Comment 8 by Stafford Gordon :

We'll see. Their tone makes me think that there will be some backsliding sooner or later; more struggle come yet I think.

Can't be easy anyway.

Comment 9 by Sara :

Stafford -I'm curious -- what is it about their tone? and what do you mean by backsliding?

Are you suggesting the pastors might go back to religion? or that there will be backsliding in the movement?

I suspect that Stafford is correct - that when all the brouhaha has died down and these former pastors no longer find themselves at the centre of attention: courted by a world-famous atheist and his and other political organisations; but are forced to return to ordinary humdrum lives and get jobs, perhaps still in the communities which witnessed their 'betrayal'; jobs which don't accord them the respect they used to receive as a matter of course....

When they stop getting phone calls from newspapers and television stations asking for interviews. Heck, when they even stop receiving hate mail from their former parishioners and from Fox News-watching mouthbreathers....

This is when we should expect to see some of them, hopefully only a few, seeking forgiveness from their former congregations and asking to be allowed back into the fold.

Because if politics is showbusiness for ugly people, what is it that makes someone want to become a minister or vicar or rabbi? Is it a sincere desire to spread the word of God, or is it something more basic: the desperate need to be a somebody; perhaps borne from deep-seated insecurities?

If this is indeed the case, then I hope provisions have been put in place to help these people when they're no longer flavour of the month but just schmoes standing in the bus queue with the rest of us.