When I was 21 I spent a long holiday hitch-hiking to Nepal. While I was there, I received a letter from a fellow undergraduate who had given up his teenage ambition to become an architect, for the sake of the Gospel. He hadn\u2019t intended to get married \u201d\u201d he thought that he could be more dedicated as a single man \u201d\u201d but he wrote that if he did, he\u2019d want a wife who was prepared \u201cto give up her career as I have mine\u201d\u009d.<\/p>\n
And yes, since you ask, it did put me off. I fancied him rotten, but I was passionately committed to my future as an actor. A few weeks later he persuaded me to change my mind, and the following summer, just before we married, he put himself forward for ordination in the Church of England.<\/p>\n
There was never any doubt, in his mind or mine, that this was a sacrifice \u201d\u201d if a joyful, willing one. When I asked my husband, years ago, if he thought that I ought to consider ordination too and he said, certainly not, one in the family was quite enough, I couldn\u2019t have been more relieved.<\/p>\n