The Reverend Dr James Hawkey

The Canon Theologian & Almoner

The Reverend Dr James Hawkey is Canon Theologian of Westminster Abbey, a Chaplain to Her Majesty The Queen, and Chair of the Westminster Abbey Institute. He is also a Bye-Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge, and a visiting lecturer at King’s College, London. Born and educated in Sussex, he read theology at Cambridge, before proceeding to the MPhil and PhD degrees as a Gosden Scholar of Selwyn College.

Ordained deacon in 2007, and priest in 2008, much of his current teaching and research is in ecclesiology and ecumenical theology. He trained for the priesthood at Westcott House, spent a semester at the Angelicum University in Rome, and served his curacy in inner-city Portsmouth, at St Mary's Portsea.

He was appointed Minor Canon and Sacrist of Westminster Abbey in 2010, becoming Precentor in December 2013. In 2015, he was appointed Dean and Director of Studies in Theology at Clare College, Cambridge, where he taught both undergraduates and postgraduates for the Cambridge Divinity Faculty and Theological Federation. Alongside work in Cambridge, he became assistant Director of Ordinands for the Diocese of Ely in 2016.

Dr Hawkey is currently a member of the International Reformed/Anglican Dialogue, and of the Malines Conversations Group. His commentary on the latest agreed statement of the Anglican/Roman Catholic International Commission was published by SPCK in 2018, and current projects include further writing on ecclesiology and ecumenism. Dr Hawkey is a trustee of the Cambridge Institute for Religion and International Studies, a Governor of the Anglican Centre in Rome, an advisor to the Center for Empathy in International Affairs, a member of the Church of England's Estates Theology Group, and of the Editorial Advisory Board for the International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church.