The bishops get tough on forced abortion

Yes! Our England and Wales bishops have at last shown that they are prepared to take a moral lead! Faced with the case of an NHS trust which wishes to force an abortion on an adult Catholic woman with moderate learning difficulties (say, one step down from Diane Abbott), they did not hesitate to condemn the brutal decision by Mrs Justice (ha ha) Lieven in the strongest possible terms.

Well, they hesitated for three days. But I suppose yesterday was Sunday, and some of the bishops may have been attending church.

"On the one hand..." "On the other hand..." "There are two sides to every question." "Remind me, are we for or against massacres?" "We mustn't offend anyone, must we?" "When do we get the doughnuts?"

But finally, there came the statement we had all been waiting for:

By and large, all things considered, we think that forcing women to kill their kids may not always be the best solution. But we don't want to make an issue of it. Still, we think you ought to know that some of us are slightly disgruntled by the whole affair.

That's telling them!

Apparently a few phrases were deleted from the original statement, because the bishops could not agree on them. These included:

Brood of vipers. Blood-crazed doctors. Murder. Bunch of psychos. Jackals. They're booked for the Lake of Fire - trust us, we know about these things.

But, on the whole, we think that the bishops' statement (which will be totally ignored, anyway) has really shown those fiends where they get off. Well done, my Lords!

When the bishop's away...

I regularly monitor the "Bishop's Engagements" page of the Catholic media, just to keep an eye on our lads, and make sure that they are not participating in any gay masses, clown masses, asparagus festivals, surreptitious 'ordination' of women, Freemason parties or chats with ACTA. However, this week's notices are rather dull, as our shepherds are all away at the Bishops' Conference in Palazzola, Rome.

Getting ready for a hard week's bishoping.

In fact, the way the bishops describe their absence is very revealing. In decreasing order of holiness we find "Attends Spring Plenary Meeting and Retreat, Palazzola, Rome" / "Bishop's Conference, Palazzola" / "Pub crawl, Palazzola" / "Wild orgy, Palazzola". But the fact remains, THEY ARE ALL AWAY THIS WEEK.

This is my chance to take over the Catholic Church in England and Wales while nobody is looking.

Eccleston Square, headquarters of the bishops.

After a bit of consultation on Twitter, I came up with the following changes that seemed worth making:

1. Restore the Holy Days of Obligation to their original dates, rather than pushing them off to the nearest Sunday. Thus Ascension Day and Corpus Christi return to Thursday, and Ed Balls Day (April 28th) and Star Wars Day (May 4th) to the days on which they actually should fall. All plans to move Good Friday and Christmas to Sunday are to be cancelled.

2. Implement Vatican II, not the Spirit of Vatican II. So the altars will conveniently be moved so that the priest can face God, rather than have his back to Him. Latin will become the principal language of the liturgy, thus removing all debates about translations. Obviously statements such as "There is coffee afterwards in the Annibale Bugnini Memorial Hall" may be made in English, although we may choose to rename the hall.

3. The complete and utter banning of hymns by Paul Inwood, Kevin Mayhew, Damian Lundy, Bernadette Farrell, Graham Kendrick, Estelle White, William McGonagall, etc.

"The world is full of smelly feet." Banned from Mass. [click to enlarge]

4. All mention of Amoris Laetitia to be banned until Pope Francis condescends to tell us what it's about by answering the Dubia.

5. The instant excommunication of women 'priests', people who 'ordain' women as 'priests', people who campaign for women to be 'ordained' as 'priests', etc. Oh, and let's close down Roehampton's Department of Human Studies and Catholic Flourishing just to be on the safe side.

How many errors can you spot in this picture?

Of course, when Cardinal Nichols returns from Rome and discovers that the Church has become unrecognisable in his absence, he's likely to be a little bit cross, but think how much good it will do him.

How to be a devoid Catholic

The story so far: you are Citizen Kane, who was brought up by Jesuits and thus never had the benefit of any moral guidance. Nonetheless, when they kicked you out into the big world, they slapped a label on your forehead saying "Catholic", and you find it useful to describe yourself as a "devoid Catholic", saying "devoid" quickly so that it sounds like "devout".

"Let us pray. Only joking, folks, ha ha ha!"

Imagine your joy when Hillary Klingon - a woman known to be suffering from a thousand illnesses - asks you to be her running-mate as she stands as the Demonic candidate for President of the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave! There's just one condition necessary: you must sell your soul to the Devil.

"Whatever you say, Hillary."

Being Jesuit-educated, you didn't even know you had a soul, but it turns out that you do. Now, what are good causes for a devoid Catholic to support? Catholics for Slavery? Catholics for Torture? Catholics for Rape? Excellent... but Catholics for Choice is even better! Ripping babies to pieces in the womb... um, sounds a bit grim, doesn't it, but Hillary's all for it, so you must be too!

By all means describe yourself as "personally" a decent human being who only wants love, peace, mercy and fluffy kittens. Provided that "politically" you go for violence, cruelty, bullying and squashed fluffy kittens, like Auntie Hillary and Uncle Bill do.

"I don't like the sound of this Klingon woman."

Oh, but there's one problem. The LOTFATHOTB is full of Catholic bishops. People such as the mighty Dolan, Wuerl, and Cupich. Stout defenders of the faith. Single-minded champions of the weak. Moral giants. These people aren't going to stand any nonsense from people in public life who claim to be Catholics and then spit on the Church's teaching. You'll be excommunicated in no time.

Only joking, Tim! First they didn't come for Ted Kennedy, then they didn't come for Joe Biden, then they didn't come for Nancy Pelosi.... You're perfectly safe. Moreover, if Hillary gets in, then in six months time she'll be carted off to the funny farm, and we'll see President Kane!

German bishops recalled in mission scandal

The company Volksbischof has been forced to recall its entire stock of Catholic bishops, after tests proved that they had been deceiving people about the quality of their missions. In everyday situations there was a distinct whiff of sulphur about their teachings, which the bishops successfully concealed whenever they were inspected closely.

Unholy smoke! A German bishop leads his flock astray.

Said a spokesman, "I have had my doubts about the Kasper 2.0 and the Marx 1.6 for some time. I was also concerned that if I drove them in hilly countryside, they would rush out of control down a slippery slope without any hope of stopping. From now on I'm getting a steady reliable Burkemobile!"

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Meanwhile, in other news, Cardinal Vincent Nichols has been trying to answer this question: What do the Catholic church's most devoted members believe? As a "process of discernment", the bishops of England and Wales have been taking soundings and the results are shocking.

According to the survey, 90% of Catholics are dissatisfied with the Church. But there's more!

Vincent Nichols looks for loopholes in the Bible.

90% of the most devoted Catholics are members of ACTA, the organization for stirring up dissent in the Catholic Church.

90% of the most devoted Catholics are Tablet readers.

90% of the most devoted Catholics never attend Mass, except for special "gay" masses.

90% of Catholics are still whingeing about the word "communion" in the new translation of the missal.

90% of the most devoted Catholics want Vincent Nichols to be the next pope.

90% of the most devoted Catholics are over 80 years old.

Indeed, 90% of the most devoted Catholics say they would be happier as Protestants.

Cardinal Nichols believes that the survey is statistically meaningful; if so, then the inescapable conclusion is that the Catholic Church needs to drop its pretence of being "religious" and become a secular charity with aims similar to Stonewall or BPAS. You read it here first.

Fifty Shades of Purple

This week shows the release of (some would say) an erotic film based on the lives of bishops. With explicit scenes of dominance and discipline, Fifty Shades of Purple is already being condemned by many faithful Christians.

A typical bishop, with his instrument of correction.

As one deacon remarked: "My bishop is very keen on discipline. First he gagged me, and then he tied my hands, so I was unable to go about my usual business of protecting the pope. I was forced to submit to his wishes. I think he sees it as a form of correction."

Another bishop, with his glamorous sidekick.

We invited the author of Fifty Shades, E.L. James, onto this blog to tell us more about the story, and to explain why her main character was called "Christian", but she told us "Sorry, I'm a bit tied up right now."

As the picture below shows, some bishops are unhappy about their exploits being revealed in this way.

"We're all DOOOOOMED!" says Bishop Frazer of Walmington-on-Sea.

Still, there is no doubt that some bishops lead far more exciting lives than the rest of us: who can sit through a "Bishop's Letter" without wondering whether they rather enjoy inflicting pain on people? Our last picture shows another scene from the film: it is so disgusting that many faithful Christians are calling for the whole work to be banned.

A shocking scene of bishops engaged in unnatural practices.