The Revd Darren McFarland
(and Elizabeth)

Assistant Chaplain since 2012
Vicar of St Andrew’s, Old Headington

The Revd Darren McFarland is the Assistant Chaplain of Keble, a post he has held for a decade having come to Oxford in 2011 to take up the post of Vicar of St Andrew’s Old Headington, a parish of which the College is Patron.

The post brought honorary membership of Keble SCR and Darren tentatively started exercising dining rights on Sunday evenings after Chapel. He enjoyed the community and commensality and felt very welcome at College. He was appointed to the post of Assistant Chaplain in 2012 and is now working alongside his third Chaplain. As well as the usual chapel duties, Darren has led on the College’s patronage work, representing Keble in the appointment of clergy to many of the sixty-nine parishes of which it is patron.

Darren is the youngest of five children, born and raised in Limavady, a town in County Londonderry. He read English Literature and Language at the Queen’s University of Belfast and Theology at Trinity College Dublin. Following the promise that you could join the church and see the world, Darren trained for priesthood in the Church of Ireland and served in parishes in County Wicklow and Dublin before moving to Scotland and parishes in Clydebank and Paisley. Then it was Oxford—which has sated his desire for any further travel!

Darren shares his life with his partner Simon and their black and white moggie Elizabeth, who has a definite sense of her station as the first cat of the parish. She has strong opinions on many subjects and will always choose to curl up in the lap of a Bishop or a Knight of the Realm if one is available!

Darren spent part of 2022 as Acting Chaplain.