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Frowns and Obstruction

After resigning from the Church of England, cleric Wilkinson-Fox of Lincolnshire Village of Wragly explained why to a reporter for Australia’s Sydney Morning Herald: “The Church will not allow me to do the work I joined it to do. . . . The clergy are merely fighting themselves, rushing around madly trying to justify their existence by doing myriad little jobs. . . . The mothers’ meetings, the bazaars, the endless committees! Time and again I have begged to be allowed to get on with the job but my pleas have brought not only frowns but downright obstruction. Several years ago on a curate’s salary of £350 a year I bought an old car on time-payment. I toured about the country, collecting candidates for confirmation, bringing the word of God to people in isolated houses. I got results but when the car broke down the Church considered the cost of a pair of springs too high a price to pay for doing God’s work.”