A message from our new vicar

Hello, my name is Linda Carter and I am the new Team Vicar in the Marden Vale Team Ministry. At the time of writing, my husband, Richard, and I have spent the last few days unpacking boxes as we completed our move to The Vicarage in Derry Hill. I hope that by the time you read this there will be some semblance of calm and order in the Carter household…

I am really looking forward to seeing you over the Christmas period and finding my way around the various communities which make up the Marden Vale Team. In the meantime, I thought I would introduce myself. I am married to Richard and we have two children. Our son Jonathan lives with his wife Lily in Skipton, and our daughter Helen lives in Bristol with her partner Joe. I began my working life in the 1980s as an insurance underwriter, in London and Manchester. During the nineties I stayed at home to bring up our children, and became involved with voluntary work at church. The first inkling that God may be calling me to some kind of ministry also began to emerge around this time. When the children were in secondary education, I worked as a teaching assistant at the local primary school, before taking on the role of Team Administrator in a rural team ministry in the Salisbury diocese. However, it soon became clear that God was calling me to ordained ministry and I began my training at STETS (The Southern Theological and Education Training Scheme), which is based at Sarum College in Salisbury. I was ordained at Salisbury Cathedral in 2014 and for the last three and a half years I have been a curate at St. John’s Church in Broadstone near Poole.

So that’s a little bit about me. As we journey through Advent, a time of reflection leading us towards the celebration of the birth of Christ, I look forward to getting to know you and exploring with you what God has in store for us.

Wishing you peace and joy in this season of Advent and Christmas.

Linda.