Our Minister
Rev James (Jamie ) Griggs BD (Hons), MTh ALCM. was born in Haddington, and spent much of his early life in Humbie. Educated in Edinburgh, on leaving school he ran his family business for three years, before studying music, first at Napier and then at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, in London, where he trained as a singer.
In 1990, he returned to Edinburgh to study Divinity at New College, graduating with Honours in Ecclesiastical History in 1994, and spending the third year of his degree studying in Tubingen University in Germany. Having established that the A68 and A1 provided a suitably swift route north south, therefore ensuring regular recuperative visits to Humbie and other places Scottish, he returned to London to train as a teacher of Religious Studies with Supportive Education at the then West London institute, now Brunel University College,, graduating in 1995. His teaching career took him from Richmond to Guildford, before he was appointed Head of Religious Studies at The Judd School in Tonbridge in 1998. In 2005 he was appointed to be an Assistant Headteacher and Director of Sixth Form, with 320 16-18 year olds to care for, who were, as he often observed, extremely good at it! (Being teenagers, that is!) During these years, he continued to give recitals, teach singing and was Director of the Senior Chamber Choir – and to attempt to reduce the Tonbridge to Scotland commuting time…
In 2007, Jamie returned to Edinburgh and undertook a research Masters Degree in Theology, with his thesis focusing on hymnody in the Church of Scotland. In 2008, he began his training to become a Minister of Word and Sacrament in the Church of Scotland. He was Ordained in August 2011, and served as minister in a rural charge, before being called to St Anne’s, Corstorphine, and inducted on May 14th 2013.
In 1990, he returned to Edinburgh to study Divinity at New College, graduating with Honours in Ecclesiastical History in 1994, and spending the third year of his degree studying in Tubingen University in Germany. Having established that the A68 and A1 provided a suitably swift route north south, therefore ensuring regular recuperative visits to Humbie and other places Scottish, he returned to London to train as a teacher of Religious Studies with Supportive Education at the then West London institute, now Brunel University College,, graduating in 1995. His teaching career took him from Richmond to Guildford, before he was appointed Head of Religious Studies at The Judd School in Tonbridge in 1998. In 2005 he was appointed to be an Assistant Headteacher and Director of Sixth Form, with 320 16-18 year olds to care for, who were, as he often observed, extremely good at it! (Being teenagers, that is!) During these years, he continued to give recitals, teach singing and was Director of the Senior Chamber Choir – and to attempt to reduce the Tonbridge to Scotland commuting time…
In 2007, Jamie returned to Edinburgh and undertook a research Masters Degree in Theology, with his thesis focusing on hymnody in the Church of Scotland. In 2008, he began his training to become a Minister of Word and Sacrament in the Church of Scotland. He was Ordained in August 2011, and served as minister in a rural charge, before being called to St Anne’s, Corstorphine, and inducted on May 14th 2013.
