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Kinsolving's training in the Chronicle city room, where Managing Editor Gordon Pates calls him "the smart-ass reverend," has prepared him to handle critics. When five Chronicle newsmen received mail-order ordinations from Kirby Hensley, president of the Universal Life Church, Inc. (which claims some 700,000 ministers, including two cocker spaniels), they posted a note: "If anyone can ordain Kinsolving, why can't our leader ordain a cocker spaniel?" Replied Kinsolving coolly: "The old Chron's department of religion has no more objection to Dr. Hensley's ordaining one son of a bitch than to his ordaining any others. Peace be with you."