Philatelist minister set to make his stamp on new Angus congregation

Newtyle Church held a joint service of union, ordination and introduction as the Kirk looks forward to the future in rural Angus.

As well as marking the creation of Strathmore Parish Church following the union of Ardler, Kettins and Meigle, Eassie, and Newtyle and Glamis churches, with Rev Carleen Robertson, previously minister of Eassie, Nevay and Newtyle introduced as the minister of the new congregation, the service also celebrated the ordination and introduction of Rev Tim Podger as an Ordained Local Minister (OLM).

Mr Podger will be attached to the new charge and is the first of three new OLMs who will be ordained into the Presbytery of Perth over the next few months.

Having completed his probationary period at Newtyle, Mr Podger will be staying on to support Ms Robertson in her expanded charge.

"Although I was officially Newtyle, because Carleen had been the interim moderator at Glamis, on a Sunday morning we would do a service at Newtyle and then Glamis," he explained.

"I covered pastoral work across the two parishes with an extension of that on occasions into the third parish as well. Obviously, people thought I'd done a good enough job that they wanted me back."

In becoming an OLM, Mr Podger is fulfilling the prediction of a former school chaplain that he would become a member of the clergy, although that teacher had priesthood in the Church of England in mind at the time. Mr Podger did consider training to become a non-stipendiary minister, the Anglican Church's equivalent of OLM, but about to be married and start a new job, the timing was not right.

Instead, he continued on a career in the chemical and oil and gas industry which took him around the world with postings in Germany, Italy, Belgium, the USA and shorter stays in Singapore and elsewhere, as well as the UK.

However, when he and his wife Lynn moved to Scotland in 2006, they made a commitment to putting down roots and not to move further until their two sons had completed school.

That led to their becoming involved with the Church of Scotland, with Mr Podger becoming treasurer and then later an elder at his local church.

A sense of call

Then, when after he was made redundant from his job and opted to take early retirement, a passage from Luke about service he read at Bible study started him thinking about ministry once again, especially as it was quickly followed by an email from the Church of Scotland for anyone interested to attend one of its online discernment webinars while in-person events were placed on hold as a result of Covid.

"I felt a sense of call from that passage and three days later I was given something to do about it," Mr Podger said.

Although just missing out on the age deadline to be a minister of Word and Sacrament, he began studying to be an OLM, which is an unpaid and part-time ministry role.

He graduated from the University of the Highlands and Islands' Highland Theological College last summer, before going to his probationary period at Newtyle.

This has meant less time for travelling or Mr Podger's interest in philately, the study and collection of stamps – he is a Fellow of the Royal Philatelic Society in London, and has written a book and articles on the subject, as well as winning international awards after an exhibition on his main interest, the revenue stamps of the Straits Settlements and Singapore.

"I only collect stamps from Singapore, which was part of the Straits Settlements with Penang and Malacca, and then became a Crown Colony and finally a republic," he said.

"My father is also a philatelist as is my brother. My father collects Cyprus and he got my brother collecting the stamps of the Cayman Islands, but my grandfather was based in Singapore before the war, so there is a family connection.

"I was very fortunate because I spent a lot of time in Singapore and I was able to go into the library, which opened at 10am and closed at 10pm at weekends, and I would go into their research area and look at the old archival material to help write my articles."

Although his parents, brother and younger son were unable to attend the service, Mr and Mrs Podger were joined by their eldest son, daughter-in-law and granddaughter as well as members of his home congregation and the churches where he carried out his probation and other placements, and other friends and colleagues, including members of the Perth Presbytery OLM network.

The Rev Karen Fenwick preached the sermon and Perth presbytery's Moderator, Rev Alan Reid, conducted the rest of the service to mark an exciting new beginning for Strathmore Parish Church.

Mr Podger is now looking forward to continuing his work in the new joint parish. This looks beyond simply church-based activities and includes a popular Thursday morning coffee club, which non-church goers have also begun attending.

"One of the issues we recognise in the rural parishes is isolation. It's a small step, but if you look at numbers across the whole parish, according to the last census there are just 3,849 people living here so it is a very rural area," he added.

"One of my tasks will be getting members to focus on that missional aspect and see what we can do to support people."