The boy who would be Bishop

Early in February we posted a picture of a large group of children at the Cathedral School (see here). It provoked a fair amount of interest, and a number of people contacted us to identify people - one or two people even spotted themselves in the picture! One blog reader identified a young Brian Noble (circled above). He was born in Lancaster and educated at the Cathedral School before becoming a priest in June 1960. In 1995 he was called from his duties as a parish priest in Whitehaven and was ordained Bishop of Shrewsbury. He is one of a number of bishops to have been brought up in the parish or educated in the school (for example, Archbishop Thomas Whiteside, whom we met in January. Bishop Noble is celebrating his 73rd birthday today - Happy Birthday!