Biography
Bishop Nigel's northern credentials go well beyond his last few years in Manchester. He was born and brought up in Crosby in Liverpool and was educated at Liverpool College.
Bishop Nigel loves music, and is a brass band enthusiast! During his time in Yorkshire he conducted the Brighouse and Rastrick, among others. He is married to Celia and they have two grown-up daughters, Kathleen and Lizzie, and a cross-breed rescue dog called Tessa.
Experience
The bishop is one of the most experienced bishops in the Church of England. Under his leadership, Wakefield was branded 'the missionary diocese' and Manchester is a growing diocese.
Bishop Nigel is always keen to use his undoubted skills as a communicator and broadcaster. In the House of Lords he speaks on church and media matters and he has also been a regular religious columnist for The Times. He chaired the General Synod's Religion in Broadcasting Group. How appropriate, then, that he should be Manchester's bishop when it is the centre for religious broadcasting in the UK.
Interfaith issues are close to Bishop Nigel's heart. He was deeply concerned about the civil disorder that broke out in Oldham and other northern towns in 2001. In the Manchester Diocese Bishop Nigel has made sensitive links with the area's ethnic minority groups and communities of other faiths.
The Bishop has a reputation for his ability to be a reconciler and healer. This is matched by a readiness to speak out with courage for what he believes in.
He was appointed by the Archbishops’ Council to chair a legislative drafting group to consider proposals for allowing women to be consecrated as bishops.
Biography
Bishop Nigel Simeon McCulloch.
Read theology at Selwyn College, Cambridge, and trained for the priesthood at Cuddesdon College, Oxford. He was ordained in Chester Cathedral in 1966 and served his curacy in the large urban parish of Ellesmere Port (1966-70).
Chaplain to Christ's College Cambridge (1970-1973) and Director of Studies in Theology there (1970-1975).
Diocesan Missioner in the Norwich Diocese (1973-1978).
Archdeacon of Sarum and Rector of the city-centre church of St Thomas's, in the Diocese of Salisbury (1978-1986).
Suffragan Bishop of Taunton, Diocese of Bath and Wells, 1986-1992.
Diocesan Bishop of Wakefield 1992.
Appointed Lord High Almoner to HM The Queen in 1997.
Diocesan Bishop of Manchester sine 2002.
He was appointed as honorary national chaplain to the Royal British Legion in 2002.
Appointed Chairman of The Council of Christians and Jews in 2006.
Appointed chair of the legislative drafting group to consider proposals for allowing women to be consecrated as bishops.
