Announcement of Second Harwich Rural Missioner

Announcement to be read at services on

Sunday 9 July 2023

From Bishop Roger and Archdeacon Ruth

We are pleased to be able to formally announce the good news that, subject to appropriate DBS clearance, The Revd John Saxon has been appointed as Rural Missioner to the Harwich Deanery and will be licensed to the parishes of Dedham, Ardleigh, The Bromleys, Little Bentley, Great Oakley, Tendring, Wix, Beaumont-cum-Moze and Wrabness, joining Revd Phillip Young, who was appointed as Rural Missioner last year.

John is currently Team Vicar in the Saffron Walden and Villages Team Ministry in this diocese.

John and his wife Dawn hope to move in the early autumn and it is likely that the Bishop will license John to his new responsibilities in early October.

John says: “It is exciting to feel called to start a new chapter in ministry.  This was unexpected but seems to be a call to continue to help lead a collaborative approach to ministry: a journey that we have already begun in the Saffron Walden Team.  Dawn and I will be sorry to leave friends and colleagues in the Walden area, not least Debden and Wimbish, but are assured there will be a warm welcome from the Harwich Deanery.  We look forward to discerning with all of you what the shape of this collaborative and pioneering ministry will look like and working across the 9 churches to see the fruit of God’s kingdom grow in and through us all.”

We look forward to welcoming John and ask for your prayers for him and Dawn as they prepare to move and as he prepares to take up his new ministry.  We also pray for John’s parishes in the Saffron Walden and Villages Team as they prepare to say goodbye to them.

John is the second of two Rural Missioners to be appointed to 9 rural parishes in the Harwich Deanery; he and the Revd Phillip Young, appointed last year, will share in pioneering leadership together and help shape a new approach to rural ministry in this part of northeast Essex.

Thank you.