Delivering a speech to a packed-out Royal Albert Hall would test the nerves of the bravest of us, but Terry said, “I wrote it, practiced it and prayer about it, and it was fine!”

 

“Prayer keeps me on track,” he says. Essential when you consider the tracks Terry has to navigate. He is chairman of the Cornwall Federation of Male Voice Choirs, which is how he came to be making that speech, a member of the Truro Diocesan Synod and the St Austell Deanery Synod. He also served as church warden to St Austell Parish Church for over 12 years and has served on the PCC.

Life isn’t just committees, meetings, organising or raising money through singing – the event at the Royal Albert Hall raised £28,000 for charity. Terry has also volunteered at Mount Edgcumbe Hospice for the past 35 years. He is a steward for their church services and considers this a tremendous privilege as it gives him the opportunity to talk to people at a time when the big questions are unavoidable. “Not everyone wants to talk,” he says, “which is understandable, but that’s when prayer, and praying for them, is so important.”

Faith and his walk with God are part of Terry’s everyday life, but they were never more so than when he took part in the Walk of a Thousand Men. He described himself as ‘a general dogsbody for a week’ before setting out with a team of eight men visiting towns in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly to share their faith. They held services in pubs and other alternative venues and, essentially, relied on God to provide as they didn’t take any money with them.  Although there is an arrangement where they can sleep in church halls, there are no formal arrangements for provision of food – so if communities don’t feed them, they don’t eat. Happily, for Terry, he didn’t go hungry for food.

Terry said he was “bowled over” to be nominated for the Cross of St Piran Award by the St Austell Deanery, but asked what have I done? I’m only doing God’s work, which I love.