A day in the life of a...vicar, Father James Gilder

“In my heart I’ve probably always felt like church is my home”

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Father James Gilder is 39 years old and was recently married. He was installed as Rector of Wanstead in 2022. Although fairly new to his appointment, Father James has already seen improvements in his appointed church. Father James always felt an affinity with the church from a young age, and eventually “gave in” to that inner prompting. However, he initially qualified and worked as both a solicitor, and then a primary school teacher, before doing his ordination training. Bringing his varied experience to the role, Father James is as comfortable with the people focused aspects of the job, as he is to the managerial and leadership aspects.

Read on to learn more about Father James Gilder!

When I was at school I wanted to be an architect. I’m still quite interested in buildings and housing and interiors, but I never went into that profession. I was quite an academic person and I did well at school. I went to Cambridge and studied Philosophy, and then I changed to do a law degree. I qualified as a solicitor and I got a job. So I spent 3 or 4 years first as a trainee solicitor, qualified, and I did quite a lot of criminal defence work. That was tiring work but also quite fascinating. 

After that I made a career change. I did a PGCE and I became a primary school teacher, and I taught for 6 years. That was the most challenging job I’ve had in lots of ways. But I think it gave me a lot of skills, and in a funny kind of way it really built up my confidence in dealing with people. I then changed careers again - hopefully for the last time in my life! In 2016 I gave up my teaching and I went back to University to train to be a vicar. I then became what’s known as a curate in 2019, which is like a trainee. I eventually became a vicar in 2022. 

Father James Gilder

I live in the Rectory in Wanstead, which is right next to one of the churches. Where I live is a mixed blessing. Wanstead is a really nice place to live and somewhere I wouldn’t be able to afford to live if I wasn't the Rector. So that’s a privilege. But the downside is it doesn’t feel like it’s yours. It feels public and that you’re duty bound to open the door to pretty much anyone. I do enjoy the public side to being the vicar but it can also be a bit of a challenge. 

I get one day off a week but in a way it is quite a struggle to switch off. Often if someone has a problem then the day they want to talk to you is your day off. So that can be a bit of an issue because I also need to carve out time for my own spiritual growth and sustenance amongst all the other responsibilities of my role. I try to always have a spiritual book on the go, and that helps. Saying the daily office of morning prayer and evening prayer is also good because it just grounds you.

“For me, I don’t think my sense of vocation was a bolt from the blue. 

I think it was basically a kind of giving in to the 

feeling of love for the church that had always been there, 

and realising that God was telling me this ages ago”

It’s easier to describe a typical week than a typical day, because days can be quite different. I’m not a good morning person, so that’s one of the great things about living next to the church. I generally try to make sure that nothing starts before 9am in the parish. We normally do morning prayer at 9am whatever the weather in the church. I’ll have a quick chat with my parish manager here. Unless we’ve got something on immediately in church I try to then deal with correspondence as soon as I can back at the Rectory. 

In terms of other duties, we might have a morning service. I might go to the school, because we’ve got a church school here. Pastoral visiting is a really important part of the job of being a vicar. Talking to people who want to be christened or married, and obviously carrying out those services. We run classes for people wanting to get further on in their faith or whatever. We help with a homeless shelter. We run a food bank. We have a mental health support group. We have teas for older people. 

Father James outside the Rectory

We’re responsible for 2 listed buildings. Both our churches are listed, and they take a huge amount of maintenance and upkeep. So a lot of what I do involves just phoning contractors, getting repairs done and so on. But there’s also taking services and preaching, preparing my sermons. I often have meetings in the evening because a lot of people are at work during the day so that’s when they can meet. So sometimes there’s a flurry of work in the morning, and a lull in the afternoon, and then work in the evening. It’s a bit like working a split shift really. 

In terms of a success in my role, I think I’ve built a good team around me of clergy and lay people who are positive and forward thinking. I think one of the things I’m good at is working out what people enjoy doing and what they’re good at doing, and letting them do it. That is kind of the key to having a flourishing organisation, particularly when you may be dealing with volunteers as well as paid staff. Unless people are celebrated for doing what they are good at, they’re not likely to push themselves I think. 

Christ Church, Wanstead

A challenge in my role is that I think we operate as a church in a world that is largely secular and largely is not that interested in what we do. Yet I have hope because often when I talk to people of whatever age, the yearning for faith and for an exploration of what it is to have human flourishing, and an openness to the idea that God exists - is out there. And if Christianity doesn’t have something to say about all that to those people, then what are we? Because that is what Christianity is all about.

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