A FORMER Bishop of Salisbury who was chaplain at Corpus Christi College in Oxford has died aged 86.

Rt Rev John Baker was Bishop of Salisbury from 1982 to 1993 and a former rector of St Margaret’s Church, in Westminster.

He had also been the Speaker of the House of Commons’ chaplain.

For 14 years he was chaplain and lecturer at Corpus Christi.

He was known for his sometimes controversial support for issues, including nuclear disarmament and marriage between gay clergy.

John Austin Baker was born in Birmingham on January 11, 1928, to parents George and Grace.

At school he showed talent in languages, but opted instead at 18 to study classics at Oriel College, Oxford, and to learn the Holy Orders.

He later switched to theology and got a first. He was ordained at Cuddesdon Theological College and stayed on as a tutor in Old Testament studies.

From 1957 to 1959 he lectured at King’s College, London, but then returned to Oxford to become chaplain at Corpus Christi.

He held the position for 14 years and also lectured there, as well as at Brasenose, Lincoln and Exeter Colleges.

In 1973 he was appointed a Canon at Westminster Abbey.

He married Gillian Leach MBE, there a year later.

He went on to become abbey treasurer and in 1978 he was made sub-dean. That same year he become rector of St Margaret’s Church.

He found himself at the centre of heated public debate, right at the start of his role as Bishop of Salisbury, when a committee he chaired published the report The Church and the Bomb, in 1982. It supported nuclear disarmament in Britain.

It was the first time of many that he weighed in on divisive topics in his new capacity, later attacking the practice of battery farming and over-zealous policemen at nuclear disarmament protests.

In 1985 Rt Rev Baker was chairman of the Church of England’s doctrine commission, a role he held for two years.

He later also chaired a House of Bishops’ working party investigating homosexuality in the Church in 1990, but later changed his views and disowned the findings, which claimed gay clergy would never be allowed.

He retired in 1994, to the post of honorary assistant bishop in the Diocese of Winchester.

John Baker died on June 4. He is survived by his wife.

This week’s obituaries: