THE Church of England has become the latest destination for downshifting professionals in search of a quieter, more vocational lifestyle.

According to new figures released by the church, there were 578 recruits to the priesthood last year, the highest number since 1980. However, while the number of new priests over 40 increased nearly five-fold between 1980 and 2005, the number below 30 has declined by two-thirds.

Highly paid bankers, management consultants and at least one former pop star have been at the forefront of the boom, often trading in six-figure salaries for the £20,000 average stipend of a priest.

While the church is welcoming the new vicars, critics are worried that the trend will hasten the “greying” of the church.

The new recruits include Richard Coles, 44, curate at St Boltoph’s church in Boston, Lincolnshire, and former keyboard player with the Communards, the 1980s pop band. The band’s hits included Don’t Leave Me This Way, the biggest selling single of 1986.

Coles said he had initially found the change in lifestyle difficult to cope with. “It was bananas. I had just turned 40, I had a good living and then suddenly I threw myself into theological college, an environment where I was wearing a cassock and sleeping with people in the same room,” he said.

“It was a cultural shock and very odd to begin with. Nobody joins the church because of the pay and conditions or because it is an attractive career package, you do it because you are conscious of a vocation to it.”

Coles, despite his pop past, prefers traditional music in church although he did recently dress up as Frank-N-Furter from The Rocky Horror Picture Show to perform in front of 150 people at his church hall. He also conducted an atheist funeral for his friend Mo Mowlam, the former Northern Ireland secretary, last September.

It is becoming more common for people to switch careers in middle age. A report by Datamonitor, a consultancy, forecast that the number of “downshifters” would rise to 3.4m by next year, a doubling since 1997. In recent years teaching has benefited from the trend.

Other recruits to the priesthood include Lesley Hay, 55, deacon of Shrivenham and Ashbury near Swindon, Wiltshire. She gave up a £100,000-a-year career in management consultancy after the 9/11 terrorist attacks for a job that often involves “picking up trash in the churchyard”.

“On September 11, 2001 I went to someone and said, this is what I have been called to do. The events on that day intensified my feelings,” she said. “I already had everything I wanted materially when I was in my forties. I had a lot of money and I wanted to put myself through the rigours of training to be a priest to draw a line under a very comfortable lifestyle.”

Simon Chambers, 41, priest-in-charge of Ashwell, near Baldock, Hertfordshire, a former director in an electronics firm, also left behind an affluent lifestyle to follow his vocation. “I moved from an idyllic place in the country to a semi-detached in Poole, Dorset, which is very built up,” he said. “I lost some of my life choices.”

According to the figures released by the Church of England, out of the 578 new priests last year, 369 were aged over 40, including 35 over 60. This represents a sharp rise since 1980, when there were just 79 new priests over 40 and none was aged over 60.

The number of recruits in their twenties, by contrast, has plummeted. In 1980 there were 278 aged under 30, but this fell to just 86 last year.

The church’s congregation is also ageing. According to one Anglican forecast, for every 100 children attending church in 1930, there will be just four in 2030.

Tim Thornton, Bishop of Sherborne, said: “We need to get our act together and suggest that young people might think about the church as their first career, not their second or third. It would be nice to see an increase in younger vocations. The average age for someone entering the priesthood now is well in the forties. It fits with the age profile of the church- going congregation.”

Christopher Lowson, director of ministry for the Archbishops’ Council and head of the church’s policy on ordination, said that a working party had been set up to “target those in their twenties and thirties who may sense a vocation but need encouragement”.

He added: “Clearly the age profile of those recommended for ordination has shifted, but this is not bad news for the Church of England. We celebrate the experience, maturity and distinctive gifts that older candidates offer.”

Explore UK News

• Crime News

• Education News

• Health News

• Scotland News

Times Recommends

• Alex Rider exclusive: Incident in Nice
• Green & confused: do energy-saving bulbs work?
• Let’s skip lunch, say the hungry generation