Former Big Brother contestant to be ordained in St Asaph
He is one of six individuals that will be ordained by the Right Reverend Gregory Cameron, Bishop of St Asaph, at the service in North Wales.
Rt Revd Gregory Cameron said: "I am thrilled that we have once again six bright and different candidates for Christian ordained ministry."
Mr Wise, a fluent Welsh speaker from Blaenau Ffestiniog, will continue his training for the priesthood in the Aled Mission Area, which covers Old Colwyn and Betws yn Rhos.
He recently completed a 770km pilgrimage along the French Camino route to Santiago de Compostela, which took him 22 days.
Other candidates include Ian Williams, a former prison governor and rugby league player originally from Cumbria.
He will serve in the Estuary and Mountain Mission Area, supporting Well-Being @St James, a new well-being and healing centre at St James' Church in Holywell.
Jampa King, a former Buddhist who converted to Christianity after visiting the Shrine of St Melangell in Pennant Melangell, will also be ordained as a deacon.
Originally from Hemel Hempstead, Mr King has lived in Wales for some time and said he finally feels at home there.
He previously worked in education and family support, including as a centre lead at a Surestart children's centre for the Children's Society.
Sharon Morgan, from Ruthin, will serve in the Hope Street Mission Area in Wrexham.
She spent many years in Pentecostal churches and previously taught maths and worked with children unable to attend school.
Ms Morgan also ran a tuition business and is married to the Reverend Dan Morgan, who became Vicar of Denbigh last year.
David Dobbs, another deacon candidate, will serve in the Estuary and Mountain Mission Area.
He previously ran one of the largest independent care companies in Wales and recently stepped down from a long career in social healthcare to focus on fostering and his curacy.
Mr Dobbs and his wife have been foster carers for many years.
He also hosts a Facebook prayer group with more than 33,000 members.
Revd Pam Hallam is the only candidate to be ordained as a priest this year.
She has been serving in the Offa Mission Area since her ordination as a deacon in 2023.
Born in Southsea, Wrexham, she has lived in Gwersyllt for 42 years.
Before training for ordination, she worked at the Shooting Star Cancer Unit at Ysbyty Maelor.
Rt Revd Cameron said: "The Church will be all the richer for their experience, and the enthusiasm they bring to ministry."
Ahead of the ordination, all six candidates will take part in a retreat at St Beuno's Jesuit Spirituality Centre in Tremeirchion.
The retreat will be led by Canon Dr Jane Williams, McDonald Professor in Christian Theology at St Mellitus College.
The ordination service begins at 10am and is open to the public, with candidates welcoming support from their communities.
The Diocese of St Asaph stretches from Llandudno in north-west Wales to the Welsh–English border and as far south as Newtown in Powys.
It is one of six dioceses within the Church in Wales, an autonomous province of the Anglican Communion.
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'But even though the Official Secrets Act had been lifted and people like Rena were allowed to talk about their work, often they still didn't want to. 'And some would take it to their grave.' (Image: Contributed/Victoria Walsh) Perhaps surprisingly, adds Victoria, often the women who toiled at Bletchley Park, churning through tens of thousands of coded messages and translating snippets of details, didn't even realise the importance of their role. "They knew there was a secrecy aspect," she adds, "but they didn't even think they were doing anything special.' Read more Sandra Dick: Born in the Fife coastal village in 1923, Rena was bright and bookish with a fondness for poetry that blossomed into a love of languages. Determined to choose a career over being a housewife, she studied French and German at St Andrews University. Young Rena Stewart growing up in Fife. Image: Stewart Maclennan 'She was determined not to follow the usual route for women of the times, which was get married, have children or maybe teach," says Victoria. 'She thought studying French and German would open the world up to her. 'She didn't know exactly where it would take her and certainly couldn't have known it would lead her to Bletchley Park.' By the time she began her studies in 1940, Admiral Sir Hugh Sinclair, head of M16, had already taken over the country house near Milton Keynes for use as part of the secret war effort. Rena Stewart studied French and German at St Andrews University during the early years of World War II. Image: Stewart Maclennan Earmarked for the Code and Cypher School and Secret Intelligence Service, it was handy for a supply of bright students from Oxford and Cambridge. Soon, though it was snatching bright young graduates from around the country, many of them young women like Rena who could handle the huge amount of information that flowed through its walls. Recruited in early 1944, she worked in the German Book Room, surrounded by around 40 other women like her rattling away at typewriters, working in German and handling secret German military messages. Rena had a role at Bletchley Park (Image: Stewart Maclennan) 'She would be analysing secret messages, filling in any gaps and making sure they read properly so intelligence analysts could use them to chart the course of the war,' says Victoria. 'They worked all day in shifts, and it was serious work, probably in a smoky room and it would be stressful because they would know how important it was to the outcome of the war. 'But they also made sure they had fun in their spare time.' To keep spirits up and to drown out the constant clatter of typewriter keys, the women sang songs, including one which Rena sang for Victoria as she recalled her war work. Signatures of Bletchley Park women left on a song sheet from May 1945 (Image: Contributed) 'The second and last time I met Rena, in her living room down in London, we were talking about Bletchley Park when all of a sudden, she burst into song,' she recalls. 'She had remembered that she and the 40 women of 'The German Book Room' had made up a song about their time there, toiling away at their typewriters. 'The song went to the tune of My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean and was called The Swan Song of GBR. 'It was all about how fed up they were of typing and how they wished for the war to be over. 'Rena couldn't remember all the words, but it was an unforgettable moment.' Victoria later found Rena shared a typed copy of the song, signed by the German Book Room 'girls' in May 1945, to the museum at Bletchley Park. The end of the war in Europe brought their German Book Room work to a close, but Rena's service was not yet over. Instead of being demobbed, she and some others from the German Book Room were sent to an interrogation centre near Hanover in Germany, where they were given the important task of translating the statements of captured Nazi officers ahead of the Nuremberg Trials. Rena and other women on parade in Germany (Image: Stewart Maclennan)Another role specifically for Rena – known affectionately as Sgt McHaggis – and fellow Bletchley Park colleague and St Andrews alumna, Margery Forges, from Dundee, was even more pressurised. Handed to them by the head of the unit, Major Bill Oughton, they were told to work together on translating a document with the instruction: 'Take as long as you like, but there must be no mistakes, and you must agree on all details'. Hitler had two wills, a political will and a personal will which stated who his executors would be, stating how he had married Eva Braun and who was to inherit his belongings. It had been dictated 24 hours before he killed himself. It had to be perfect and they consulted every dictionary they could to make sure it was absolutely right. Tracking down the two wills had already been something of a saga involving a trio of messengers' efforts to smuggle the documents out of Germany before they were finally seized by the Allies. Sergeant Rena Stewart - affectionately known as Sgt McHaggis - while serving in Germany (Image: Stewart Maclennan) Rena and Margery were trusted with Hitler's personal will: a task Margery's family only discovered by chance, years after her death. Rena was finally demobbed in 1947, but that was just the start of another remarkable chapter. Having refused to settle for marriage and housework and having had a taste of international relations, Rena set sights on becoming a journalist with the BBC. But she was at an immediate disadvantage, says Victoria. Read more Sandra Dick: 'She couldn't say anything about her secret wartime work,' adds Victoria. 'It took her a long time to find a job and there were a lot of people who had been demobbed ahead of her. 'But she was very determined and she became a huge inspiration for younger women.' Having started at the bottom typing scripts and making tea, she rose to become the BBC World Service's first female senior duty editor. Rena Stewart went on to blaze a trail for women at the BBC World Service In her later years she occupied her time with simple tasks: editing the magazine for the church close to her Ealing home, running Scottish country dancing sessions and planning Burns Suppers – all a world away from the pressure of Bletchley Park. 'Rena left Scotland in 1943 and never moved back,' adds Victoria. 'But she was always incredibly proud to be Scottish, and she kept up her love of Scottish culture for a century. 'She deserves to be better known.' The Story of Rena Stewart is published by Pen and Sword Books.
