Lockdown Diary, Day 7313

March 31st 2040.

Well, here we are after 20 years of lockdown caused by the Coronavirus, which keeps mutating every so often into something even nastier. The present incarnation is called COVID-39.

The latest form of the Coronavirus.

We are still allowed out to go shopping, and for exercise, but the churches have now been closed for 20 years. It is hard to remember what it was like in the old days, when we went along to St Daryl the Apostate and received Communion on the tongue (to the great annoyance of one or two pearl-clutchers who didn't actually believe in the Real Presence), or, if we wanted, did the Sign of Peace and sang hymns such as Cumberland ("Someone's eating sausages, Lord, Cum-ber-land..."). I may have got the words wrong after all this time.

Nowadays the churches remain closed, and all Masses are live-streamed. Pope Francis II (alias "Chito" Tagle) takes a very relaxed view of these, and priests no longer have to wear vestments. Many of them stay at home and stream the Masses from their bedrooms, without even bothering to choose the liturgically-correct colour for their pyjamas.

Father Brown dresses down for his livestream Mass.

Of course "Chito" takes seriously some aspects of worship, especially liturgical dancing (getting down wiv da yoof, as the 82-year-old teenager puts it) and the faithful are encouraged to skip around their houses during Mass. "Chito" claims to have arthritis and sciatica, so that kneeling is out of the question, but he can still dance the Funky Cardinal.

Late news: a new strain, the Coren virus, is infecting our brothers in the Anglican Church (having flipped between the Anglican Church, the Catholic Church, the Seventh-Day-Adventists, the Baptists, and the Pachamama Church several times during the last 20 years). It is particularly unpleasant.

The Coren virus.

Even later news: Eccles is still waiting for an answer to his "Dubia" - why was he excommunicated from Twitter?

How would God vote?

In this post about British politics we shall (as usual) take the mainstream Christian view of God, namely as the Holy Trinity of Father, Son, and Spirit. So those with imperfect viewpoints who see God as Allah, Vishnu, the Tiger God, or a bowl of porridge (the Quakers) will be disappointed.

GOD the Father

This one is easy. The Father is an authoritarian figure; indeed He produced the Ten Commandments as a definite policy. He must be a Conservative, probably even a Thatcherite. He would certainly be described as "Strong and Stable".

Allowing the vast majority of his people, except for a wealthy yacht-owner (Noah) and his family, to be drowned in a flood, is the sort of policy that conservatives can only look on with envy.

All right, there's some stuff in the psalms about the Lord being a shepherd, and people lying down in green pastures (definitely appealing to the Greens), but generally the Old Testament has little to say about carbon footprints and recycling plastic bags. So a Tory He must be.

"Vote Conservative! Mind you, I'm not all that keen on Theresa May."

GOD the Son

Jesus is easier to pin down, as He is the only one of the Trinity who is actually human. He was very keen on helping the poor, so it is not surprising that the Labour party would like to claim Him. After all, their main appeal is to poor people such as celebrities (footballers, actors, BBC comedians, etc.), doctors, professors, etc. Oh and a few ex-miners and ex-steelworkers aged about 95.

The other reason why we assign Jesus to the Labour party is that He bears a distinct resemblance to the young Jeremy Corbyn, although without his fondness for Marxism, terrorism, etc. Indeed, as a Jew, Our Lord might feel unwelcome in the modern Labour party.

The IRA theatre players with their re-enactment of the Last Supper.

Still, the "what would Jesus do" people tend to focus on His "Labour" credentials as a touchy-feely softie, rather than His habit of chastising people with ropes of knotted cord (surely a UKIP habit?) - not to mention the threats of Hellfire - so let's provisionally assign Him to Labour.

GOD the Holy Spirit

The problem with the Holy Spirit is that He (or She if you believe James Martin SJ) has never been known to make a precise statement. A lot of hot air rushing around with good intentions... well, that suggests the Liberal Democrats.

"Kumbayah, Lord," say the Lib Dems.

You'll find that the people who mention the Holy Spirit a lot (especially when implying that Christ's teaching could do with a little updating) would fit in well with the Lib Dems: think of their leader Tim Farron and his "these are my principles, but if you don't like them I've got others" attitude to abortion and same-sex weddings.

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So, according to the Trinity, we must expect a hung parliament. Of course, by looking at the early church, we can find representatives of other parties: St Andrew, the Scottish disciple, would be SNP; St Peter, with his suspicion of foreigners, would be UKIP, and so on.

Maybe we can get more guidance by asking a bowl of porridge.

How to praise the Lord

A sermon from Fr Arthur of the church of St Daryl the Apostate.

Many of you will have seen the Pope's recent homily on the fruitfulness of praise, telling people not to despise good people who praise the Lord in a spontaneous manner. Deacon, would you mind holding back on your spontaneous cries of "Hallelujah! I been saved!" for a few minutes, so that people can hear me preach? Just go back to sticking pins in that wax dummy of Brother Eccles. Thanks.

Fr Arthur releases an "emu of peace".

Now, we in the church of St Daryl interpret the Pope's words as meaning that you can sing whatever you like, and it is acceptable to the Lord. There's no need to look for good hymns with well-constructed melody and harmony, with verses that rhyme and scan appropriately, and which contain at least one new idea in every line. No, the Lord likes it if we sing "Walk in the Light" thirty times in one hymn, without ever bothering to analyse what walking in the Light actually involves, or why exactly it is a good thing to do. The same applies if we sing "Kum ba yah" thirty times. Who needs the intellectual hymns of a Newman or Wesley? It's sheer snobbery to prefer them.

You know, the Lord wouldn't mind if we just sang "The Laughing Policeman". Let's do that now.

Oh, be joyful in the Lord!

I know a fat old policeman,
He's always on our street.
A fat and jolly red-faced man,
He really is a treat.
He's too kind for a policeman,
He's never known to frown.  
And everybody says
He is the happiest man in town!

A ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Ooo hoo hoo hoo ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Ooo hoo hoo hoo ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Ooo hoo hoo hoo ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. 

There! That did us all a power of good, didn't it? I'll bet that God was laughing too! That's the joy of praise for you, even if we're not sure exactly who we're praising here. Even the deacon joined in the chorus.

We take the same attitude to the liturgy. A committee of scholars has produced a new English translation, faithful to the Latin original. Phooey! As the great Fr Butler of Brentwood has said, the Vatican II Council (crosses himself reverently, and genuflects at the sacred name) allows us to use the vernacular, if we want to, and this means "informal, colloquial speech". Cor, strike a light, missus!

So, let's have another hymn. This one comes with a liturgical dance.

Liturgical dancing.

Chim chiminey,
Chim chiminey,
Chim chim cher-ee!
A sweep is as lucky
As lucky can be!

That was good, wasn't it? Of course in this hymn the sweep is a metaphor for all Christian people. Well, let's not be judgemental here - he represents all people of faith, regardless of what it is or whether they have any. God is indeed bringing us luck!

By the way, next Sunday we'll have one of our special "fun" Masses. The deacon and I will be dressing up as a pantomime horse - I'll take the front part of course - and we ask you all to enter into the spirit of the occasion. After all, what is a holy day, but a holiday? Let's parteeeeee....

The priest and deacon on their way to Mass.

Bad Hymns 5

Today's entry for the Eccles Bad Hymn Award is Kum Ba Yah, or, as it is known in Yorkshire, Ee Ba Gum. This is a negro spiritual, which somehow escaped from the Dawkins slave plantations and ended up as a hymn in happy-clappy churches. We had some trouble tracking down the authors, since they quite understandably wanted to remain Anonymous, but in the end we succeeded.

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The authors of Kum ba yah

E: Welcome, Anonymous. Now, what exactly does "Kum ba yah" mean?

A: It means "Come by here," Eccles, and is a reference to Revelation 22:20, "Come, Lord Jesus."

E: I see, yes, it does sound a bit like "Come by here," spoken by a Yorkshireman with a mouthful of chip butties. Why not just write "Come by here?"

A: We wanted to make it more ethnic, you know. That way it doesn't sound so ridiculous when accompanied by guitars and drums.

E: I see we get exactly 30 repetitions of "Kum ba yah". What is it about the number 30? In the previous hymn we discussed, "Walk in the Light" is also repeated exactly 30 times.

A: Is it? Perhaps we'd better add another verse or two and claim the record?

E: Now, apart from "Kum ba yah," the words are very simple. We get "Someone’s laughing," "Someone’s crying," "Someone’s praying," and "Someone’s singing,"

A: Give us a day or two, and we could come up with some extra verses, then. "Someone's sneezing," "Someone's giggling," and "Someone's snoring?"

Someone's yawning, Lord, Kum ba yah.

E: Yes, that wouldn't make the hymn any worse. Who is this "Someone," anyway?

A: Do you know, we never really discovered that! When we were writing the hymn we were distracted by some noises from next door. Our secretary, not being very bright, thought that our complaints, "Someone's laughing," and so on, were part of the hymn we were dictating to her.

E: Well, thank you very much, Anonymous. I am sure that "Someone's laughing" indeed!

Someone's laughing, Lord, Kum ba yah.