How should saved persons vote?

There's been very little about it in the news, but some people may be aware that in the UK we are having General Election on May 7th. In fact, you wait five years for someone to publish a manifesto, and then seven (?) come along at once.

However, most of the nastiest laws that get passed do not even appear in manifestos - do you remember anyone promising us same-sex "marriage", genetically-modified babies, or sex-selective abortion? Or even "yes, ye can shove yer Granny off a bus" legislation (that one seems to have been defeated, at least for the time being). So,burn the manifestos and start again.

Rule 1: All party leaders are villains. Cameron, Miliband, Clegg, Farage, Sturgeon, that thick woman from the Greens whose name I've forgotten... I wouldn't trust any of them to feed my cat if I went away on holiday.

Two unsaved people.

Rule 2. All major political parties contain one or two decent people. Even the SNP - they must do, or the Scottish Catholic bishops wouldn't fawn on them so much. Not sure about the Greens, actually.

Well this isn't getting us very far. You may vote for a saved candidate, and find that his or her leader bites the head off hamsters and performs human sacrifices at the full moon. So we'd better think again about this.

A typical party conference.

If you go to a polling booth, you will be handed a piece of paper looking something like this (without the pictures).

Sir Jasper Babyeater-Smyth (Conservative)

Edna Bully (Green)

Brother Eccles (Saved Persons' Party)

Praying Lord Frank (Monster Raving Loony Party)

Chris Fraud (Lib Dem)

Nicholas Frogbasher (UKIP)

Moira McNasty (SNP)

Cardinal Vincent Nichelieu (World Domination Party)

Arthur Tablet-Freke (Tina Beattie for Queen Party)

Damian Thompson (Custard Liberation Front)

Sid Thugg (Labour)

Well, it's a tough call, but I rely on you to spot the most saved person in that list. If you are not so lucky with your ballot paper and you think that all the candidates are unsaved, then just write "UNSAVED", "VERY UNSAVED", "NO CHANCE OF BEING SAVED", "SAVED? DON'T MAKE ME LAUGH", etc. against all the names in turn. This may mean that your vote doesn't count, but it's perhaps the best you can do.

BBC sacks man for using the S-word

It has been reported that the the BBC has sacked one of its Thought for the day speakers, Fr Jeremiah Clarkson, for using the "highly offensive" S-word. Obviously on an invariably polite and courteous blog such as this one we cannot print the S-word in full, but for those who don't know what we are talking about, it begins with S and rhymes with "dinner".

"Stig" Eccles, a colleague of Fr Clarkson.

Said a spokesman for the BBC, "Times have changed, and language that would have been perfectly acceptable 50 years ago is now regarded as offensive. The S-word has not been used in polite company for a long time. The important message of religion is that God loves us all (or, when the Muslim speaker is on, that God hates us all), and to call someone a S... oops, it nearly slipped out, there - is grossly offensive."

Fr Giles Fraser, a seasoned Thought for the Day veteran, agrees: "When I see someone acting in a really unpleasant way - for example, repeating Christ's views on marriage - I may go so far as to call them a Bigot, but I would never insult anyone by using the S-word. After all, the concepts of Good and Evil aren't compatible with modern secular religion."

Cynthia Payne (Madame Cyn), a well-respected moral philosopher these days.

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In other news, our Boat of Fools sent its "mystery worshipper" to check out the Harvard Black Mass. It turns out that the attendance was rather small, as the publicity on the church noticeboard was unappealing, to say the least.

The Devil does not have the best advertising agency.

Some people were attracted to the Harvard church by the prospect of seeing a virgin sacrificed; however, when they saw what was on offer, they hastily made their excuses and left.

Ceci n'est pas une nonne.