Jonathan Chaffey

On 20 May 1990, Chaffey was commissioned into the Chaplains Branch, Royal Air Force and granted the relative rank of flight lieutenant.[6] His first posting was to RAF Lyneham.[1] On 20 May 1991, he was promoted to the relative rank of squadron leader.[7] He transferred from a short service commission to a permanent commission on 17 November 1993.[8] During his early career he served as a chaplain at RAF Stafford, RAF Finningley, RAF Wittering, RAF Waddington and RAF Lossiemouth. He also completed overseas deployments to RAF Gibraltar, the Falkland Islands, Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar and Gioia del Colle Air Base in Italy.[1]

On 1 July 2003, as part of the half-yearly promotions, Chaffey was promoted to the relative rank of wing commander.[9] From 2004 to 2007, he served as the Staff Chaplain at Royal Air Force College Cranwell. In addition to being the senior chaplain, he also taught the Beliefs and Values Programme and the Care in Leadership Course.[1] He was then posted to HQ Chaplaincy Services in a training role. During this time he also completed two postings to Afghanistan as part of Operation Herrick.[1] On 1 January 2010, he was granted the relative rank of group captain.[10] He was then appointed the Deputy Chaplain-in-Chief.[1][11]

In 2013, Chaffey began his attendance of the Royal College of Defence Studies.[1][12] In July 2014, he succeeded Ray Pentland as the Chaplain-in-Chief and head of the Royal Air Force Chaplains Branch.[13] He was promoted to the relative rank of air vice-marshal on 25 July 2014.[14] Chaffey was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath in the 2018 New Year Honours.[15] He retired from the Royal Air Force in July 2018.

On 29 January 2020, it was announced that Chaffey would be the next Archdeacon of Oxford in the Diocese of Oxford: he was due to be licensed as archdeacon during a service at Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford on 9 May 2020.[16] But, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, was instead collated online on 1 May 2020.[17]