Ordination Leaping : The Human Cost

Over the recent course of Petertide ordinations, many controversies have wracked the Social Media side of the Church of England. Some, for instance, have wondered how come Petertide ordinations take place on St John the Baptist's Day. Some wonder why it's called Petertide when the actual feast is Peter and Paul.

And some have regarded this blog's view on leaping ordinands as miserable, curmudgeonly and lacking in joy.

Well consider. Many of these clergy are not the youngest people. OK, they're likely going to be the youngest in their congregations. But it's all relative. It is only today, from doctors' surgeries around England, that the full list of injuries is coming in.

Revd Doreen Lambswool, new deacon of the Cheesemill Benefice, has been put down for a hip operation after landing awkwardly on a cobble.

Revd Broderick Bartholomew, of the Shallowgrave Benefice, copped an episcopal mitre to the ear and has balance problems.

Revd Chester Leicester, of Cirencester, is sporting an  eye patch in liturgical colours after an unfortunate dabbing accident.

Fr Chesney Welderson, of Upper Grateswell, has irritated his gout and gave his new-priestly blessings from his bath chair. Fr Chesney is very much of the old school.

Rambert Martyrson, an innocent worshipper at St Baldwin's Cathedral, Bloghampton, unfortunately wandered into the path of a leaping curate in the cathedral grounds and may never play the mouth organ again. To be fair, nobody really knows why he was playing the mouth organ at the time.

Revd Malfoy Plunckett slipped a disc doing a "Superman" impression and is horizontal for the next fortnight. Which is, coincidentally, how he spent every weekend on his training course. In bed by 4am and never at Morning Prayer, that was old Malfoy.

The Bishop of Bloghampton himself is suffering from a crumpled mitre after jumping in the air under the archway to the cathedral close.

In  other news, Revd Chas Smashley of South Bilgewater was determined not to indulge in all this frivolity. Unfortunately the wind changed during his official ordination photograph, and he is destined to go around, looking like Kenneth Williams detecting a bad smell, forever.

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