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.

The Book of Brexodus, Chapter 9

Continued from Chapter 8

1. Many months ago, O Theophilus, I told of the bloody fighting between the children of Bri-tain as some of them strove to flee from the land of EU-gypt.

2. But let us now tell of the wondrous deeds that followed.

Cam-aaron and May-sis (renamed).

3. After many debates and votes, in which the wisest people in the land the members of parliament took part, it was decided that May-sis should trigger the 50th article, in order to cast down the Tusks and Junckers from their mighty seats.

4. And there was a great grayling and gnashing of tusks from the deepest thinkers of the land, they that sat in the New College of the Inanities.

5. "Alas, the people have voted the wrong way," said the deep thinkers. "We must have another election, in which the voices of the Leavites are silent!"

Try and be philosophical, Anthony!

6. Still, the Day of the Trigger came, and May-sis and her advisers began to speak with the Pharaoh Juncker. For they knew that within forty years they must reach an agreement on the movement of camels carrying spices, gold, and precious stones.

7. But the people cried out, saying, "We want an election, for thou hast done away with Cam-aaron the High Priest, and we did not choose thee!"

8. But May-sis said, "No."

9. And again the people cried out, saying "Thou art a chicken!"

10. And May-sis clucked, "No."

11. And again the people cried out, saying, "Give unto us an election, that we may see a dazzling array of talent presented to us on the screen that is called Idiot-Box. Yeah, the Ukipites led by whoever-it-is-this-week, the Corbynites, the Libdemites of Farron, the Nationalites who worship a sturgeon, the magical Greenites who leave no footprints of carbon, and best of all the Monster Raving Loonites.

A threat to May-sis.

12. And finally May-sis said "Oh, all right, the people may have their election."

13. And the people cried with one voice, "How cynical is May-sis, that she exploiteth the weakness of the Corbynites in such a manner. She seeketh a majority, and this is not seemly conduct for a prime minister."

14. However it was written in the ancient laws of Cam-aaron that May-sis could not call an election, unless the Corbynites voted to cut their own throats. Which they did.

15. At least, those are the words of the prophets, Comres, Mori, and Yougov. In my next chapter, O Theophilus, I shall reveal whether these prophecies came to pass.

To be continued.

A remembrance service for departed politicians

I am the re-election and the life, saith the Lord: he that believeth in me, though he were rejected by voters, yet shall he live, peradventure to return to the world by a by-election, or peradventure to enter the heavenly House of Lords. Failing that, to be blessed with directorships, consultancies, and other means by which the world poureth out money on the otherwise unemployable.

Man that is elected to parliament hath but a short time to serve, and causeth a lot of misery by his meddling. He cometh up, and is cut down, like a flower; he fleeth as it were a shadow, and never continueth in one eternal government.

Three polticians (two of them also walking dead) remember the fallen.

Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God, in his wise providence, to take out of parliament the souls of our deceased brothers, we therefore commit them to the dustbin of history; earth to earth, ashes to ashes, toast to toast; looking for a general re-election on the last day of the new administration.

We remember in particular the following brothers who have been taken from us:

Edward Edwin Edgar Edmund Balls, he whose testament to the world, "Ed Balls", is forever remembered in "Ed Balls Day". Although his cutting off leaves the House of Commons emasculated, may the holy day of April 28th (or, if the bishops choose, a convenient Sunday nearby) ever be used to remember him; yeah, even when his works have faded into history and the deficit is no more.

Ed Balls, clad in robes of white.

George Saddam Felix Galloway, many times winner of the "most obnoxious man in politics" award. Well, the less said about him, the better. May he be granted seventy-two virgins in Paradise, preferably Jewish ones.

Possibly the last we shall see of George Galloway. I'm an optimist.

Vincent Nijinsky Cable, dancer extraordinaire and politician ordinaire, he who was unplugged before his time; and Mark Lemming Reckless, of whom we never heard until he decided to sing a new song to the Lord, which proved his undoing.

And there are many others, mostly dressed in robes of red and yellow, whose names are already forgotten.

I heard a voice from Heaven, saying unto me: Write, From henceforth blessed are the dead who are thrown out: for they rest, and we have peace from their foolishness.

"Mwahahahahaha!" Sometimes the undead come back to haunt us.

The priest is asked NOT to mention wailing and gnashing of teeth, even though there is a lot of this going on in BBC interviews, etc.

[At this point Messrs Cameron, Miliband and Clegg will lay wreaths at the eight-foot "Edstone". Mr Cameron will endeavour to stop giggling, before departing to visit some more fish markets. Mr Miliband will trip and fall, before leaving to seek spiritual advice from the Venerable Brand. Mr Clegg will depart in a taxi with the rest of his MPs.]

Life goes on: Theresa May teaches liturgical dancing to a group of new MPs.

A saved person goes to vote

Holy water? Check. 
Rosary? Check. 
Crucifix? Check. 
Missal? Check.
Thurible? Check. 
Right, it's off to the polling station I go.

So, guess which one I voted for?

In fact, I got to vote twice today, once in my own right, and once to cast a proxy vote for a family member who had fallen down some stairs and sprained his ankle. He gave me explicit instructions how to vote in both the local and general elections, but he added a request that I adorn his ballot paper with a rude and naughty poem about Ed Miliband. Apparently, this would not invalidate the vote, but I didn't fulfil that request. Maybe that puts me in breach of electoral law? I don't know.

An unfortunate (double) lookalike. Fr Ted and Nicola Sturgeon.

It was a glorious day as I walked along the street to the polling station. I passed a yellow sign telling me to vote Lib Dem, then a red one for Labour, and a blue one for Conservative, and a green one for, er, Green. No UKIP ones, as it happened. Surely they couldn't all be right? No, of course not.

The election literature gave me a clue: "Joan Tharg cooks a delicious baby for her dinner. Fred Barg helps a constituent raise the money to send his granny off on a surprise trip to Dignitas. Alex Warg explains lesbianism to the St Vincent's Primary School Reception Class. Mohammed Xarg raises £5,000 for ISIS." I was beginning to suspect that all my candidates were grossly unsaved.

The "Savedometer" for analysing the swing between saved and unsaved candidates.

In the end I did find one candidate who was slightly saved (let's say, more saved than Professor Tina Beattie but less saved than Bishop Mark Davies), and voted for him. However his leader is definitely a very unsaved person. My only consolation was that my vote could only make a real difference if the majority in my constituency was 0 or 1. But it's not a happy day for a saved person.

As the old story has it, we shall have three possible hymns to choose from tomorrow:

Now thank we all our God.

O God, our help in ages past.

God moves in a mysterious way.

Christian Comment at election time

Deacon Donnelly, formerly a protector of the pope, has had a "Christian Comment" article banned by the prestigious Barrow Evening Mail, because of its political content: apparently the suggestion that Christian belief might actually be relevant for those wondering how to vote was too much for the newspaper. The Evening Mail claims to be in pre-election "purdah" - itself a Hindu/Muslim notion, involving the editor covering her body and retiring to a secluded room.

The Evening Mail's ace reporters on the streets of Barrow.

Admittedly, the Evening Mail has had an exciting week, with many more interesting news stories to cover, and it may simply not have had space to publish the Nick Donnelly piece, provisionally entitled Help! All the candidates is unsaved persons. Take, for example, this story, which gave the newspaper a "Hold the front page" moment, involving all the staff working overtime.

A story soon to be taken up by newspapers worldwide.

The deacon's full article can be found here, but as a public service we publish a revised version, which should meet the rigorous journalistic standards of the Barrow press.

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Every General Election I am faced with a dilemma as a Christian – which candidate and political party can I vote for in good conscience?

Well, they're all jolly good chaps, aren't they? Labour's wonderful - very sound on making sure that all kids are adopted by gay couples! Killing off baby girls - that's another nice one! My heart warms to John Woodcock - a great man and a great star. He reminds me of many of my favourite Biblical characters such as Cain, Jezebel and Herod the Great.

Then the Liberal Democrats and Green party are even better! Abimelech and Herodias would have voted for them, like a shot.

Abimelech is declared to be duly elected to parliament.

It's been really great seeing David Cameron's legalisation of same sex marriage, especially since it was a surprise that we weren't expecting! And LGBT rights are now to be taught in Christian schools, which will be much more useful to 5-year-olds than learning to read. Simon Fell is the Conservative candidate, and he's the first animal-human hybrid to stand for parliament. Well done!

He's no worse than many other MPs, to be fair.

You don't need to make a protest vote, but many of my friends who want to see the entire third world starve to death say that UKIP may be the way ahead here. An embarras de richesses, eh?

It is a solemn and binding duty to vote. Didn't Emily Davison say "I have a dream" and then spend 27 years on Robben Island fighting the Fascists in World War 2, all because she wanted to put an X against the name of some deranged half-wit chosen from a bunch of greedy, perverted time-servers? So we should do this too. But how can I choose?

See, Nick! Be nice about everyone, and they'll publish your piece. Eccles.

Sigh... here we go again.

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.