Catholics keep out!

It is becoming increasingly obvious that Christians - and especially Catholics - are not welcome in public life, and should know that their rightful place is in hiding or on the scaffold.

Crime scene, as seen on television.

Midsomer Murders, episode 3019. Chief Inspector Barnaby (either the one with the crazy wife or the one with the boring dog, it doesn't matter) turns up with his usual jovial cry of "Hello, George, what have you got for me today?". The pathologist, Kate Wilding, gives him a puzzled glance and replies.

"Well Tom, or do I mean John? Anyway, you can see that this chap has had his nostrils stuffed with plutonium (as it is episode 3019 we are running out of original ways to kill people), and he has been dead about six weeks."

"Let me through, I'm a priest!"

An evil cackling priest walks by. Barnaby realises that this must be the criminal, but his contract says that he must wait until there have been another three murders before finally arresting him.

Next, the British Army turns up and asks to drive its tanks all over the place where the dead body is lying. "Don't you realise this is a crime scene? Go away!"

The general in charge replies, "But China has invaded Midsomer and we are the last line of defence!"

"This is still a crime scene. Go away!"

Crime scene, in reality.

A man is dying from stab wounds. The 999 emergency services are called, "Which service do you require: Fire, Priest, or Ambulance? There's no use calling the police, they're all out on gay pride marches."

In fact the priest is the last to arrive. At the crime scene there is already a blood-crazed assassin, several witnesses, an NHS troupe of nurses doing a dance to put on Youtube, and six policemen with alsatians who wandered in having heard reports that someone had been using the wrong pronouns.

A crime scene.

"Let me in, I'm Father Brown, a Catholic priest. I want to give the dead man the Last Rites. This is a fundamental part of the Catholic faith."

"Get out. This is a crime scene. We can't have it contaminated."

A CRASH! is heard as a sergeant in size-14 boots trips over the dying man.

"On second thoughts, Rev, I'm arresting you. On television it's always the priest wot dunnit."

"I want to question you about all those dead bodies in your churchyard."

The Accelerated Dying Legislation.

To their great credit, church leaders are fairly united in opposing the proposed "Yes, you can push your granny off a bus if she's rich enough and too confused to say 'No'" legislation. One exception is George Carey, star of Carey on Killing, the retired Christian who was once Archbishop of Canterbury. But they are put in their place by a learned professor, one Alice Roberts, who has contributed two brilliant pieces to this blog in the past, namely the amazing revelations that Miracles are just a bit... unlikely and Dead people don't come back to life.

Alice hits the nail with her head on the head.

She's got a good point, hasn't she? But we should go further. People with religious views, whether they be popes (no, he won't say anything helpful), bishops, priests, or laymen - even Anglicans devoted to this blog, such as Giles Fraser and Peter Hitchens - SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO COMMENT. We welcome atheist leaders like, er, little Alice in Blunderland, BECAUSE THEY HAVE THE RIGHT OPINIONS.

Got the message, Catholics? You're not wanted. Ask Henry VIII and Queen Elizabeth I. And any Anglicans - or even atheists - who agree with you about the morality of Accelerated Suicide - why, you're just closet Catholics! Get lost!

"It's no use complaining now. Mr Gates's App said you'd consented to dying. Don't worry, we'll get the bug fixed in the next release."

Clap the Church each week!

In these dangerous times everyone wants to thank the front-line troops - bishops, priests and deacons - who are protecting us against Damnation, sometimes at risk to their own souls. So at 8 p.m. every Thursday it has been agreed that we shall Clap the Church (not "give our clergy the clap", which means something else entirely).

A bishop, priest and deacon trying to save a soul.

With its catchy slogan "Save the Church by staying away," the campaign has thrilled the hearts of all our people. The Daily Mail has airlifted an aeroplane full of "PPE Equipment" - cassocks, chasubles, stoles, albs, you name it - from China, so that our "Boys in White" (or whatever liturgical colour it should be right now) can be properly equipped.

Admittedly, clapping is not the only activity that we have seen: some people have gone further, praising bishops with sound of trumpet, praising them with psaltery and harp, praising them with timbrel and choir, praising them with strings and organs, praising them on high sounding cymbals, and even - in extreme cases - praising them on cymbals of joy.

"Unclean! Unclean!" A poor sick man praises the Church with a bell.

It has been claimed that the campaign to "Save the Church by staying away" has been a little too successful: most of the buildings remain empty. The clergy are also often under-employed, and have been seen making TikTok videos in which they dance around the aisles - to the annoyance of many devout worshippers who think they should be at the "coal-face" of soul-saving.

A typical TikTok video.

Still, these are minor considerations, and all citizens are invited to be happy-clappy at 8 p.m. on Thursday. We shall be sending the police out onto the streets to make sure you participate - not-clapping is now a criminal offence, considered to be as serious as sitting on a park bench or sunbathing in a public place! You will obey!

Religious news items

The third Pope?

To everyone's disappointment, it seems that the "third Pope" in the picture published by the Sun newspaper is not, after all, Pope Francis.

Clearly the picture shows Pope John-Paul II and a future Pope Benedict XVI, but the very spiritual-looking cardinal in the middle has so far been unidentified. It is thought that he may be even have been a Telegraph journalist who gatecrashed the meeting in disguise.

---

Pope Francis likes gerunds.

The gerund - shunned by Pope Benedict XVI.

Meanwhile, Latin scholars are ecstatic because the motto of Pope Francis, Miserando atque Eligendo, contains no less than two gerunds (verbal nouns). This is in strict contrast to the mottoes of Popes Benedict XVI (Cooperatores veritatis) and John-Paul II (Totus Tuus), who restricted themselves to elementary grammatical constructions.

Our detailed researches (5 minutes with Wikipedia) reveal that there have been no papal gerunds since mottoes were introduced by Pope Pius X, although Pope Benedict XV was widely praised for using a passive subjunctive verb in his In Te Domine Speravi, Non Confondar In Aeternum.

So far it is too early to tell whether Pope Francis is intending to make gerunds a regular feature of his future encyclicals, but Vatican-watchers are hastily buying up all copies of Kennedy's classic text, just in case.

Kennedy's classic text (two editions are available).

---

Meanwhile, over the the Church of England...

Knock knock! Who's there? I'm Justin. I know you're just in, but who are you?

This week also saw Justin Welby's enthronement as Archbishop of Canterbury. Although he could not expect leading religious figures such as Robert Mugabe or Joe Biden to attend, since their place was in Rome, Archbishop Welby also enjoyed a most impressive service.

Ha ha ha, no, we're still against abortion and same-sex marriage, Mr Biden.

In his homily, Archbishop Welby was careful to avoid all controversial topics such as religion, good and evil, etc., instead focussing on some of the other riches associated with the Church of England.

Liturgical dancing from the Little Sisters of the National Health Service.

Meanwhile, Queen Elizabeth, as Supreme Governor of the Church of England, naturally had an important role to play in the service, as she parachuted down to Canterbury Cathedral.

"At least Rowan Williams allowed me to arrive by car."