This is my take. It may upset the Warriors of Social Media from both sides equally. I don't know. Don't care, actually. But this is my take.
If you believe the Media - and especially the BBC, which has to report the news, regardless of the lack of anyone who understands religion or journalism - the Church is obsessed by gender and sexuality.
Oh yeah. Hardly ten minutes go by without Church members thinking "That Revd Nehemiah Jones. Is he, ignoring the beard and interest in steam trains, secretly a woman? Is he, despite a total lack of interest in the music of Judy Garland, and his happy marriage to a woman called Rose, secretly gay?"
And so, in the mind of some parts of the media, we go on - fretting lest some unnecessary use of lace, or lack of interest in the Duckworth-Lewis method, reveals that our clergy are a Y-chromosome short of the full bag of almonds, or are as the nine-pound-note.
Whereas, in reality, on the whole, nobody cares.
The things that would put us off/on ministers include such important questions as:
1. Will the minister use baptisms as an excuse to launch a Nine-point Path to Salvation on an unsuspecting congregation of visitors?
2. Will Christmas services consist of the minister wondering what the congregation has been doing the last 12 months?
3. Will s/he return my calls within 48 hours (allowing for their day off )?
4. Are they able to listen?
5. Do they believe in God?
The correct answers to above being "no", "no", "normally", "yes" and "hopefully" respectably. The questions as to the disposition of their genitals - and what they do with them - remain, as they should be - less important than whether they can run a fund-raising event, or the assurance that they won't fill the rectory garden with goats. Frankly, filling the garden with Village People tribute acts is a lot less trouble than goats. And I'm only banging on about the goats because I know of a parish where the (male) rector had a lot of goats as pets. And when non-worshippers complained about his successor being a woman, the worshippers counted their lucky stars that she was a woman who didn't like goats.*
No, Church people, on average, probably think about matters of sex about as often as anyone else. Maybe slightly more, as let's face it, the average Church member is more attractive than an anorak clad atheist. But the question of whether they might or might not want to have sex with the minister occurs no more or less often than the same question with respect to a shop assistant, bus driver or council receptionist.
And that doesn't, normally, have any effect on whether we'd want to use their services. Come on, we've got God to worship. That's far more important than sex.
*There was, as far as we are aware, nothing dodgy about the liking for goats. What are you, the Daily Mirror?
I actually thought that the average Rector/Vicar/PriestInCharge was required to keep a good store of Gin, have two gun dogs or terriers and a substantial liking for home grown produce. What their spouses think of this 'norm' isn't disclosed. As for sex, well the reproductive rate of Clergy is no different from the average UK person 2.4 children I understand.(I'm not sure where the other .6 is though). And the cases of Clergy making off with a member of the congregation is so rare as to make it a case for Jeremy Kyle.
ReplyDeleteWith reference to your Daily Mirror spot. More like the Sun.
I am a Minister - an old minister. No one thinks about my sex life. My congregation has never considered that I might have one - heaven forbid! My wife doesn't think about my sex life and I don't either any more. Our old dog has left us ... But we have gin - oh yes, we have gin. "Another G&T dear - I'll be mother" .... "Mother?" Hmmmm
ReplyDelete"the nine-pound-note"
ReplyDeleteI see inflation has had a sad effect on the traditional nine-bob note.
Not just inflation. Decimalisation got there first.
Delete