Revd Kate Bottley: I'm a proud daughter of Sheffield - and I have Henderson's Relish delivered by the crate

“In my line of work, I do a lot of funerals and I’ve always said to the kids, you know I want to be buried in Sheffield don’t you?,” Revd Bottley muses. “And they go yeah but that might not be possible mum. And I go well then you get a bucket of soil from Sheffield six and you chuck it in.”

She can remember as a child, a school trip to Weston Park Museum and gazing in awe at the Edwardian red-brick building of Firth Court, just a stone’s throw away. It is part of the University of Sheffield, her teacher had told her, and one day you might be able to go.

Last week, Revd Bottley posed on the university’s campus, with cap, gown and beaming smile in a moment she describes as “lovely poetry”. She was awarded an honorary degree from the educational institution, recognising her successful career and her work to support inclusivity in society.

“It was a great honour from my home city to be able to receive it,” she reflects. “I’m a proud daughter of Yorkshire and a particularly proud daughter of Sheffield. It’s difficult to articulate what it means really.”

Revd Bottley was born and raised in the city, her father a toolmaker and her mother a cleaner and dinner lady. They were working class and non-academic, she says. Both her parents had left school at 14, her mum barely able to read and write. Their first family home initially didn’t have heating.

“The sorrows were really sorrowful and the joys were really joyful and when there was a party to be had, the party really counted,” Revd Bottley reflects. “There’s a beautiful grit and a beautiful honesty to being part of a working class community in a post-industrial town.”

It shaped her, in many ways. The early 1980s were a tough time for the city. “I remember my dad being made redundant on Christmas Eve in the early eighties and that really forms the way you feel about social justice and about fairness.”

“Sheffield has always been a city of opportunity,” she continues. “A city that will stand up for itself and will speak out for those who aren’t getting fairness. We have a socialist heart.”

Singing and performing in public was an ordinary family occurrence for Revd Bottley growing up and still now she oozes with vibrancy. “I was very lucky in the 80s because the council funded things like theatre spaces and music provision.

"I got to have all these amazing experiences that we could never have afforded as a family because of the city I lived in and how it valued more than just certificates and pieces of paper.”

At youth theatre, she hoped one day she’d have the chance to “show off once or twice on the telly”. It turned out well, she laughs. Today, Revd Bottley combines her church duties as a priest in North Nottinghamshire with a career as a media presenter, television broadcaster and writer.

She is currently a presenter on Good Morning Sunday on BBC Radio 2 alongside Jason Mohammad. Previously, she presented The Sunday Hour and has appeared as a contributor on Saturday Breakfast with Dermot O’Leary and Pause for Thought on Chris Evans’ Breakfast Show, for which she won a Jerusalem Award.

Revd Bottley also writes for The Guardian, The Independent and Radio Times, aiming to amplify the voices of those marginalised in society and spark national conversations.

She has appeared on Celebrity Mastermind and The Weakest Link, as well as contributing to The One Show, This Morning and Sunday Morning Live.

Her media career began after she led a flash mob to Celebration by Kool and the Gang at a wedding she was officiating – and the video went viral. She was asked to appear on Channel 4’s Gogglebox and was a regular alongside her husband Graham for five series.

It was a crush on Graham - the son of a vicar - in her teens that drew Revd Bottley closer to the church. “I only went for a snog and ended up with a dog collar,” she told The Yorkshire Post back in 2018.

Revd Bottley studied at Leeds Trinity University then became a religious education teacher in Sheffield. She trained for ordination in the city then studied at St John’s College in Nottingham before being ordained as Deacon in the Church of England in 2008 and as a Priest in 2009.

Her media profile, she says, just gives her another pulpit, a chance to share her stories of faith and spirituality, and her messages around such topics as love, hope, success, and grief to a wider audience.

She’s been doing so with nursing and midwifery students at the University of Sheffield and last week, it was a Doctor of Medicine that she was awarded, when she joined more than 2,700 students celebrating their graduations.

“Of course I never expected things to work out this way,” she says, reflecting back on all she has achieved. “But I did expect things to be Kate-shaped and I think that’s the important thing, to find something that fits and feels right for you…

"I’ve worked in a sausage factory, I’ve worked at Meadowhall, I’ve been a teacher, I’ve done all sorts and I’ve always loved what I’ve done and always embraced everything.”

Who knows what she might dip her toe into next, “but whatever it is, I just hope I love it,” she says.

“Oh, and if Yorkshire Tea want me to do an advert, I’d love to!”