Readers may recall last month’s account of how a visiting vicar burst into flames during communion at Pauntley, and of how a disaster was averted by the quick action of a communicant in beating out the flames with his walking stick. This month Pauntley Church is once again in the headlines as it was the Palm Sunday destination for Esau the Dymock donkey. At thirty six Esau is past his youthful best, but still had the strenght to carry the boy Jesus (from Dymock) down the lane and into the church. He even did not forget to bob his head at the altar before being led outside to graze whilst the rest of the procession stayed inside.
Palm Sunday was cold and wet and the porch outside the church was full of Wellington boots as walkers changed into shoes before entering. The last man to enter the building was ‘fresh’ from the lambing pens and, like the others, took off his wellies and tiptoed over the ice cold flagstones prior to putting on his shoes. As he sat down his wife gave him one of those wifely ‘why are you the last one’ glances, but then stared as he opened his Tesco bag only to discover that he had lost a shoe on the walk down the lane. Whereupon he tiptoed out again and came in with his mucky wellies which he put on.
All went well until the point in the service where the congregation file forward to the altar rail to kneel and receive communion. A dilemma was apparent and he hesitated. Should he kneel at the altar in dirty Wellington boots or walk up the long cold nave in just his stockinged feet. For a moment the problem seemed intractable until he realised that he had put on brand new socks that morning and so they were not, as he put it afterwards, “un-holey.”
The preacher told us that Esau must be like the young colt that the early disciples had persuaded a reluctant owner to lend to their master who needed it to ride into Jerusalem. He then told us that he had spent thirty years as a vicar in the East End of London and that one Palm Sunday he came out of church to find his car being broken into by one of the congregation. “What do you think you’re doing,” he cried. Whereupon the miscreant shouted back, “The Lord hath need of it.” At this the Vicar was propelled into action, and seizing the young man by the collar yanked him out of the car with the words, “Well go and tell him to …….. borrow somebody else’s.”
It is unusual nowadays to find animals in public places and so the sight of Esau the donkey in Church reminded me of how an old farmer friend once appeared on TV because he regularly took his pet Gloucester Old Spot with him to a local pub. The reporter sat smilingly as Allan fed the pig a bottle of Guinness with a teat attached, and then chortled as ‘Spot’ snuffled in his master’s pocket for Polo Mints. His demeanour changed however, when the pig saw its chance, and promptly stuck its snout into the reporter’s tankard forcing his hand to bend until the glass was empty. Afterwards the Landlord remarked that Spot was, “Welcome in the pub anytime, as he always behaved like a gentleman,” “ ….. Not like Bob the horse who knocked tables and chairs over whenever he drank a pint or two.”
View from the Pew 