It seemed as though the bishop was looking straight at me "Are you in debt so much as to embarrass you in your work?" What an incongruous question to ask of a candidate for ordination. It seemed so mundane, so inappropriate for such a hallowed occasion, even if it was one of the questions asked of ordinands ever since the day when John Wesley first posed it. "Are you in debt so much as to embarrass you in your work?" "Of course, I’m in debt, Bishop! Who wouldn’t be after three years in seminary on a student pastor’s salary? All I’ve got to my name is a Bachelor of Divinity sheepskin, a 1964 Rambler with 65,000 miles on it, a pocket full of credit cards, and debts! What else did you expect?"

I didn’t answer the bishop that way, of course. Neither did any of the other sixteen ordinands on t…