When the chickens they were trying to raise at school died, teachers asked students to pen their views on death. Christopher Calderhead wrote simply: “You are dead when you are dead.  That’s it.”

Raised by agnostic parents, Rev. Calderhead, then 11, says he was a “militant atheist.” He never went to church and believed there was neither mystery nor spiritual angle to death, or even, for that matter, to life.

Six months later, the militant stance melted, giving way to curiosity about faith, religion, and God.  Swelling year after year, the spirit of inquiry grew until Calderhead realized he wanted to become a priest.

He says a quote by Frederick Buechner resonated deeply for him:  “Your vocation is where your joy meets the world’s need.”  By age 30, he says, he derived very little pleasure from the paycheck he got as a freelance graphic designer and calligrapher, preferring to do the hard work of a volunteer at the Church of the Redeemer in Astoria instead.

Today, his ministry is on Roosevelt Island as half-time priest of the ecumenical congregation.

Calderhead’s passion for calligraphy and pen-lettering never diminished.  As a teenager, he had spent a lot of time helping his father at his advertising agency and, even though he assumed he would have to give up art entirely once he became a priest, Calderhead, 40, says he is now much more of an artist than he ever was.

As an elected fellow of the Society of Scribes and Illuminators, a London-based organization, Calderhead continues to work as a graphic artist and teach calligraphy when he gets a chance.  Recently, he served as a faculty member at a calligraphy conference in San Francisco.  He also works with the St. John’s Bible Committee on Illumination and Text, writing feature articles for the St. John’s Bible newsletter, which encompasses various topics on the making of the one-of-a-kind Bible.  “He is among the most respected calligraphers in the world,“ says his friend from high school, Robert Coker, a graphic artist himself.  “He has always been interested in visual things like stamps and flags.”

The night Calderhead announced to his rector his decision to get ordained, the rector took him by the shoulder and shook him.  There was a glut of Episcopal clergy and Calderhead was doing fine in the role he was already playing, but Calderhead’s mind was made up.  This was, after all, the same person who had gotten himself baptized at age 18, while studying Art History at Princeton University.  He had, of course, neglected to inform his parents of his decision.  “It was a WASP-y family.  We never talked about anything,” says Calderhead, chuckling.

He wanted to go to Yale for theological studies but his bishop, he says, “made him go to“ Seabury-Western Theological University in Evanston, Illinois.  “He thought I was too East Coast,” says Calderhead, who had lived in New York all his life, attending Lyc‚e Fran‡ais, the Town School, and Collegiate High School in Manhattan before going to Princeton.  His only stint outside the country had been the years he spent in London, attending a calligraphy and book-binding course at Roehampton Institute.

The midwest was a bit of a shock. “People there wear their religion on their sleeve,“ says Calderhead.  It took him some time to get used to what he thought was their somewhat “intrusive“ attitude but, at the end, the year he spent working at a chaplaincy in a hospital on the south side of Chicago as part of his clinical pastoral education was the most valuable experience he had.  “That’s where the rubber hits the road,“ he says.  All his training was put to the test, as he had to talk to people who were in pain and in need of advice and guidance.  He recalls a meeting with a teenager who had sickle-cell anemia and his feeling of inadequacy in ministering to her.  “What should I have asked her?  How do you feel?  Lousy, of course.“  He says the girl’s roommate helped him by asking questions and forcing him to talk.  “I learned how to pick up signals from people, talking to them about what they wanted to know.”

His first church job was in Cambridge, England, where he lived for four years.  He says he found English reticence “very appealing though very frustrating,“ so he decided to return to New York.  He missed the City he grew up in and realized he was too much of an urban person to live in a small town in England.  “The fact that, in a city, people live on top of each other and develop networks of interconnections, fascinates me,” Calderhead says.

The monetary angle was of some importance, as well, because salaries doled out by the Church of England are very low and the country is comparatively more expensive.  Here, he can get by, living in Astoria, being paid a modest salary by the Diocese of New York, and using his artistic and writing skills to supplement his income. 

It took him a few months to land the job of a half-time priest at the ecumenical congregation on Roosevelt Island, and Calderhead says he hopes he can stay because he loves the place and the people.  He believes the congregation, now comprised of about 60 people, will double once he can get some programs in place.

His first major effort was a five-session Ask your Pastor program during Lent, when people could ask him anything about the Bible and their faith.  “It was terrific,“ said Tracey Kaminski, who attends Sunday morning service regularly with her family.  “I’ve never had that sort of explanation before.  He spells out everything very carefully, makes it very easy to understand and is very intelligent.“  Kaminski says her ten-year old stepdaughter, Samantha, says of Calderhead’s services:  “They are not really boring.“  “Small victory,” says Calderhead, laughing good-naturedly.

He says he was impressed with the quality of questions and, at first, didn’t think the sessions would last beyond the first three, but they did.  People, and the questions, kept coming.  Fourteen-year-old Emerson Santaio says Calderhead is “very interesting“ and makes everyone “want to go to services.”

Westview resident Maureen Santella says Calderhead is “very much a teacher, he embraces the children and is very warm and charismatic.”  Emma Felix, a long-time Island resident, says the priest clearly has a calling and is making a huge effort to get the congregation involved in church and with one another.  She says he likes to spend time with them socially and is willing to come early on Sunday and stay after service so he can get to know everyone better.

Among the plans for the congregation are a parade and barbecue picnic for Pentecost in June, a new notice board and afternoon-tea sessions.

“People here have a real desire to grow and understand they have to give of themselves in order to make that happen,” says Calderhead. In his mind, this desire to work and grow is all-important. So important that, on his own tombstone, the epitaph he foresees is:  Christopher Calderhead:  A Work in Progress.