slang term for a member of the Anglican
Church who favors and is at times outright preoccupied with Anglo-Catholic ritual and observance and is a general know-it-all and
smart ass about all such matters. Often characterized as a fussy, effeminate younger male, either clergy or layman.
The term
may have arisen from humorous observations on the extreme inflexibility and "uprightness" of such individuals as well as their tendency to be very temperamental, or spiky.
He loved candles, bells, incense, fiddleback chasubles; the whole liturgical nine yards. He couldn't
imagine church being any other way. In other
words, a classic spike.