Blind Faith Obsolete phrase meaning visually challenged faith.

Burnout When clergy start preaching from the telephone book. The result of extreme overwork or excessive stress. Hiding the telephone book is not a sufficient treatment.

Camping A specialized ministry traditionally offered in the summertime. Often directed at young people. Theologically, it has the potential to teach valuable lessons about the Israelites’ 40 years in the wilderness. This is usually thwarted by the tendency of churches to place their camps in swamps, rather than deserts.

Candlelight Services A time when otherwise sensible choirs wander around in darkened churches singing with fire in their hands. This has been known to affect the quality of music.

Canon Law An ancient arms limitation treaty.

Choir Gown Robes worn by all choir members, designed to look equally ill-fitting on everyone. Generally colour-coordinated with previous church carpeting.

Evensong A song with a meter which can be divided by two. The alternatives is "unevensong", which should not be used for processionals.

Gargoyle An extremely ugly statue on a church building. In medieval times, they were intended to scare away evil spirits. Now they are intend to attract tourists. The relationship between tourists and evil spirits has not yet been determined.

Joint Services (1) Worship in a ramshackle building. (2) Worship with illicit substances, subject to police raids. (3) Worship with another congregation or denomination. In some people’s eyes, this is morally worse than (2).

Leap of Faith Bungee jumping with a Bible.

Missionary Tea Steep a missionary in boiling water for two minutes. Remove and add lemon or milk to taste.

Offertory Ritual sacrifice of a member of the British Conservative party. Now restricted to Parliament.

Organ Fund Money being raised for a transplant. Fund is often not established until long after the organ in question is in a terminal condition.

Original Sin A bad deed that no one else has thought of. There are few of these anymore since most bad things have been tried over the history of humanity. If you come up with an original sin, you should consider patenting it.

Overhead Projector A teaching aid which has become a great labour-saving device. It takes material which is clear and transparent and then ensures that it goes over everyone’s head. Theologians used to take years to learn to do this.

Pall Bearer St. Paul’s mother.

Pew Ancient device of torture, developed to make people wish they had to stand through worship, as in early centuries.

Pledge Cards Little pieces of paper used for dusting pews.

Psalter A device for sprinkling Psalt on pstews, psteaks, and psandwiches.

Redeemed What happens to coupons and Christians.

Slam Dunk A rough baptism.

Stained Glass Windows Colourful glass set into attractive patterns. When installed in a church, these prevent a congregation from gazing out the window during the sermon without having to use shutters. Some have pictures, which depict people long dead (usually from the Bible) under which are the names of different people, who died more recently. For some reason, this never confuses as many people as it should.

Temptation Something you want to do but know you shouldn’t. See Sin. On second thoughts, don’t see Sin since sin sometimes leads to temptation.

Vestments Small, white mints kept in the vest pockets of grandfathers in the church. A traditional bribe to keep children quiet during a sermon.

Women’s Groups The source of all power in the church.