New Inter-Faith Adviser

Canon Bill will advise Bishop Nicholas on his work with other religions and work with him and ministry teams across our Diocese help to promote good relations between Christians and other faiths here in Dorset and Wiltshire.

He will also be charged with encouraging Christians in our Diocese to learn more about the teaching and practice of other religions.

Bishop Nicholas welcomed Canon Bill to the role:

"The Church is local and global. We live in a world of faiths in which terrorism and evil seeks to divide us. To know our neighbours and make friends with people of the other faiths is a priority for Christians. I am grateful to Canon Bill Cave for being my Adviser on Inter-Religious Affairs. He will be a great asset to the diocese as a whole."

Our Diocese has relatively small communities belonging to faiths other than Christianity, although there is a well-established Jewish community in the Greater Bournemouth-Poole area, and small communities of Muslims in several of the larger towns, most notably in Trowbridge, Poole, and Salisbury.

There are also individuals belonging to all major world faiths scattered across the Diocese, and among New Religious Movements, the neopagan movement is larger in Wiltshire than almost anywhere else in the country.

Ordained in 1979, Canon Bill’s ministry has been spent working with people, now friends, of other Christian and faith traditions. He spent 12 years at the Inter-Faith Chaplaincy Centre at Lancaster University, and directing students in their understanding of conflicts in Northern Ireland and the Middle East.

He came to this diocese in 1997 as Chaplain of the Prison Ship, before becoming Chaplain of the Verne. Since leaving prison in 2017, he has been Chaplain to Wiltshire Police. Canon Bill takes over in the role from Canon Guy Wilkinson.

Bishop Nicholas regularly writes to leaders of other religions in the Diocese around major festivals, to extend good wishes and recognise their contribution to the common good.

Please feel free to email Canon Bill at interfaith@salisbury.anglican.org.