During the 1980s my friend Canon Brian Brindley was arguably the ‘highest’ clergyman in the Church of England, celebrating Solemn Masses of rococo splendour in Holy Trinity, Reading, a dreary little Victorian church on the Oxford Road. He also possessed the essential qualification of a great English eccentric: he did not know how eccentric he was.

When I was a cub reporter on the Reading Chronicle I would sometimes run into Brindley parading through Sainsbury’s dressed as an 18th-century Roman monsignor. His buckled shoes with red heels – painted by himself – clopped like horse’s hooves against the linoleum as he scoured the aisles for ever creamier puddings. I once watched him sail into a civic dinner in Reading in a cream tropical cassock with violet buttons. ‘My auntie’s got that frock,’ sang out one of the Labour councillors.

As the shadows lengthened, the butler lit the candles. The crab was magnificent

As the shadows lengthened, the butler lit the candles. The crab was magnificent

In 1988 Brindley celebrated the 25th anniversary of his ordination. Fr Anthony Symondson, a former Anglican colleague who had become a Jesuit, remembered ‘40 concelebrating priests wearing matching Latin vestments. The Bishop of Oxford’s chair was covered by a sumptuous canopy decorated with pink ostrich feathers. The function had more than an element of the opera buffa…’

A year later the comedy was over. A baby-faced News of the World reporter called at the Holy Trinity vicarage posing as a young man confused about his sexuality. ‘Brenda’ Brindley – as he was known........

© The Spectator