Renewal of vows

Here at the Church of St Daryl the Apostate, in conjunction with ACTA, the Tablet Newspaper and the Tina Beattie Foundation for Extreme Silliness, we recognise that Easter is a time to renew our vows, or more precisely to make some new, more modern, ones. Therefore, I ask:

Do you renounce all that happened in the Catholic Church prior to the 1960s?

We do.

Do you renounce all that stuff in the Bible written by bronze-age goat-herds, in particular the four Gospels, which obviously need updating for modern secular Catholicism?

We do.

A bronze-age goat-herd learns that he is simply not up-to-date.

Do you believe in the Spirit of Vatican II, who came upon us and told us to preach many new and exciting things which were beyond the wildest dreams of those who were actually present at the Second Vatican Council?

We do.

Do you believe in those Saints of Modernism, Annibale Bugsbunni, Carlo Maria Spartini, and Basil the Lofty (who some say is not just an old bearded man in the sky, but alive and resting in a bothy somewhere in Sutherland).

We do.

"What's up, Doc?" asks Annibale Bugsbunni.

Do you believe in the blessed Hans Kong, he who has written 295 books telling the Catholic Church why they are not saved and only he is saved?

We do. O Worship the Kong.

At this point the congregation will light their Hans Kong candles.

Do you believe in the blessed Professor Tina Beastie, the world's leading expert on human flourishing and avant-garde post-modern neo-liberal Catholic doctrine?

We do. Wonderful woman.

Surely "from long-windedy Beatties"?

Do you praise the Tablet, the National Catholic Reporter and all other organs of liberal Catholicism?

We praise them. Of course we don't actually read them.

Do you renounce all the orthodox Catholic blogs, such as Protect the Deacon, What did the Pope really say?, The Hermit of Continuity, and Father Ray Bloke?

Verily, they are a thorn in our side.

Nasty traddies seeking to prevent dialogue in the Church.

We now come to some ACTA-specific vows. Do you live in fear?

We live in fear.

What do you want?

We want dialogue!

When do you want it?

Well, now would be a good time to have a chat with the bishop, although it seems that he's blessing the lesbian knitting circle this afternoon, and then he's got a joint service with the Freemasons, and we mustn't forget that he's conducting a circle-dancing class this evening...

Finally, some vows of modernism. Do you renounce Latin, a language spoken by Nero and Caligula (here he may name other famous nasties who spoke Latin)?

We do.

Do you swear always to worship God in English, except when we have joint services with the local Maharashtran community, when we may have a Mass conducted partly in the Marathi dialect, for convenience?

आम्ही करू.

पवित्र जिव्हाळ्याचा परिचय एक विलक्षण मंत्री (An extraordinary minister of Holy Communion).

Do you abjure Gregorian chant, hymns written by dead people such as Charles Wesley and John Henry Newman, and any hymns with more than one basic idea in each verse?

We do.

Do you adore the songs of Paul Inwood, the publications of Kevin Mayhew Ltd., and all hymns where you can go "clap clap", "ch-ch" or "fizz-pop" in the chorus?

Yes.

BONG! You said "Yes". That's the end of the game.