[Magdalen] The Theology of Clerical Beards

[M J _Mike_ Logsdon]

>>>My hair and full beard are completely grey.  I am heavy enough
that I can do a mean Santa Claus.  I did do a Saint Nick for a
party some years ago, in cassock, surplice, red and gold cope,
and mitre (once belonging to the USA Papal Nuncio).  I wore
my large, brass Canterbury pectoral cross.<<<

At Christmas sometime in the early 1990s at St Paul's, Salinas, a fellow dressed up as St Nicholas, all red and coped and mitred to beat the band.  And he had the misfortune either to not think ahead, or to be reading fresh from something handed to him, but he announced to the congregation then present that he was the patron saint of seamen.  The air positively vibrated for a fraction of a second.  All I could do was beat on his chest in my head and scream "Seafaring men!  Seafaring men!  Idiot!"