Meet the Characters
Meet the people who keep St Faithful’s going — and occasionally bring it to a standstill. Here are some of the familiar faces from our fictional parish of Havnot.
New to Havnot? Start with Tim and Sandy, then meet the people who make their working lives so interesting.
Clergy & churchwardens
Shepherding the parish, with varying degrees of success.
Revd Dr Timothy (Tim) Keen
Rector
Trying to shepherd a parish full of strong opinions, Tim brings dry humour, patient faith and the occasional look of a man whose sandwich has been interrupted.
Revd Sandy Lintel
Curate
Thoughtful and quick to see the funny side, Sandy has a gift for asking the gentle question that makes everyone pause.
The Hon. Peregrine (Perry) Wainwright
Churchwarden
Perry brings tradition, constitutional knowledge and a burgundy Rolls-Royce to parish life. A simple question may receive a surprisingly extensive answer.
Sally Tiredwell
Churchwarden
Sally takes her responsibilities to heart and responds promptly to a crisis, sometimes before the precise nature of the crisis has become clear.
Readers
Licensed Lay Ministers: thoughtful faith, practical wisdom and the occasional blowtorch.
Leslie Griffin
Reader / Licensed Lay Minister
Leslie is thoughtful, steady, and dangerously competent with a thurible. His sermons have a habit of sounding gentle until you realise he has just turned your assumptions inside out. He is also the only person who can say, “Let us pray,” and make you actually want to.
Mary Adebayo
Reader / Licensed Lay Minister
Mary combines deep reverence with fearless public witness. Whether imposing ashes in the rain or challenging injustice with a raised eyebrow, she brings grace into the street as well as the sanctuary. She also owns a kitchen blowtorch, which is never not impressive.
People who actually work for a living
The people who keep the doors open, the music going and the paperwork approximately under control.
Mrs Judith M. Crowther
Parish Administrator
Judith runs the parish with a keyboard, a clipboard, and an expression that suggests she has already anticipated your mistake. She prefers clarity, correct spelling, and prompt form-filling. Without Judith, nothing would happen; with Judith, everything happens – on time. (Though her spelling is not as good as she thinks it is!)
Mr Alan “Dobbs” Dobbs
Verger
Dobbs is guardian of the sacred space and long-suffering adversary of squirrels, draughts, and experimental liturgy. He knows every switch, hinge, and slightly temperamental radiator in the building. He also believes intercessions should be shorter, and is not afraid to say so.
Sybil Ratchet
Charity Shop Manager
Sybil rules the parish charity shop with formidable discernment. She can spot designer labels at twenty paces and moral ambiguity at ten. Behind the sharp wit lies a fierce commitment to dignity for those who give and those who receive.
Mr Lionel P. Hargreaves D.Mus
Organist
Lionel considers himself the last defence against musical decline. He believes in proper hymnody, correct tempo, and choirs that breathe as one. When he plays, rafters and children tremble and heaven occasionally seems very near. He insists on “Mr” because he can’t do C.P.R.
Mr Horace “Horse” Palmer
Very Odd Job Man
Horse is philosopher, handyman, and pub theologian. He fixes what is broken (eventually) and asks the sort of questions that make clergy shift in their seats. If you want common sense wrapped in British-Asian understatement, Horse is your man.
Mandy Collinson
Yoof Worker
Mandy operates in that sacred and unpredictable territory known as “the yoof”. Armed with snacks, patience, and an instinctive understanding of memes Tim has never heard of, she translates faith into a language that includes hoodies and questions. She believes young people are not the church of tomorrow but the glorious, noisy church of now.
June Mosse
Little Sheep Team Leader
June presides weekly over “Little Sheep”, where toddlers, babies and their long-suffering grown-ups transform the Nave into a landscape of singing, glue sticks, and existential crumbs. She radiates calm in the midst of holy mayhem and knows every child by name. Alan Dobbs regards Thursdays as liturgical endurance training; June calls it mission.
Team leaders & key volunteers
Standards, spreadsheets, bells and biscuits: the parish would be lost without them.
Mrs Pauline Rivers
Head Server
Mrs Rivers upholds standards. Standards of posture, footwear, candle alignment, and general decency before Almighty God. If the sanctuary gleams and the processions move with holy dignity, you may be certain Pauline has been watching.
Maureen Clapperton
Tower Captain
Maureen commands the bells with military precision and pastoral concern for both rope and ringer. She can detect a mistimed pull from three storeys down and will correct it with kindness and steel. When the tower rings out across the town, that is Maureen’s quiet triumph.
Malcolm Bowyer
Honorary Treasurer
Malcolm speaks fluent spreadsheet and regards a balanced budget as a minor miracle of loaves and fishes. He can say the words “restricted funds” in a way that silences even Perry. Calm, forensic, and faintly haunted by Parish Share, Malcolm is the financial conscience of St Faithful’s.
George “Old George” Wilson
Church Clock Keeper
Old George winds the ancient church clock with the solemnity of a man keeping time itself alive. He remembers rectors past, sermons longer than Lent, and the winter of ’63. When George speaks about faithfulness, it carries the quiet authority of someone who has quite literally kept things ticking.
Margaret Basington-Smyth
Coffee Team Leader
Margaret believes civilisation rests on decent coffee served at the correct temperature in proper mugs. She commands the post-Eucharistic milling with serene efficiency and a tray that never wobbles. If you have felt welcomed at St Faithful’s, chances are Margaret handed you a biscuit.
Audrey Black
Deanery Synod Member & Prolific Baker
Audrey attends Deanery Synod with a notebook, a keen eye, and occasionally a simmering sense of injustice. She can quote diocesan policy and produce a Victoria sponge of structural integrity. Her baking has soothed many a theological disagreement.
Mildred Reeks
Deanery Synod Member & Crocheter
Mildred crochets with intensity. Muppets, angels, possibly apocalyptic beasts – all emerge from her bag in various stages of yarn-based manifestation. She speaks at Synod in the tone of someone invoking Magna Carta, and her creations have been known to stare meaningfully from the back pew.
And finally…
The author makes an appearance.
Canon Tom Kennar
Mentor
A friend to everyone (whether they asked for one or not), Tom drifts about the parish dispensing the occasional nugget of wisdom, deputising for Lionel on the organ, and—purely in a supportive capacity, of course—contributing the odd reflective piece to the St Faithful’s Facebook page. He insists he is “just here to encourage the others,” bravely content to let the real stars shine.