After nearly three decades as a police officer, Mike Dyne’s lifelong faith has led him down a new path to ordination. Mike says throughout his life he has always had a sense of being called by God. “When I was born, I was very, very premature, I weighed less than two pounds. I wasn’t expected to live. So, I was given an emergency baptism in the military hospital I was born in. “As a result, I’ve always had this thing that I was spared for a reason. Out of that came the idea of service. My vocation as a police officer was rooted in service.”
Mike was a police officer for 28 years. He says his faith has always provided him with a strong foundation. “I was a Senior Investigating Officer for road death, so I was surrounded by trauma and that was quite difficult. But my faith sustained me during those difficult times.
“I come from a place where my faith has been very active in what I did every day. I was comforting people. I was helping people through the death of their loved ones on a regular basis, and I very much brought my faith into that. I had a very strong and active prayer life. I needed to have it really, because of the things we saw.”
His sense of purpose, however, was tested and reoriented in 2018 during a quiet Sunday service. “I very much felt I was being called to serve people in a different way. We were singing a hymn, and I just felt this push. Almost like a physical push. It felt like I was being told, ‘You’re not in the right place, you need to be somewhere different.’ That was pretty terrifying.”
Just weeks later, his vicar approached him. Mike says he was shocked when he pulled him aside and said, “‘I think we need to have a chat about you being ordained, don’t we?’ And that was without any prompting. That’s when I said what had happened, and it confirmed what we were both thinking.”
Mike began a process of discernment, supported by those around him and spent time learning in different contexts and churches. But he also wrestled with questions of self-worth. “I didn’t doubt the call. However, I doubted my worthiness. I wasn’t sure a serving police officer from a rough council estate in Corby could actually be a priest.”But the call didn’t go away, “It’s always there. It’s a very powerful thing.”
Mike will serve his curacy in East Clevedon with Clapton in Gordano, Walton Clevedon, Walton in Gordano and Weston in Gordano. And as he prepares for ordination, his he says he is looking forward to serving the community. “I want to walk alongside them. I want to be embedded with the people I serve. I want to be part of the fabric of their lives, making Gods love known.”