A different lens

In her interesting book, 'Britannia Obscura', Joanne Parker explores some of the differing ways in which we can 'map' the UK. She takes the reader on an exploration of the caves of Great Britain, its waterways, its air lanes and ley-lines. Here's another way of mapping ourselves:

So far I've treated the Diocese of Peterborough as if it were co-extensive with Northamptonshire, but of course that's wrong. It also comprises the county of Rutland and a little bit of Cambridgeshire, where Peterborough itself is deemed to sit (Ely diocese actually 'owns' a portion of the city).

There are forty-two dioceses in England, each of which has a presiding, metropolitan bishop, each of them operating from 'their own' cathedral. In the case of Peterborough, take a bow, a round of applause please, for Donald Allister. As if he didn't have enough to do, he gets to sit in the House of Lords. Some dioceses (most of them? all of them?) have a suffragan bishop to help out. John Holbrook is the current Bishop of Brixworth. It's an apt title, given Brixworth's ancient pedigree as a place of worship and its geographical position, halfway along the Diocese's long north-east to south-west spread. If there weren't two bishops to share the work, no one could expect the inquisition or indeed any episcopal visit at all in the distant south.

The Diocese is also divided into archdeaconries, Oakham and Northampton. And in this case each archdeaconry is subdivided into six deaneries, which in turn are divided into the parishes which most members of the Church of England experience as their day to day spiritual/practical/pastoral/cake-eating reality. Is it coincidence there are twelve deaneries?

I can sense a yawn coming on (yours not mine) so I won't bother you with what Bishops, Archdeacons, Deans, Rural Deans etc. etc. do to earn their daily bread. Astute and intelligent readers that you are, I know you can perfectly well look this up if you don't already know.

So you can better see where I've been and where I'm going, I'll occasionally throw in some maps of the different deaneries from now on. I did ask the Diocese if they'd let me use theirs, but they said no, and offered the thought that they didn't know who owned the copyright. Strange...so you'll have to make do with my own, I'm afraid. As you can see they have more in common with the Mappa Mundi than the OS in terms of precision or artistic merit. Well, let's say nothing about the artistic merit. I haven't sussed why I can't coax a better resolution out of the image. Sorry.

Channel 4/BBC4 have thus far missed a trick. You know how they like to enliven their schedules intermittently by grouping programmes round a particular theme? What a brilliant thing it would be to give us an evening of hallmark episodes from the major TV comedy series about the Church! The Vicar of Dibley would have to be included of course, and certainly Rev but also the venerable black and white of All Gas and Gaiters and possibly Derek Nimmo's subsequent Oh Brother! Room would have to be found too for Father Ted whose charms have always passed me by, though my friend Jo, who's Roman Catholic swears by it. As a study in contrasting views of Archdeacons (allegedly the hatchet men/women of the Church) compare Robertson Hare's sherry swilling Henry Blunt in All Gas and Gaiters ('I don't mind if I do, Bishop...') with Simon McBurney's scheming Mafioso in Rev haranguing Tom Hollander's hapless antihero Rev. Adam Smallbone in the back seat of a cab, before expelling him carelessly into an inconvenient, damp London street.

Not a word of truth in any of these caricatures. Surely not.  Not even in John Barron's 'Dean of St. Ogg's'. Great fun, though.