Rector

Meet Our Rector

I came to St Mary's as Rector in February 2025. I am Sicilian, and I live at the Rectory on Hadley Common with my civil partner Felix.

A good deal of parish life happens through our front door. The English conversation group meets here on Thursday mornings and the parent and toddler group in the afternoon, and there is usually a drama rehearsal going on somewhere in the house on a Sunday. Do ask if you would like to come to any of them.

The drawings on our orders of service are mine. If you have been to a service here, you have held one. There are more of them at francescoaresco.com.

This is a busier church than its size suggests. There is a choir and a fine organ, bells on a Sunday, study groups, concerts, a barn dance in the autumn and a summer fayre that takes over the churchyard. There is almost certainly something here you would enjoy, and nobody will ask you to believe anything before you come.

I read Classics at Bologna and I am finishing a doctorate on Renaissance spirituality. I also serve as Dean of Growing Younger for the Edmonton Area, which means helping churches across this part of London think about children, young people and families.

The thing I would most like you to know is that you do not need a reason to get in touch, and you do not need to be a churchgoer. People write to me about christenings and weddings and funerals, and also about things they cannot easily say to anyone else, and about whether any of this is true. All of it is welcome.

rector@monkenhadley.church

020 3672 5563

To meet some of the other leaders of our church community and get in touch, please visit our "Who's Who" page.