Former showbiz agent swaps Hollywood glamour for parish life

Sang Cha is leaving behind a successful career as a Hollywood agent to become a lowly minister in the Church of Scotland.

The 34-year-old will become the first person of direct Korean descent to be ordained as a minister in the Kirk when he is inducted at St Mungo's Church, Alloa, tomorrow.

Cha was born in Seoul, South Korea, but moved with his family to New Jersey, in the US, when he was eight.

After studying business at university in Pennsylvania, Cha headed to California where he began working as an agent.

He hoped to become a producer and later went to Alaska in search of people with compelling stories to tell.

It was here that the Korean-American found God and a higher calling to serve in the ministry.

“I renounced at that time all the money, power and success associated with the Hollywood way of life," he said.

“In the Church of Scotland the most one can ever make is £30,000 per year so I chose this path with my eyes wide open.

“It was not a hard decision as money never fascinated me much in any case, but it does make a change from having hundreds of thousands of dollars at your disposal.”

His ordination coincides with the 100th anniversary this year of the completion of the first Korean Bible translation by Scottish missionary John Ross in 1911.

The anniversary is not lost on Cha.

“What started with the translation of the first Bible into Korean with Reverend John Ross in 1911, will, in some way, have come home," he said.

“The fruits of the missionary’s labour will have, I dare say, returned, and this is a deeply humbling thought.

“Scots and Koreans have always had close links, and it is an honour and a privilege to be the first Korean to serve on these shores.”

Mr Cha is desperate to get down to business in his new congregation and is looking forward to the challenge of presenting Christ to a nation where many are no longer seeking him.

“I have always been interested in the interplay between theology and the social sciences, especially as it concerns how Christians can and must speak authentically in the public sphere," he said.

“I have been given the work of trying to imagine what it means to be a Christian in a world that Christians no longer control and look forward to the long haul in ministry which lies ahead.”