University College Plymouth St Mark & St John

Joy Carroll 

oy Carroll grew up in the inner-city ofSouth London,England, where her father was a priest.  In 1978, she spent a year working inHaitiwith a relief and rehabilitation mission, before returning home to train to be a teacher.  After qualifying with a Bachelor of Education, she taught for three years before following a call to train for the ministry in the Anglican Church of England.    Joy was one of the first women to be ordained as a priest inEnglandin 1994 and as the youngest elected clergy member of the General Synod was able to speak on behalf of women and others marginalized by church and society.  Her ministry in inner-city parishes embraced the needs of the poor, the homeless, the mentally ill, families and the elderly.

Joy is a gifted preacher and communicator. In 1995, the BBC Everyman series made a documentary to mark the first anniversary of the ordination of women to the priesthood.  They profiled Joy’s work in inner-cityLondonand highlighted the new dimensions that women priests are bringing into the church.  Joy was also the advisor to British writer Richard Curtis, as well as the inspiration and role model for his hit situation comedy series “The Vicar of Dibley,” starring Dawn French

n October, 1997, Joy married Jim Wallis. In 1998 their first son, Luke, was born and in 2003, Jack was born.  She lives inWashington,DCwhere she is licensed as a Priest in the Episcopal Church. These days she runs the school PTA and is a Little League Baseball Commissioner! If it ‘takes a village’ to raise a child, she is the village priest.  She has written a book about her life and work as a priest in the Church of England: ‘Beneath the Cassock. The Real life Vicar of Dibley,’ published in 2002 by HarperCollins,UK. Also released in 2004 by Crossroads Publishing, the American edition is entitled ‘The Woman Behind the Collar’ and has a foreword from the Archbishop of Canterbury.