Sally Nash’s passion is to see people flourish, live out their vocation and fulfil their potential through education, training and support. Her first experience of ministry was helping to lead a holiday club for children on British Army bases in Germany. Having qualified as a schoolteacher and worked with young people with educational and behavioural issues, she felt God calling her into a ministry with Youth for Christ, initially as a volunteer youth worker and then supporting others in training.
In 1998, she became involved in theological education and was the founding Director of the Midlands Centre for Youth Ministry based at St John’s College Nottingham. She has two practical theology doctorates, one focusing on long term urban youth work, the other on shame in the church. She also has an MA in Education and is a qualified Higher Education Teacher. She has written and published extensively on ministry, including books and journal articles on topics ranging from collaborative and reflective ministry to youth ministry, paediatric chaplaincy, spirituality and shame.
Sally was licensed as a lay minister in Birmingham Cathedral in 1996 and subsequently felt called to ordination and in 2012 she was ordained deacon, 2013 priest. She served her curacy in an outer estate church in Birmingham having spent the previous 15 years worshipping and leading in inner city or outer estate contexts. She is also involved in ministry in the Diocese of Truro.
She established Sally Nash Learning and Research in 2020 which includes her work as Senior Research Fellow at St Pardarn’s Institute Cardiff, Co-Director of the Centre for Paediatric Spiritual Care at Birmingham Women’s and Children’s Hospital, a Ridley Associate, doctoral supervisor with the Cambridge Federation/Anglia Ruskin University.
Sally is part of the Grove Youth, Children and Families Series Editorial Group, edits Bible reading notes, is a spiritual accompanier, trainer in different aspects of ministry, and leads retreats and quiet days. She has an interest in both Celtic and Ignatian Spirituality. She loves sport, spending time by the sea and in nature, and drinking coffee in independent coffee shops.
