7th International Clergy Polish Correspondence Chess Championship

[David Blower]

Is anyone going to be entering this event.

[Kevin Thurlow]

Any members of the clergy that visit this forum must be made of stern stuff...

Poland is organizing the event, they welcome entrants from clergy anywhere.

[Richard Thursby]

My school chess captain (170+ strength at peak) is now a vicar, but has not had a published grade for nearly twenty years and I don't think plays any more.

[James Pratt]

The late PR Kings (King's Lynn) told me that the trouble was the clergy had much more work to do these days than hitherto. Who is Britain's strongest man of the cloth?

[Kevin Thurlow]

"Who is Britain's strongest man of the cloth?"

Don't forget they let women in now...

[John McKenna]

Some say -

http://manofthecloth.co.uk/

Women remain mainly working on the inside.

[IM Jack Rudd]

FM Nathan Alfred, rated 2209 and last grade 206, is a rabbi.

[Nick Burrows]

William Lombardy would have been a contender. John Donaldsen said he was a stronger junior than Fischer.

[John McKenna]

Another who might have been a contender -

"Henrique Costa Mecking (b. 1952), also known as 'Mequinho', is a Brazilian chess grandmaster who reached his zenith in the 1970s and is still one of the strongest players in Brazil...

His highest FIDE rating is 2635, achieved in 1977, when he was ranked number four in the world."

He was the first Brazilian to become a grandmaster...

And, in 1979, was stricken by a serious illness that caused him to retire from the Interzonal (held in Rio de Janiero that year) after only two rounds, and from chess itself, on medical advice.

He turned to (the study of the Catholic) religion and almost became a priest but, having recovered his health, he decided to make a return to chess in 1991.

(Brazil is now suffering greatly due to the virus, which even before its appearance has been helped on its way, at times, by political decisions and other forms of human agency.)

[Matt Mackenzie]

Rubinstein originally trained to become a rabbi, of course.

[J T Melsom]

If we allow religious buildings then Ezra Kirk would be a strong contender.

[Joseph Conlon]

The opening theorist Ruy Lopez de Segura (1.e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5N ) was of course a Spanish priest.