Timothy Dudley-Smith

Timothy Dudley-Smith  (born 26 December 1926) is a retired bishop of the Church of England and a noted English hymnwriter. He has written around four hundred hymns, including “Tell Out, my Soul”.

Dudley-Smith was born on Boxing Day in Manchester, England, to Phyllis and Arthur Dudley-Smith, a school-teacher. He was educated at Tonbridge School, before studying maths and then theology at Pembroke College, Cambridge. After graduating in 1947, Dudley-Smith began his ordination training at Ridley Hall. He was ordained deacon in 1950 and priest in 1951 by Christopher Chavasse, the Bishop of Rochester.

After ordination, Dudley-Smith served as an Honorary Chaplain to Chavasse, as well as Head of the Cambridge University Mission in Bermondsey, South London. In 1955, he was appointed Editorial Secretary of the Evangelical Alliance and editor of the new Crusade magazine, created after Billy Graham’s 1954 London mission. Dudley-Smith also began serving with the Church Pastoral Aid Society, serving as Assistant Secretary from 1959, then as Secretary until 1973.  He served as Archdeacon of Norwich from 1973 to 1981 and as Bishop of Thetford from 1981 to 1991. He also served as President of the Evangelical Alliance from 1987 until 1992.

He married Arlette Macdonald in 1959, to whom he remained married for 48 years until her death in 2007; they had one son and two daughters together. 

Dudley-Smith is a member and honorary vice-president of the Hymn Society of Great Britain and Ireland; he has also been awarded fellowships from the Hymn Society in the United States and Canada and the Royal School of Church Music. In 2003, he was appointed an Order of the British Empire “for services to hymnody”. In July 2009 he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree by Durham University.