Stephen grew up in multi-cultural South London, where some of his family still live.  He attended a Church of England grammar school next to the Oval cricket ground, providing free views of test matches.  He was the first member of his family to attend university, where he read Modern History.  He trained as a teacher and taught at Glenalmond College, an Anglican public school in Scotland.  He taught History and English and tutored the Oxbridge Sixth.  He coached the school basketball team, with the obvious advantage of his height at nearly six and a half feet.  He also coached remedial rugby and organised the community service programme of the school.

Stephen’s late father was a novice for a time with the Comboni Missionaries, a Catholic order founded to share the Gospel in Africa.  Stephen is in touch with one of his father’s teachers who is still an active missionary brother in Uganda in his eighties. 

Stephen was brought up nominally as an Anglican, but attended Methodist Sunday School and was formed significantly by the prayers taught him by his Catholic grandmother as well as by good influences at school.  His own experience makes him a keen supporter of church schools as centres of mission as well as of educational excellence.  Stephen made his public commitment to Christ early in his time at Oxford and it was there that discernment about vocation to ordination took place.  He was selected for training while he was still an undergraduate.  After his time as a teacher, he was formed for the priesthood at Westcott House in Cambridge, where he also read Theology. Archbishop Rowan was one of his teachers.

Stephen is a trustee and past Chairman of Affirming Catholicism and a member of the Society of Catholic Priests, a society to support the ministry of women and men in the priesthood. He has had a passionate interest in mental health since he did a placement as a student on an acute admissions ward in a mental hospital.  He has also been the carer of a close family member who suffered mental illness.  He is the chair of the trustees of Mental Health Matters, a national mental health charity and provider of services to people with mental health needs.

Stephen is close to his family, including an uncle who is a Roman Catholic priest in the Archdiocese of Southwark.  He is a keen walker.  He enjoys rugby and cricket as a spectator, enjoys the cinema and is interested in the connection between faith and film.  He reads theology and history at any time and thrillers late at night.  He enjoys cooking and inflicting the results on others.

 Good Friday Addresses 2010, Salisbury