Word: vicar
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Dennis Filler, a London shipping clerk, went round to see the parson of St. Peter's. The Rev. John Perry, he thought, would be delighted to baptize his two-month-old daughter, Christine Margaret; the vicar had married the Fillers years before, and Dennis had been a lifelong member of St. Peter's in the East End district of Hackney. But at the church, Dennis Filler was told flatly that, considering his spotty record of churchgoing, he would have to take religious instruction before his child could be baptized...
...Since Vicar Perry came to his Hackney parish four years ago, his policy of no baptism without regular church attendance has boosted the average number of Sunday communicants. Backed up by his bishop, Perry said last week: "To a lot of people, who have not been inside of a church since they were married, baptism is a good excuse for a party. But they have to realize that this is one of the church's great sacraments . . . If a man is to become a bus driver, then he has instruction. A Christian should have the same. In a pagan...
...such subjects as gardening and interior decorating, with a manufacturer's representative on hand to lecture. Owner McVicar has set up a free coffee dispenser so that customers can help themselves while making up their minds on what to buy. "The coffee stimulates their brains," says Mc Vicar. "There isn't any place to set a cup down, so they just go round and round, getting warmer and more receptive...
...plays in a repertory group and took to the stage himself. An Evening Standard critic saw him in a production of Hamlet, wrote: "Mr. Kenneth Tynan, who did the First Player last night, would not get a chance in a village hall unless he were related to the vicar. His performance was quite dreadful." Tynan, outraged at the review, wrote such a lively letter to the Standard ("My performance in Hamlet was not 'quite dreadful' . . . it was slightly less than mediocre") that the paper at once hired him, later made him its drama critic...
...night in 1709, a gang of bullies set fire to a thatched cottage in Epworth, England, where their censorious Anglican vicar lay sleeping. The Rev. Samuel Wesley and his family escaped in their nightshirts, but one small son got left behind in the rush. It took a valiant rescue effort to save five-year-old John Wesley from the flames, and when he was restored to his mother, she is supposed to have offered a prayer: "See-is not this a brand, plucked from the burning...