BISHOP Jonathan has appointed a new vicar for St Simon’s Church, Southsea – and she’s looking forward to being by the sea.

The Rev Anna Norton, who is currently vicar of Ripley and rector of Ockham with Hatchford and Downside, has been appointed, subject to DBS, and is expected to begin her new role in January.

Her experiences include living and working abroad, working as an English and Drama teacher, and volunteering with toddlers, children, families and youth. It also includes swimming in the River Thames – so she’ll look forward to taking dips in the Solent.

She said: “One of the things that excites me is that St Simon’s wants to be a safe place for everyone, and has a theology of hospitality. They run Sunday Suppers for those who are disadvantaged and a Friday Friendship group. That certainly fits in with where I stand.”

Anna grew up in a Christian family in Yorkshire. Her father was a headteacher, and the family moved to the remote island of Tristan da Cunha in the South Atlantic, where he was director of education for the school. It began her journey of being interested in different cultures around the world.

She trained as a secondary school teacher, and taught English and Drama for 20 years. She met her husband Johnny during that time. They moved to Hong Kong and worked with a Christian missionary organisation called Bethany. At the heart of that work was member care – looking after clergy, missionaries and church workers.

Anna and Johnny have two daughters, who are now aged 18 and 16, and Anna had a few years of being a full-time mum before ordination. She was involved with an Anglican church near Guildford, running a group that helped toddlers and children to praise God.

She applied for a full-time job as a children and families’ worker, and didn’t get it. But the experience helped her to realise that perhaps she was called to ordination instead.

Having gone through the discernment process with Guildford diocese, she was first ordained in 2020, at a Covid-affected service with few people present. And she worked as a curate at St Peter’s, Chertsey, before taking on her current role three years ago.

She said: "In my current role I have three traditional churches in a rural multi-parish context, and that has its joys and challenges, and has been formative. But Johnny and I both come from and have multicultural families. Johnny grew up in a vicarage in North London and we both enjoy being part of a melting pot of ethnicities and cultures and have missed that sense of diversity.

“I am very much looking forward to being a part of the community of St Simon’s and of Southsea. I feel most at home in a church which loves God, loves people and worships with authenticity, deep faith, vulnerability, hospitality, a generous welcome, joy and a sense of fun as well as having the maturity to hold and process grief, pain and suffering without turning away. 

"On a lighter note, I am also looking forward to being by the sea. As a girl, I would swim in the sea on Tristan and I currently swim in the Thames every Friday. So I hope to be swimming in the Solent in January. Watch out for me in my dry robe - I’ll be the one with the flask of Yorkshire tea!”

Bishop Jonathan expects to license Anna on January 18 at St Simon’s Church.