European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - January 30, 1981, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Priestly togetherness Alan Decker the reverends Ann and Michael Coburn with their by Andree Brooks new York times in the midst of the Holiday season cacophony outside the stores at the Junction of Church and main streets in Christ Church Cathedral stood steadfast and a Monument to the immutability of certain Tim tested beliefs and it is in this most traditional of ins Titu rather than in the More contemporary that one finds perhaps the most dramatic result of a dec Ade of from the hushed Interior of the Cathedral a Stone corridor leads to an arched doorway that Marks the Entrance to a Small Corner office a room Over flowing with boxes and religious the clutter attests partly to the fact that it is Busy season in Church circles at the far end two desks face each other under leaded on the left sits the Michael casually dressed in a Blue a clerical shirt and Collar and Brown on the right is his the Ann also wearing a clerical shirt and but there Are notice Able feminine touches a  Brown Wool skirt and tall Brown a Blue plaid mohair poncho tossed Over that clerical shirt on her Side of the a cartoon that questions the gender of exactly three years ago last in a Blitz of National the co Burns became the first married couple to be ordained together As priests of the episcopal the ceremony took place in James Church in the Church that had taken them in after months of being turned Down by congregations not at All sympathetic to the idea of a priestly How is this most contemporary of All religious arrangement working out the each 31 years Exchange smiles and appear eager to Tell of overcoming initial derision and such As the jarring moment at their ordination when the William Loring of Johns Church in nearby Sandy Hook stood up in anger and 1 am convinced Ann co Burns womanhood is an impediment to the the co Burns Are moving right in the summer of 1979 they were offered the posts of assistant ministers at Christ Church Cathe dral Home Church of the Bishop of Connecticut and the seat of the As in they chose to take the salary and position of a single priest rather than take on two separate we tried working in two separate parishes while we were still at the said but it didst work each Parish lays in a heavy it took us in different we could not worship we could not hear each other we always had a different set of friends and visits to two jobs in the same Church at the same time is not a Likely but splitting one Job has not proved a in it has its sharing a Job As Well As a private Coburn is there is a wholeness instead of a Coburn nods Iri i think i have an under standing and a tolerance some staffers would not she we even give More because we can pitch in for each other at any i remember when i was growing continued co who is the son of an episcopal there was tension at Home Between professional commitments and private my father was always on he was consistently late for dinner or Busy at Holiday there was even friction on Christmas Day because of his the arrangement the co Burns have is particularly use Ful right they because it provides them time to raise their 16monthold a boy they called Why Noah Coburn i had been having a particularly difficult pregnancy and Noah was a sym Bol of Noah was also the Only righteous Man in his Genera added Coburn with a twinkle in his and who could ask for better credentials than that because of the Par time nature of their arrange ment at Christ the co Burns have been Able to share equally in the upbringing of while they firmly believe this sharing is Best for Par ent and they said they also recognize the arrange ment As an Opportunity to practice rather than simply preach their commitment to in the old Days it was always the Mother who was the dominant person in a Childs said some children hardly know their we Hope this wont be so with they also Hope they will impart a sense of Equality and commitment by making him part of their working As Well As their private lives father and Mother each spend one Day a week at Home with they also have arranged to take the same Day a Day emphasized at other Noah is cared for by a private Babysitter or by the babysitting service set up for parishioners at the despite what they see As the co Burns conceded that the shared life had certain i know in taking a risk in terms of personal and said when asked about his there Are Only so Many positions we can fill As a there is no such thing As a he a Rector is the priest in charge of a episcopal we Are also always listed As Par time the said their arrangement also placed pressure on their ability to maintain separate thus the birth of they was propitious because it forced them to attend More meetings and events alone and enabling them to become known As individuals As Well As a now that Noah is Here we Are rarely even in the office at the same said another consequence had been that although Coburn was the focal Point of attention at their co Burns Job sharing and coequal Par enting has made him a far greater curiosity to the outside he was recently for to speak at the Hartford Owca on the changing role of men in because it was his Day to take care of his Coburn said that she found herself calling up to ask if babysitting could be nobody had Given it a especially for a male what Mike stands for is continued he seems exceptional because he has deliberately chosen to work part time and care for his child part and he is finally beginning recognized for up until now most people automatically assumed he was being paid full time and i was filling in As his unpaid the co Burns receive equal halves of a single which comes to them in separate and they stress that their responsibilities at the Church Are As interchangeable As their chores at most of the they admit that All is not Christian Harmony and love and that a Little discord does set in once in such As the times when one of them forgets to Tell the other about a crucial be cause of Noah one of us has to cancel out to make it possible for the other to said we cant afford babysitters very who is the one who usually has to cancel out the co Burns Exchange glances and shift around in their chairs in a moment of pregnant begins Coburn it s usually a question of who can most easily cancel out and who Coburn is uncharacteristically other moments of truth they when the Babysitter lets them they the master which is kept on the Kitchen is consulted and a Compromise they said that they Felt compelled to resolve any differences quickly because their marriage was on we Are always on display As role explained there Are no buffers in this sort of we know people Are constantly watching us As a couple As Well As professionals All Day so we have to make a great Effort to be up front with each other and not let anything but we Are not trying to sell ourselves like a i think were just trying to show that marriage is still viable because there is no but at the same time there Are options and other ways of handling a Houston learning dub Lor mimics by William Stevens new York times the scene has Long been familiar to Habi tues of certain nightclubs from the catskills to Sunset from Miami Beach to Las in a Smoky room in Houston answer to Greenwich a ban sometimes heckling crowd fills every drink ing and grinning and generally having a wonderful the single performers on the Small stage up front have successfully drawn the crowd into the comedic spell they have been the Quality of the Patter is essentially unc Onvey Able except in the live so important Are timing and but a few snippets of some of the less risque routines suggest what is going Robert Hall my Girlfriend is so fat that she gets stuck in the front i got to Fly Over every Day and drop hamburgers Down the Chimney to Jack talking about the toy rocket his neigh Bors child got for Christmas Ive got the Only cat in the neighbourhood that knows what my House looks like from 300 feet in the and on How he and the neighbor Deal with crime in violence Ridden Houston in going to the grocery store cover Steve on the election of Ronald Reagan All All just seemed furan Dahal years Menzel kind of did the grapes of Wrath number my wife and a dog and a cat and five performers from Minnesota migrated for years there was virtually nothing in the Way of a significant comedy establishment anywhere along the Sun except for Miami Beach at one end and los Angeles at the the comedy workshop is believed to have been the first and now establishments Are beginning to Spring up in the Region As two recent examples Are an improvisation Andreve group in called random and a  showcase for standup comics on new Orleans Bourbon called clydes comedy no other is believed to Combine both the revues and the standup comics in such a under the same creative and business As does the Houston like other clubs of its the comedy workshop is in business to make but the main feature that sets it apart from the Menzel is that we have set it up As a learning club for whereas other people set them up As a bar where comics occasion ally come to we have tried to set up a learning going to raffle off a car we dont know which one were out in the parking lot looking for one the sometimes cruel Art of the standup cultivated and nurtured in recent years so that it is bigger than has moved out of its natural habitat on what texans Call the left and right coasts and started to invade the inner parts of the Sun it is a part of the particularly in that is not much Given or accustomed to laughing at but As Art follows Money and and what is going on now can be read As part of the maturing of a Young Region that until now has been mostly engaged in the single minded business of making entertainment today is a surging Pursuit in these from grand opera and Ballet to dancing the Texas style Western schottische and Cotton eyed Joe in shopping enter Dinean dance spots that have sprung up where Only empty Fields existed two years and that includes in this Means the comedy the Montrose spot that not Only functions As a  showcase and semiformal training ground Tor professional standup comics from All Over the Southwest and but also maintains a full time improvisational company that creates and puts on a continuing series of satirical both the Foury Earold cabaret for the revues and the 1 comic Annex for the stand up Are runaway successes in a town that for All its stature As the nations fifth largest City has blossomed so fast that the amenities Are sometimes slow in and hungered for until they both enter Prises have gathered Many kudos for their and the workshop As a whole is operating in the it has 26 full time employees in addition to some 25 Comedi ans who work on a Par time like Many another Sun Belt resident and the workshop and its Paul Are trans plants from the Menzel got his Start at a similar Dudley Riggs Brave new workshop in my Neap when he Felt the urge to go out on his he consid ered a number of places to set up his including and los but hous ton Houston was what everybody was talking be and theater seemed to be just on the upswing rather than a saturated it clearly on the Way up rather than on the Way that Falk Page 14 the stars and stripes january 1981 Bill Silva Bottom left preparing audience for an evening of standup comedians the stars and stripes Page 15