in ministry as possible across the Christian traditions, again, which is also really great, and just trying to be out in the community and be as visible as possible. Because whatever you think of the role that I hold, a key part of it is about availability, and with that, availability only comes by being known. So it's about trying to, those first few weeks were about trying to get to know the town, and some of the key players in the town, to get to know me.
FGG: And through that process, do you recall now any sort of adjustments of your sense of what Hertford was like, and maybe a deepening, a particular understanding about it?
SC: Not, not changes or differences as such, but, actually, my initial assumptions about what I thought the town was like were, and continue to be six months in, affirmed in the sense that it's really interesting.
I spend a lot of time with old people, and they tell me how much Hertford has changed, and most of the change is not positive. But actually, the Hertford I encounter is one that I love, you know, I love the fact that there is a vibrant arts community here. I love the fact that there is, and I mean that by Beam, I mean that by the Corn Exchange, you know, I love the fact that the Courtyard Arts is here. I love the fact that Hertford Art Society is here. I love the fact that the Choral Society, I love the fact, you know, that ticks loads of boxes from my point of view. And I love the fact that there are a variety of pubs where people meet. So there are opportunities across communities to meet a whole range of different people.
You know, I'm used to spending a lot of time in local schools, so it was a bit of a change arriving here and not having quite the involvement that I was used to. But, you know, the six months so far have been about building those lasting connections and finding opportunities to meet people wherever they are. And some of that's just happened by accident. You know, within the first week of being here, I wanted to make sure that All Saints was open during daylight hours, which, for all sorts of very good reasons, it hasn't been. It now is open from 8 till 5 every day. And, unsurprisingly, what happens is, when a building as striking as All Saints is open, particularly in the warmth of the late spring, early summer, and then into the autumn, is that people go, ‘Oh, this is interesting. Let's go and have a look inside’. And so I end up with having fascinating conversations with people who I wouldn't normally have met, you know.
So I've met one of the trustees of Courtyard Arts, for example. Out of those conversations over a couple of beers and dreaming some dreams, we're looking at some sort of involvement art exhibition inside All Saints, probably in 2026. There's a local photographer who's been working a long-term project taking photographs, beautiful, high quality, high res, images of the graveyard and the cemetery around All Saints over the seasons. And again, we're talking about a multimedia exhibition, both in the building and outside it, the photographs, and I wouldn't have encountered all, either, of those people if the building hadn't been open. So it's not just to me about kind of knocking on doors and going, ‘I'm the new vicar. It'd be nice to see you’, it's actually about just stumbling across conversations with people and being open to saying yes to everything that appears.
FGG: Yes, and that's very interesting. I mean, it is a very striking big building, isn't it, that you can see from most places in the town, and was there an element of nervousness about taking on something that big?
SC: Yes, it's, it's utterly terrifying, in the sense that, you know, I mean, perhaps the easiest way to explain it is using the language of kind of the theatre almost, you know. Being inside All Saints and doing what I do is about learning to understand the choreography of the space and how to use the space well, you know. If the worshipping life of a church is about drama and theatre, it is about trying to make sure that we use this extraordinary space well on a Sunday. But, you know, one of the things that I was really clear on, and was clear about when I was appointed, was that, actually, All Saints is a gift for the community, and its space is a gift for the community. You know, we can seat 550 people inside that building with comfort, you know, and I would just love to see the building used for all sorts of stuff, you know. I'm so grateful that Hertford Choral Society come and sing with some regularity in the building.
FGG: And it's not going to show on the recording, but I'm just doing a big thumbs up here!
SC: And that's fantastic. You know, we've seen it used recently, before Christmas, for some commercial ventures, films, music, candle-lit, er…
FGG: Hans Zimmer.
SC: Hans Zimmer…there was the candle-lit concerts as well. But you know, we've talked with Herts Ware College as well, about again, getting some of their theatre tech people, their fashion design people to come and actually, you know, do some creative stuff with the space. Now, we're a big building with lots of pews, discuss, but actually, you know, it is an extraordinary space, you know. Its acoustics are interesting, but it is a beautiful place. And you know, my dream, my hope, beyond anything else, is that more people, individually and corporately, use that space.
FGG: Yes, I think if people can engage with a space on their own terms, something that they feel confident about, it will get them into territory that might otherwise be alien. So, excellent. Yeah, very good. There's always a lot of photographers lurking in the churchyard.
So I just think we've talked a bit about the local environment and what your aspirations are. Of course, there are other churches in Hertford, so St Andrews, how does that work, relationships with St Andrews, maybe other churches that you've encountered?
SC: I mean, as Anglicans, we are, we are bound by parish boundaries, which don't always run concurrently with, you know, the boundaries of towns, all that sort of thing. And that's certainly the case with the boundaries of All Saints parish and St Andrews parish. I'm fortunate that Alan Stewart is the vicar at St Andrews and I know him really pretty well, and have done for a number of years, and we've made it pretty clear to each other early on that the boundaries imagined, drawn, whatever, between us are very semi-permeable and our hope is that, as the two Anglican churches serving Hertford, that we will do that very much interchangeably and together. But actually, you know, one of the things that was rammed home for me working in a church in France, particularly an Anglican, Church of England church in France, where the Church of England is a denomination that's, you know, a centimetre small, It's, you know, it's tiny, and you're in a country that's surrounded by Roman Catholicism and Protestantism, and most of the French who go to church don't understand what Anglicanism is at all. You suddenly realise that actually you need to work in partnership, you know, across denominations, across faith traditions and none. And actually, you know, at my heart, that's what I'm about. I want to build partnership relationships, whether that's with St Andrews, yes please, whether that's with the Baptist, yes please, whether it's with the Methodist, yes please, if it's with community organisations, yes please, if it's with the local funeral directors, I don't really mind. We've got this gift of a space and I've got some time. I've got a growing love of a town and its people. If I can mix my metaphors, let’s dance,
FGG: No, no, mix away. From your point of view, what is the outcome of all these partnerships from your professional perspective? How do you evaluate how well they work and what they contribute?
SC: I mean, I guess I've used this word several times in this conversation, but at the heart of what I'm called to is a very old-fashioned word, service. And actually, you know, if these partnerships, from my point of view and the point of view the Church, mean anything they are about, how can we play a part, in partnership with others, to make the life of our town just that little bit better. Let me qualify that. You know, for some that might be a big project, you know. I don't know what that would look like, yet, it might be akin to something like the food banks or the food pantry or whatever. But actually, you know what, it's also about doing, I said I've talked about before the other unseen stuff, and supporting the lonely and the isolated and the bereaved and the broken and the hospitalised and stuff, the stuff that doesn’t make the headlines and people don't talk about in the cafes and so on. But actually, those people, whether they're at home or in their hospital, you know, are still part of this town, and it's about making this town the best version of Hertford it can be. And I guess that's what the partnerships are about. It's about making Hertford the best version of Hertford it can be at this point in time.
FGG: And I suppose for residents, whatever their perspective and place in the community, to feel it is a home in which they can share what they are. And I was just thinking about your observation that a number of the older residents of Hertford may feel that the town perhaps isn't what it used to be, and it has changed, particularly around the edges. I mean, it's getting bigger all the time, and there are changes in the middle, and the place you grew up in changes, and you feel a little bit lost, don't you? And so I suppose appealing to them to replace a sense of loss with a sense of opportunity, that's quite a challenge, particularly for people later in life who don't, aren't engaging so much. So I can see you've got your work cut out for you.
SC: Yeah, and I mean, it's interesting, isn't it, because I think when, when everything else changes in life, whether that's personal relationships or family or job or the geographical area within which you live, for some people of faith, the thing that shouldn't change, therefore, is your expression of faith, in this case, the Church. But actually the Church also needs to change and continue to speak into the lives and hopes and dreams of this particular community, you know. And we are not an organisation with a brand from the centre, as it were, you know, we're a local organisation, so you can just serve a local community. And so, you know, Hertford All Saints, going forward, will be about being a church, serving and supporting and encouraging, you know, the people who live in this part of the town.
FGG: Yes, it strikes me it's quite similar to local politicians as opposed to national politicians. So often our local politicians really, whatever the colour of their political perspective they are, matters less because they are of the community, I think, and so, yeah, the same with the church. And are there things that you would like to do that six months in you're thinking, okay, that might be a bit harder than I might have anticipated. Are you able to, you know, we can go over the recording afterwards, but are you able to say what those might be?
SC: Um, I think six months in some of the things we've been working on, let's do it this way, some things we've been working on are becoming attentive as a church community of who's present within our community and who's absent. So you know, the congregations have already become aware that they are, perhaps of a particular demographic or an age group or a socio-economic group, and who isn't present.
So the related question is that, well, how do we then try and reach these sectors of the community that aren't present? And what's really interesting, having done some listening exercises with them, they already know who's not there. They already know, actually, how best to try and engage with them. So it's about just trying to action some of that. We've also been doing quite a bit of work behind the scenes in terms of building a hope, with the hope that will be an important culture in the life of the church. So anyone who happens to listen to this recording in their own working life will be well aware, however, in whatever business you're working, and the whole thing about vision and values being such an important driver in in commercial life, whatever sector, and actually, the same is true for us as a church. You know, I think vision and values drive how we express what we believe faith wise, and how we use that to serve our community, how we can be a more effective local community.
So we've been doing some interesting work about that too, and what our aspirations will be over the next 5 years. We've also done a really quite interesting, creative community survey. One of the things I discovered through this was that before Christmas, in the two weeks before Christmas, we have something like 5 and a half 1000 people through the doors at All Saints, through Choral Society concerts, through other commercial concerts, through about a million, it feels like, school Christmas Carol, whatevers, you know. And so I created a very simple community-based survey, five questions on a Google form, linked that to a QR code, printed it out on a piece of paper and laminated it and stuck it to the glass in the doors of the church. And whenever I was at an event, just said, ‘Those of you with a smartphone, before you get home today, scan the QR code, take 2 minutes to do the questionnaire’. And actually, it generated some really interesting data about what people think about All Saints as a community, what they think All Saints should be giving as we engage with our community, how we might do that more effectively, how we might be more present and visible in the town, and so on and so on and so on. And so what's really interesting is we'll take that data now and actually use it to inform again, how we engage. So, yeah, data led some of it as well.
FGG: No, that's very good. And I'm thinking that that's particularly good because the people filling in the questionnaire will largely be existing customers, because they've already come through the doors, and you've still got a lot of the community yet to engage with?
SC: Well, except they're not existing customers, because these are people who wouldn't normally come to anything that we would otherwise offer.
FGG: Right.
SC: These are people are coming to the kind of one or two or three odd things over the course of the year, a school thing, a concert here, that sort of thing. So, from my point of view, these are, these people are the microcosm of our community and they are largely, not exclusively, but largely, a demographic that, actually, I would like us to see really engage much more with. In other words, people in their 30s, 40s, 50s and 60s.
FGG: Yeah, so parents, grandparents, people coming in because there's something else going on.
SC: Yes, exactly, and that's not turning All Saints into an arts venue or anything like that. But it is about saying, Okay, well, look, you know, if we were doing stuff, what would you be looking for us to do if you were going to come back to something here, what would draw you? How can we be more present, you know? Well, we do posters and sign posts and whatever, social media websites, you know, so really useful data.
FGG: Yes… absolutely. Well, I think I said to you when I came around before I had a look at your social media, rapidly had to change my idea of what a vicar is. So, … I think all of that helps, doesn't it? Because people bounce off these things and find themselves taking stock and rethinking and thinking, you know, my idea of sort of 1930s English parish is not quite right anymore, so. You were also out and about quite recently I saw on your social media, the Ash Wednesday in town, I think, at Hertford North, and also Parliament Square. So that's a different thing, I think, isn't it? So you're literally going out and catching people when they're not expecting it [laughter], in a way you were wanting to put the church in front of people as they went about their life and if they were in Hertford North, so they'll have been coming home from - what time of day was it?
SC: So I was at Hertford East and Salisbury Square, yeah. And so yeah, 7 o'clock in the morning on Ash Wednesday outside Hertford East, and then about 10ish in Salisbury Square. And, yeah, what we were doing was, was offering the ‘ashing’ that often goes on Ash Wednesday inside our church buildings, a call to re-examine the way we live our lives, not to kind of beat ourselves up, but to intentionally choose to live differently and to actually place that into the public context.
And what was really interesting was outside Hertford East for an hour, I probably ‘ashed’ seven people, six of whom, in the brief conversation I had with them, don't have a church locally that they would kind of call home. So they're connecting with something, maybe from their past, something they recognised, you know, from those, those formative years, or in the case of one person, their working life, meant that they weren't actually going to be able to attend the church they would normally get to on Ash Wednesday, so it was their opportunity to do that. And then, yes, Salisbury Square, I think 15 people over the hour, 3 of whom normally attend church somewhere else. But again, some fascinating conversations with passersby, no, no argy-bargy in technical terms, no kind of what do you think you're doing here?
But actually, you know, some, some lively and quite deep conversations, as far as you can, in a very brief chat with someone, about the importance of things in their life. And actually, that's one of the really important things I think the Church still does. You know, our local churches are holders of community story. You know, if you think about All Saints which you look out the window of my study, you can see, you know, it's been there since the late 1800s and the number of people who've been born and being welcomed into, you know, the community and life through their christening, the number of people who've then reached maturity and love and come to be married in church. And there are people who've then lived that life of love and reached its end and then had their funeral in church, you know, we hold the community story, and actually it's a really privileged place to be. And so to hear even the brief snippet of conversation with someone, you know, about where they are and how they're feeling on that Wednesday morning was an extraordinary privilege. But, yeah, I mean, I am really trying to make sure that I, and we, are outside of our building, you know. Because one of the things I have noticed is that, yes, you can see All Saints from nearly everywhere in the town, but actually, bizarrely, it also feels quite difficult to get to, you know, so one of the one of the partners we're working with, starting in the end of March, is Street Food Heroes who are coming to use our kind of hard standing in our car park once a month.
And I noticed on their social media feed, someone commenting that, you know, getting there was a strange move, they felt, to move to All Saints, because it wasn't, you know, easy to get to. So Ed, who runs Street Food Heroes, then did one of those slightly sped up videos of the journey from Salisbury Square up to All Saints. And he's like, ‘I could do this in less than three minutes’, you know. And actually, you know, when the Gascoyne Way was built, which was built with a compulsory purchase order in 1966 and two acres of the churchyard was just literally built over, and the underpass was there. You know, it's strange, you know, it is easy to get to us, and yet the Gascoyne Way is a kind of barrier, also is a bit cut off from the town that it was built originally to serve. So from my point of view, it is about really trying to be tangibly present, but not just doing stunts, you know, in Salisbury Square or whatever, but actually about trying to really engage with the institutions of our town, with the people of our town, to walk alongside the people of our town, to share in the joys and summaries of that to, as I say, try and really make sure that our town is the best version of it that it can be
FGG: Fantastic. No, you have a lot of energy and, yeah, lots of luck to you. Is there anything, Simon, that we haven't covered that you’d really like to say or talk about?
SC: Um, no, but I guess one of the things that I say to school children, whenever I spend time in school, applies to every person, you know. I know that the majority of the UK doesn't hold a position of Christian faith anymore, and that's just fine, as far as I'm concerned. But you know, whether I'm a designated member of the Church or not, you know, part of my role is to be here for the whole community, and whatever one thinks that the Church of England as the state Church, you know, we are here for everyone, people of faith and none. So what I always say to school children is, you know, if you ever see me around in town, say, ‘Hello’, you know. And I guess the same is true for actually, anyone who happens to listen to this recording, you know, I am genuinely available for everyone, and would really like to get to know as many different people in this town as I possibly can. And that's not about hoodwinking them into faith, although if they genuinely want to get down then I'm open to that, of course. But actually, you know, I love this town already, and I really love these people, you know, I'm planning on sticking around. So we'd really like to get to know as many different folk here as I can.
FGG: I’m sure that's going to be good news before you go into your next parish, which could be the parish of Europe from Paris to Russia [laughter]?
SC: I think the chances of a return to the diocese in Europe is pretty small!
FGG: Good, we'll aim to keep you here. Yes, I think that's a lot of conversations, isn't it? Different conversations.
SC: It is. And it's about taking time over it, you know. You know, I realised in this first six months that actually I'm saying yes to everything, which means opportunities and meeting people and, you know, but actually, also I've realised that, you know, I'm 52 I can't move at the pace that I did when I was 26 and by that, what I mean is, actually, I'm looking forward to taking the time to build those connections, and take the time to build those relations, and take the time to get to know folk, to take the time to provide the support that I do believe the Church still can offer.
FGG: Yeah. And I also think the benefit perhaps, of being that little bit older is you know how to bring together groups and people who may feel things would stop them coming together, that they don't have anything in common. So you've got a bit of a toolkit that comes with you, which will be to our benefit as a community.
SC: Well, let's hope so. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, whether the Church still has a platform to have those conversations anymore, discuss. But from a personal point of view, yeah, absolutely. You know that partnership thing that I've talked about before is a really important part of what I do is about. So yeah, let's hope it continues to happen here.
FGG: Fantastic. Right, thank you very much. I think we've probably covered everything and nothing precludes me coming back in seven years’ time and doing part two! Fantastic. Thank you.