• Sermon preached on 28 September – Who do you think you are?

    Who do you think you are?

    In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

    “Hello, can you help me, this is ICM and we are conducting a telephone poll in connection with the recent referendum would you be willing to answer some questions.”

    And I said yes – and the questions were mostly about whether or not I’d found it easy to vote in the referendum (I had) and about whether or not I had any concerns about widespread fraud having taken place (I had no concerns at all).

    When I said I had no concerns, she asked me why? Why did I have no concerns?

    Well, I know people who were there, I said – people from both sides who were at the counts and who saw what took place. And I was involved myself.

    It took quite a long time to answer all the questions but it went fairly smoothly until the end when she said, “Can I ask you some questions about who you are?” I agreed to this and readily gave away my age and all kinds of other information that one doesn’t normally dare ask someone in polite conversation.

    “And can I ask you what job you do?”

    “Yes, no problem, I’m a priest.”

    “Thank you sir – oh, I need to ask you what kind of priest. (more…)

11 responses to “The Pink List”

  1. Ryan Avatar
    Ryan

    Ooh, you’re in some illustrious company – there are worse places to be than beneath John Barrowman!

    Congratulations 🙂

    1. kelvin Avatar

      He and I are almost the same age, Ryan. It is why we look so alike.

      1. Ryan Avatar
        Ryan

        Made more impressive by the fact that the praepostorial look is presumably, unlike Mr Barrowman’s, all-natural 😉

        1. kelvin Avatar

          Mostly natural.

  2. Rosemary Hannah Avatar
    Rosemary Hannah

    Yes, I’d quite like to be under … sorry, got lost in thought there. Well done, Kelvin, and yes, more church people, please. As long as they spell your name right, that is all that maters ….

  3. Revd Ross Kennedy Avatar
    Revd Ross Kennedy

    I don’t think the paper got it wrong at all. St Mary’s is Glasgow’s Cathedral (that is if we ignore the chapel by the Clyde). The C of S place was a cathedral but not any more – it hasn’t had a cathedra for hundreds of years and so is merely a parish church now (nothing wrong with that). The C of E has done away with provosts (they were the head of the cathedrals which also functioned as parish churches). The boss priest in all the
    C of E cathedrals is now called the Dean. And so it should be in SEC because the title ‘provost’ is the designation accorded to the head of toon cooncils.
    Yes I know we have deans in the SEC dioceses but they could be retitled as archdeacons which is what (I think) is their function.

    As to the pink list…how times have changed….. years ago it would have been called the black list! (sorry!)

    1. kelvin Avatar

      Times have indeed changed, Ross. Something which is to be celebrated.

      I’ve no desire to be a Dean. Deans in Scotland do something quite different to what I do, and Provost described me nicely. The title of Dean is also used in secular life now too, in education, as is the term Rector.

      There are four cathedrals in Glasgow. St Mungo’s, St Luke’s, St Andrew’s and St Mary’s, each no doubt dearly loved by their people.

  4. Ryan Avatar
    Ryan

    Archdeacon is a great title tho, suggesting to the layperson that it involves deacons raising one eyebrow and making drily witty comments.

  5. chris Avatar

    I’d’a thunk you might have been a ‘national treasure’ by now…maybe next year. 🙂

    1. kelvin Avatar

      I’m a National Treasure round about this blog. That’ll do for now.

  6. Uncle Al Avatar

    I seem to recall that at Coates Hall back in the very early 1970s the student charged with providing services at the Mission Church in Dean Village was known [tongue very firmly in cheek] as the Archdeacon of the Water of Leith. A resounding title but no gaiters came with it.

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