HE DID NOT get round to having his hair cut for nearly nine months, and some members of his congregation started to complain. The Vicar, the Revd John Leonard, tells me he was taken aback by such personal criticism, but countered it by saying he would have a sponsored haircut to help pay for the church-roof repairs.

Then it emerged that some people liked his hair long (it is, he says, “strawberry blonde”, and he has quite a bit of it for someone past 60), and a division arose among his three churches of Kingskerswill, Coffinswell, and Abbotskerswell in Exeter diocese. So Mr Leonard offered another proposition to the three congregations: he would either have a sponsored haircut, or have his hair dyed purple for Lent, whichever raised the most money.

The purple dye won, and on Shrove Tuesday a hairdresser came to the church to colour it for him (above). It was cold, he says, waiting for the dye to set before his hair could be washed, and the result turned out rather more blue than purple because he was advised against bleaching his hair first.

So far, the sponsorship has raised £1200, but added to it is another £5000, which a bereaved family, for whom he conducted a funeral, wanted to give him to keep his hair long, much to the dismay of Mr Leonard’s wife. But he will compromise, he says, by having his hair trimmed neatly in time for Easter.