It Wouldn't Be Christmas Without It

I've mentioned before how every year a priest gets into trouble for daring to suggest that Father Christmas might not be real and arousing the ire of parish parents as a result. This year the reckless dupe suffering from an excess of literalism is Revd Margaret McPhee of Stalham. Unlike other stories of this kind, Revd McPhee's denunciation was more a slip of the tongue rather than a deliberate statement, which made the inevitable apology more swift if perhaps no more palatable to parents unfazed by the cognitive dissonance involved in the whole Father Christmas business (what their children will have made of Doctor Who this year, I can't imagine). I wonder what the bishop responsible would do with a clergyperson who refused to do the decent thing and apologise for not lying in these circumstances; and also am full of admiration for the fact that one of these stories, at least, seems to happen every Christmas, regular as clockwork.