The London Institute for Contemporary Christianity

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In memory of Margaret Killingray (1938–2024)

Wonderful Word for the Week author and long-serving LICC volunteer.

Margaret Killingray was a woman of extraordinary talent, someone whose abilities and godliness of character could have catapulted her into some lofty role in a much bigger organisation than LICC. And yet for 30 years, led by the Lord and gripped by the cause, she chose to give her all among us. Elaine Storkey, my predecessor as Director, described her as ‘a living embodiment of servant leadership, faithfulness, and Christian love.’

Margaret is probably best known in LICC circles – and indeed, more widely – for her culturally astute, pastorally rich, and exegetically insightful Bible reflections. She was the editor-in-chief of LICC’s innovative Word for the Week email series, from its inception in 2001 until she retired in 2015. And she wrote around 40% of them –  literally hundreds – garnering plaudit after plaudit from its audience.

Her contribution to LICC goes back further than that, almost to our very foundation. A graduate of LSE, she was one of the first students on LICC’s groundbreaking Christians in the Modern World (CMW) course back in the early ’80s. From then on, she worked for LICC in a host of volunteer capacities. If a job needed to be done, Margaret, with the versatility of a Swiss Army knife, would pop up with the skill and appetite to do it: as tutor, PA to Elaine Storkey, lecturer on CMW, Chair of our Board, archivist, bookshop manager… The list goes on, including formal roles and all the things that need to be done to make things happen: setting up for events, serving coffee, washing up afterwards, doing silly sketches at CMW parties, and gathering Californian women in their twenties and male African pastors in their fifties around the Bible to discuss gender issues.

Alongside that, there was a time for Margaret to be the editor of Anvil, the Anglican academic journal, a time to be an author, a Spring Harvest speaker, a preacher… And there were many times when she was an iconoclast, provoking us with a mischievous twinkle in her eye and kindness in her heart to see things afresh through the lens of the gospel and act accordingly. Indeed, Margaret could always be relied on to bring a fresh angle to an issue, drawing on a rich range of sources – sociology, history, theology, psychology, pedagogy, art, Master and Commander, or her grandchildren. And all this was wrapped in such warmth and joy that, if you weren’t careful, you might miss the humility that impelled it all.

When I arrived at LICC in 1999 there were three-and-a-half paid people on the team, plus Margaret and two other amazing volunteers. We were trying to lay the foundations for a new season in LICC’s ministry. We had ambitious plans, a much bigger programme, and a very small budget. We couldn’t have got through that time without Margaret. And we wouldn’t have made such progress in the years that followed without her. Thank God we didn’t have to. A noble woman of valour indeed. And a gift from above.

I am so grateful to her and for her. And for the amazing support she and we always received from David, her husband.

May he and their children and grandchildren know the strength and comfort of the Father in the weeks and years ahead.

Mark Greene
LICC Mission Champion and former Executive Director

Comments

  1. Bright in both senses..
    Extremely intelligent, thoughtful and considered.
    And
    Lively, generous and eye-twinkly.

    I am sorry she has gone. Are we all just a little less bright because of her departure?

    By Douglas Holt  -  3 Feb 2025
  2. Good to read this obituary. Sounds like she was a wonderful lady! I always appreciated her word for the week thougts the best of any!

    By Bernadette Birtwhistle  -  3 Feb 2025
  3. In 1997, I had the privilege of being on a team of three people (Margaret, myself, and Richard Higginson) who delivered the ‘academic’ stream of daily seminars at a Spring Harvest week in Minehead. She was wonderfully helpful, especially given the fact that I was just a local church minister who had never spoken at a major conference before. A few years later, when I was on a sabbatical, she offered me the use of LICC resources. She will rest in peace and rise in glory.

    By Dave Faulkner  -  3 Feb 2025
  4. I always looked out for Margaret Killingray’s reflections and printed many to go in my Bible. Still there, and glad to have another now. Missed them when she retired. Good to know what a remarkable Christian woman she was.

    By Olive Powell  -  3 Feb 2025
  5. Reading what you write about Margaret makes me even more aware of what an awesome privilege it was for Peggy and me to be with her and you and John Stott and Helen Parry (and many others) for 10 weeks in 2004 for what turned out to be the last CMW gathering. I am so grateful for the times interacting with Margaret and to have been a tiny part in the beginning of the Imagine initiative. Seems to me that Margaret is still a big part in what we appreciate about LICC!!

    By Gary Nielsen  -  3 Feb 2025

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