‘There’s sadness in the world but we can recognise and celebrate the goodness among us’
‘WE’VE NOTICED THE FRIENDLINESS AND SINCERITY HERE’: Bishop of Hull Eleanor Sanderson
Chewing the Fat - Out to lunch with Phil Ascough
This week’s guest: Bishop of Hull, Eleanor Sanderson
Sitting in the Lion & Key on the first day of December and thoughts inevitably turn to the idea of an Advent pub crawl, of sorts.
These days even the challenge of a different pub every day until Christmas would be a tad ambitious, but there was a time when – with the right companions – we could have done them in a couple of days.
Either way it wouldn’t be the walk that’d kill you. There are more than enough watering holes in the Old Town alone, an area which my guest chose because she’d heard it is blessed with good pubs. I like that in a Bishop.
Eleanor Sanderson was appointed as the new Bishop of Hull and moved to the city in September. The death of the Queen coupled with political upheaval ensured Bishop Eleanor’s arrival was more under the radar than fanfare of trumpets.
You get the idea she’s comfortable with that, finding her way largely incognito around the Archdeaconry of the East Riding with her husband Tim and their two teenage sons.
“When I came here I walked around the streets in normal clothes and I had some wonderful interactions,” she said.
“We were on Ferensway trying to find a record store and a lady came up to us and said if we were looking for a place to eat Hammonds was really good. We have all noticed the friendliness and sincerity here.”
‘I HAD AN INCREDIBLE SENSE THAT GOD WAS REAL AND SURROUNDING ME’: Bishop Eleanor
Born near Whitby and brought up in the Peak District, Bishop Eleanor has strong northern roots. Added to that is the knowledge and understanding which comes from having travelled far and wide to build communities through study and work, and from having survived a near-death experience.
“I got appendicitis on one of the islands off Fiji when I was 18 and I should have died because I needed an operation but was stranded for four days,” she said.
“They were trying to seaplane me off for treatment but a tropical storm blew up. I felt it was more likely I would die than not. I had an incredible sense that God was very real and surrounding me.”
It was a pivotal point in the life of someone who had set out to explore the world and Christianity during her gap year.
“I wasn’t brought up in the church. I had a sense of God from being very little and I was trying to figure that out,” she said.
“I wandered into churches and tried to connect, searching and wanting to understand about the sense of God and creation. I wanted to do overseas development work so I saved up and got accepted on a gap year programme before university.”
After graduating in geography at Bristol University, Bishop Eleanor secured a scholarship to do development studies and went to Wellington in New Zealand, where she began her work with the church.
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She furthered her understanding by working with other young Christians as an assistant chaplain at Wellington University. She became a priest in 2006 and assistant bishop in 2017, the first woman in the diocese to hold such a post.
The Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, was clearly an influence in the internal selection process but it would appear certain terms were laid down by the new recruit: “I said to God that these years are critical for my kids.”
Bishop Eleanor describes “a sense of being called back to England” for the job, which covers the whole of Hull and the East Riding and into North Yorkshire as far as Ravenscar.
The Archbishop has spoken of his new Bishop’s “zest for life”, the joy of her faith and her approach of keeping her feet on the ground and rolling up her sleeves. Recent history suggests she’ll find a city which looks after its bishops – she’s only the fifth in over 40 years.
Bishop Eleanor’s comments about exploring Hull’s community spirit are reminiscent of James Jones, who served in Hull from 1994 until 1998 and devoted so much time to rebuilding confidence in a city which he identified as still suffering in silence from the scars of the Second World War.
His appointment was greeted with great excitement in the business community, with one prominent figure who shall remain nameless moved to what can only be described as a bit of pulpit punditry: “He’s already being tipped for the Canterbury job you know!”
The same chap is probably saying something similar now about Jude Bellingham.
‘ZEST FOR LIFE’: What the Archbishop of York said about Bishop Eleanor
Richard Frith served as Bishop of Hull from 1998 until moving to Hereford in 2014 and his successor, Alison White, became the first woman Bishop in Hull and only the second in the Church of England when she was consecrated in 2015.
Her retirement in February this year created the vacancy now filled by Bishop Eleanor. It’s a bit early to be asking her about long-term ambitions but the response was interesting.
“I will not be a Bishop all the time until retirement. I have a bit of a joke with Justin Duckworth, the Bishop of Wellington, about when we will both be able to run a café or a pub connected with a community in a very small place, but I’ve learnt to know the difference between my plans and God’s plans.”
One of the first lessons you learn as a young journalist is the value of pubs and priests in helping you to connect with communities.
As a young reporter covering the Thorne area for the Doncaster Gazette I found the vicar of St Nicholas’ to be a source of cracking stories. He introduced me to the canal-side factory which made drums for a few of the late 70s ska bands and sticks for such luminaries as John Bonham.
He also gave me the best quote ever from a clergyman: “You know that story about the parishioner having a kidney transplant? The Daily Mirror rang up. I told them to go to hell.”
When the Japanese industrial giant Sumitomo bought a big chunk of Fenner’s operations in the mid-90s and moved production from Marfleet to South Wales, I decided to take a trip to the new site, testing the validity of the suggestion that Hull workers could relocate and keep their jobs.
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After more than seven hours of trains and buses, changing at Sheffield, Birmingham, Cardiff and Pontypridd, I set about exploring an area called Long Street in the Rhondda Valley. The pub was closed but there was the sound of singing from a few streets away, and I followed it to find a sizable congregation spending their Friday afternoon in the church hall because there wasn’t much else to do. The area had struggled since the pit closed but the local people still didn’t like the idea of taking work from the people of Hull. They felt as though they were stealing jobs.
Bishop Eleanor spoke about the role of the church in supporting communities, especially in difficult times, and about conditions in Hull compared with a remote Pacific island.
“My first activities in Hull were part of two poverty round tables and that felt really important,” said Bishop Eleanor.
“Relative poverty is really dangerous to health and wellbeing and there are places here when the gap in equality is very dangerous. I would never underestimate the impact of that. Our society is very hard to live in if you haven’t got a lot of money.
“In a subsistence economy it’s different – you are living off the land, there’s no social welfare but there’s a strong fabric to society. In the UK, the social welfare net is so stretched and the fabric of society isn’t as strong as we would like.
“But my experience of the church in Africa and the Pacific is that they are the biggest provider of social development and support. It’s not unlikely to think that the church can be that hub of community and social enterprise.
“In Hull it feels like the local community is really important. I was so impressed on arriving here to find the amount of community work and charities is phenomenal. Seeing so many different charities of all sorts of flavours all working for the good of other people. I don’t know you would find that in every country in the world.”
Pubs are a big part of that and the Lion & Key is an Old Town favourite, popular for the quality and range of its food and drink and for a décor which makes the most of beer mats, posters, wood panelling and pews which are perfect for a Bishop.
RESERVED: The table where the England squad could sit
The place was almost empty when I arrived. The Christmas lights were twinkling in the windows, it was day one of the festive menu but the landlord hadn’t gone over the top. Isn’t this one of the pubs that has banned garish jumpers in the past?
The place filled up quickly, mainly with groups of three or four women. Friends, colleagues, shoppers, whatever. Most of them eating one or other of the varieties of the pub’s acclaimed fish and chips.
We chose the festive special of chicken, homemade sausage meat and chestnut stuffing, and cranberry sauce squeezed into a ciabatta with a side of pigs in blankets. Also a bowl of chips, washed down with a tonic water and a half of World Cup Winner from the Heritage Brewing Co.
Total price just under £33. Food fine and the beer decent enough but with a questionable selection of national football badges on the pump clip. Italy? Not at this World Cup!
Our choice of venue is significant for its proximity to Wilberforce House, with the slave trade abolitionist an inspiration to Bishop Eleanor, and its location at a junction which Old Town tour guide Paul Schofield calls “Pub Central” and which is on the list of places to investigate fully as the Sanderson family settle into their new surroundings.
Bishop Eleanor is looking forward to being close to her parents and sister at Christmas for the first time in 20 years. But Tim and the boys have never lived anywhere other than New Zealand. It’s a combination which triggers distressing memories.
“The pandemic when New Zealand closed its borders for a very, very long time,” Bishop Eleanor recalled.
“It was quite scary in those early days not knowing if I would see my parents again. It was really hard. A number of the clergy in Wellington lost family members overseas and that was part of wanting to be here. We are missing people terribly. Your heart is always in two places.”
We put down a marker for some sort of Advent pub trail in 2023 and then cut to the all-important Christmas message, because every bishop, everywhere in the world, has to have one of those.
“There is enough that is hard and sad in the world and it’s for everybody to recognise and celebrate the goodness that’s amongst us. Peace, joy, hope and love are the Advent messages and I don’t think you can get enough of that. Choosing to be them, and to receive them and to go and find them. After all, it was the people who were most hungry for those things that recognised and embraced Jesus.”