Island Life Magazine Ltd October/November 2015 | Page 37

INTERVIEW

With Rev. Kevin Arkell are Donald Coggan, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Michael Turnball, and Richard Garrard
as people.
“We had a situation where the Co-op in
Ilkeston took on 60 people – which was
great news – but then six months later,
laid off 59 of them.
“When people feel rejected,
downtrodden and without purpose, I
believe it’s the job of the Church to bring
encouragement and hope.”

Ordination
Whilst in Ilkeston, he took the decision
to train for the ordained ministry, and left
there for a two-year period at theological
college in Salisbury.
After ordination, he and the family –
wife Hilda and daughters Jennifer and
Catherine – were on the move again,
when he was appointed curate of a
church in Somerset. Again it was a case
of having to make new friends and adapt
to a different kind of community.
“The older you get, the harder it
becomes to keep making new friends.
And as a minister you do learn that there
are times when people put themselves
forward to be your friend, and actually
they’re not – they’re just trying to
influence the vicar.
“At theological college you may be

“While it’s a beautiful
island and the
holidaymakers love
it, it can be a very
tough place to bring
up a family with the
challenges of finding
jobs and schools”
trained to take a service, but not about
handling and understanding people. That
just comes with time and practice.”
For his first job as a vicar it was back
north to the parish of Great Harwood
near Blackburn – so at least there, he
knew the territory.
It was in Darwen, near Blackburn, that
he recounts the experience of having had
a gun pointed at him - and on another
occasion, a knife drawn: “It was certainly
living a bit on the edge!” he says. It was
during this time that, for the protection

of his family, he thought it a good idea
to have an Alsatian. The dog might
have been a soft family pet indoors but
it remained very much a guard dog:
“People certainly knew not to mess with
the rector’s dog!”
At his next parish in Bournemouth, he
ran a fellowship for people recovering
from addictions: his churchwarden there
was a recovering alcoholic, and one of the
church servers was a former drug addict.
Street girls would often come into the
church and light a candle if ever one of
the local prostitutes died.
“You come across some very sad and
desperate people, some of whom have
perhaps taken wrong pathways – but I
have yet to find anybody who is totally
beyond hope. Wherever I go, I find people
who want to change their lives, and with
help and encouragement, they can.”

Island challenges
So how is he managing to use this
colourful and eventful background here
on the Isle of Wight?
“Every community faces its challenges,
and here on the Island, we have a lack
of work opportunities for young people,
our more able ones tend to go off to
www.goilife.co.uk

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