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Incognito, Unknown, Unrecognised
There is a trend, especially among clergy of the Evangelical persuasion, to dress in mufti. They are instantly recognisable as parsons in disguise by their appalling taste in ties. They might as well be attired in full clerical rig, complete with biretta. Not so with me, as my legs are not fit to be seen in public I am in the habit of hiding them under a cassock. This covers a multiplicity of sins, including the holes in my jumper and the accidental soup stains down the front of my trousers.
Not that the wearing of a black frock makes a ha'porth of difference. There was the oft referred to incident when I arrived on the doorstep of a grieving widow, intent on arranging her husband's funeral, when she demanded to know who I was before she would let me in. Sometimes I do nip across the road without the enveloping garment but never without the ubiquitous dog collar. It came as somewhat of a shock, therefore, when one of our congregation mistook me for an elderly fisherman. I must go steady on the cod liver oil in future. I was even more taken aback when, being helpful over a lost post code, I returned to the Vicarage and brought out the Diocesan Year Book, whereupon the enquirer, seeing a church publication, asked me if I was a Methodist; this after eight years of being the notorious Vicar of this parish
Nevertheless, I have no room to complain about others. So many couples have been joined in Holy Matrimony before me that I fail to recognise more than a handful of them, even the week after the event. And as for the baptized! There have been two hundred and sixty of them since I came here. How am I supposed recall who they, or their parents, are? If they came to church more than once in their lives, I might. Or maybe not, there are times when I cannot find my own wife in a crowd.
So we should not be amazed that Mary of Magdala failed to recognise that what she mistook for a gardener standing before her was the risen Lord. We would have done the same thing ourselves. What is important, at this Eastertide, is that we, who know the whole story, do not fail to proclaim that we accept that Christ is risen indeed, alleluia!
May God bless you all, Fr. Allan
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