It’s something you don’t often see: a vicar having his photo taken with a tiger in the toilet.
But the father-in-loo has a good excuse, as he has found a bog-standard way of donating hygienic toilets to poor communities worldwide.
The Rev Chris Spittle has twinned all of the loos in his church with latrines in Burundi.
This year, he asked his congregation to put their money down the drain (literally) and create a hitlist of local toilets that deserve to be twinned.
Restrooms in nearby schools, a supermarket and an MP’s office were nominated, at a cost of £60 per throne. Churchgoers then voted for their favourites.
Their ‘guerrilla twinning’ tactics also saw some Scouts stage a sponsored sit on a toilet.
Mr Spittle, vicar of St Paul’s Church in Skelmersdale, Lancashire, added: ‘The way that it has all snowballed is rather incredible. What people love is that toilet twinning is a fun way of tackling a deadly serious issue.
‘Some 40 per cent of the world’s population don’t have somewhere safe, private or hygienic to go to the toilet. Every minute, three children under the age of five die because of dirty water and poor sanitation.’
Each twinned toilet is given a certificate, a photo of its latrine lookalike and exact GPS coordinates.
The Toilet Twinning scheme is part of a nationwide campaign ahead of World Toilet Day on November 19. Anyone can twin a toilet with one a country such as Afghanistan, Nepal, Ethiopia or Cambodia.
As the fundraising continues, it seems Mr Spittle is on a toilet roll.
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