Minutes of the Fabric Committee

1. Tartan
2. Plaid
3. Wool
4. Tweed
5. Cotton
6. Silk
7. Vinyl
8. Linen
9. Velvet
10. Nylon
11. Polyester
12. Rayon

Not Lycra

After Erwin Died, The Schrödinger Family Shamelessly Cashed in on His Ideas

Image from http://www.theguardian.com/media/2011/dec/12/time-warner-bid-endemol 

Liturgy of Socks and Sandals

Archdruid: The spring has sprung.

All: The great Watcher in the Sky has appeared above us.

Moon Gibbon Folk: Errk! The Moon Gibbon! Spare us, O Great Primate, from thy steely fangs! (They rush off into the woods)

Archdruid: No! We were just poetically referring to the International Space Station....

(Moon Gibbon Folk slink back)

Hnaef: And the Dragon ship that is following it....

(Moon Gibbon Folk run back into the woods)

Archdruid: And as the meadows swarm with butterflies, the grass grows long, the birds are mating and the whole of Mother Nature's family exalts in the fruitfulness of the land....

(Beaker Fertility Folk rush off into the woods)

Archdruid: For crying out loud. Is there anybody left?

Socks 'n' Sandals People: We are here.

Archdruid: And who are you?

Socks 'n' Sandals People: We are the Socks 'n' Sandals People.  We celebrate the new warmth of Spring, but sensibly. We want to allow the air to our toes. But not too much. Come, for the day is now and our socks are grey!  We shall run into the meadow and do the Solemn Spring Dance of the Socks 'n' Sandal People!

Archdruid: Won't there be dew on the grass?

Socks 'n' Sandal People: Good point. We'll go to the car park instead.

Socks 'n' Sandal People depart for the Car Park

Archdruid: So there's just you few left.

Remaining Beaker Folk: But where would we go?

Archdruid: You mean I have the words of eternal life?

Remaining Beaker Folk: No. You confiscated our car keys so we had to work in the Doily Shed.

Archdruid: Oh yeah. Well, blow this for a game of soldiers. Peace be with you, and keep your boots on.

Far away, across the car park, the sounds of the Floral Dance and shuffling of gravel reveal the Socks 'n' Sandal Folk are performing their ancient, solemn dance. Frogs revel in the new sun, and thank their froggy god that she never expected them to wear socks.

Beating Out the Gay Demons With Sticks

Inspired by the people running Christian gay conversion therapy. Though wary about the name. After all, some gay Christians might think it's a course on how to transform your attic into a lovely master bedroom with en suite shower room. Also wary about the description of the leader as "earnest and petite". I'm pretty sure that should be "petit". Unless he prefers petite, obviously.  Anyway, we've added a couple of new strands to our "traditional healing and wholeness" programme, with mixed results.

Bad news on our new course for people with same-sex attraction, "Beat the Gay Demons Out with Sticks". Turns out you can't.

Better results, however, on our similar course for people who are into S+M. Everybody came back for the second week.

In fact, some of them even brought friends.

The Blank, Empty Message of the Daily Mail

You know, that article of the Daily Mail I quoted this morning really tells you everything you need to know about that paper's attitude.

In the Mail's view of the world, the fact that Fr Richard Coles once did something wrong means he can't be trusted to pronounce on something now. In other words, the Mail allows nobody the ability to learn. Nobody can repent. No-one can be redeemed.

It's fundamentally the story the paper re-tells, over and over. We, the innocent nice ones, must be protected. (I presume I'm in that camp, being white, middle-class and without a criminal record). Them over there are alien, criminal, poor, disabled, unemployed. Different.

We must never think that anyone could move from one group to the other. For if a benefits scrounger gets a job, or a migrant works hard and makes a fortune, or a drug taker becomes a vicar - that will destroy the myth of unchanging order we have sold ourselves. So in challenging the ideas of the party of the establishment, Richard Coles is that most awful of things - an imposter. It must be shown that he has a Past. So things can go back to normal. Because if others can change for the better, we or our circumstances could change for the worse.

In the Mail's schema, only one thing must change. Pretty young girls must become pretty young women, so they can be displayed on the right-hand-side of the web page, for the delectation of middle-aged letches. But by remarking that these young women are 'all grown up", the paper will be able to reassure their readers that they have nothing in common with the paedophile who has just been revealed in another article.

Maybe this is why the Mail is so obsessed with health. Because, in a Mail world where nothing must ever change - what could be worse than illness? It turns working people into benefits claimants, able-bodied people into ones who get reserved car parking spaces, pilots into mass-murderers. No, we must take our vitamins, drink filtered water, eat this week's recommended set of healthy foods and not the ones we told you to eat last week, which will give you cancer. Follow our diet tips and live forever! Or, at least, till next week, when we tell you you've just poisoned yourself.

It's a vile creed. A world without change, growth, redemption or hope. A world where we are always good and right, and they are always evil, weird and dangerous. A world where you can live forever - or, at least, for an extra few weeks - without ever having to admit you were wrong.

No wonder it's so popular.

Right to Buy for Vicars

Curious piece by the Daily Mail, apparently saying Revd Richard Coles can't criticise the Tories' ridiculous and un-Conservative plan to steal homes from Housing Associations to buy votes from people who want a quick win, because he used to have sex in lay-bys. Having a go at Fr Richard for his drug-taking past seems a bit rich, given the Mail's readers must be constantly off their heads on Victory V's and gin to accept the constant fear-health-scare-sexism-immigrants diet they are fed without realising it's all drivel. Indeed, if they believed the Mail's tales of benefits-stealing, scantily-dressed, disease-ridden celebrity asylum seekers, it's a wonder they can get out their doors without a stiff amyl nitrate.

But it does strike me, reading about Fr Richard's 'grace and favour" mansion (I presume the Mail thinks he does no work except on Sundays. This is really not true) that, looked at in one sense, the property portfolios of the churches of our country make the Church a confederation of Housing Associations. So I have a suggestion.

The churches should start charging a peppercorn rent for their parsonages, so that, in effect, the religious ministers of this country are sitting tenants. This means that surely, on Tory logic, they must have a right to buy. Even today, some vicarages are nice bits of real estate with development potential. And the ministers will be able, by flogging off their new acquisitions, to buy themselves a decent pension, thus saving them having to form dodgy alliances with undertakers during their retirements. And the church property departments, having released a nice slab of cash from the mortgage companies and the Government subsidy, will be able to buy nice new manses.

Which the ministers will have the right to buy.

The churches could even rent the old manses back from the ministers they've sold them to, then let them live there. After all, they still need somewhere for their clergy to live.  I reckon, if the churches play it right, they can get the Government to subsidise the whole of British Religion. I'm off to get my application in now.

Traditional Worship in the Methodist Tradition

Ah, there's nothing like worshipping in a proper, authentic tradition. In this case the Methodist Revival Service last night.

Out in the field, singing hymns with 16 verses each. A two-hour sermon threatening Hell to those that won't accept true path, and a route to perfection for those that will.

And by the end we had had three schisms, and six new denominations had been founded. I can't wait for this evening's "Worship in a 1980s Ecumenical Style", so we can put them all back together again.

Advanced Myers Briggs

When you have to build a team, it's important to understand the balance. Who's the enabler? Who's the worker? Who's the mouthy get who doesn't contribute much but claims the credit and gets the pay rise?

In recent times, Myers Briggs has been very popular in Church circles as a method for people to lie to themselves that they're basically sensitive flowers, when in fact they're prime candidates to run the Herman Goering Division. But it takes time. You have to answer questions. If you feel called to ministry, you've got to work out the right answers to prove on a scientific basis that you're an INFP.

So the Beaker Folk are happy to present the Advanced Myers Briggs method. It's quicker, and proven to be just as accurate.

Step 1: Throw three darts at this board.

Step 2: Add all the scores together.

Step 3: Make up any old drivel to express your personality.

Step 4: Tell everybody you're INFP. And therefore sensitive, spiritual and gentle.

Step 5: Sack the Quire for refusing to respect your authority.

"FivesDartboard" by Andy Roberts from East London, England - Dartboard. Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons 

The Bald Man's Prayer

Oh Lord who made both hairy and balding men
listen to my prayer.
Listen to me, you who sit among the angels
who shine more brightly than even the top of my head
in the brightness of a spring sunrise.

Do not let the youths laugh at my balding head
do not let them mock my thinning locks
or if they do,
remember how you upheld Elisha in the same circumstances.
I'm not asking for a swarm of bears
maybe just the one?
That would do.
I'm not being greedy.
I wouldn't like them to suffer too much
maybe just a light mauling.

And Lord, remember my vulnerability to the weather.
For you make the rain to fall on the hipster and the baldy alike
and rain's OK. Because it dries off quick once you're in the dry
when you're as bald as I.
But don't let me be caught in the wind
when I've left the bobble hat at home.
And don't let the sun beat down on my unlotioned head
(for it's hard to apply sun tan lotion to a scalp that's not totally bald.
If only someone would invent Factor 50 Brylcream.
Perhaps you could inspire some devout chemist who works for L'Oreal?
And most of all, O Lord my protector,
keep me from the hail that bounces off my bony bonce.
Do you have any idea how much that hurts?

And so, Lord, protect me from overhanging branches
and brambles.
and stillicidal drips
and overflying birds.

Surely I shall be on the safe side
and wear a hoody all the days of my life.
takes 10 years off you, that does.
So thank you Lord for hoodies,
flat caps and trilbies
bobble hats and bicycle helmets
but not fedoras.
Unless you're Terry Pratchett, they make you look like a prat.

Amen.

Getting Babies Through Their First Border Control

This idea that you've got to show your passport to get NHS treatment worries me.

So for maternity wards - how do unborn babies apply? If their parents apply for the passport, do they leave name, sex and date of birth blank? Do they have ultrasounds instead of photos? And at precisely what point are they requested to show the passport to be allowed to be born?

And if, when they're born, it turns out they're illegally in the maternity ward, how are they gonna be sent back?

It's gonna be a logistical nightmare, this one.

Church Sounds in Decibels

Source	Level (db)	Notes
The minister has just asked for volunteers to take the children's group this week.	-50	This is believed to be one of the few verifiable examples of religious phenomena that cannot be disproved by science. As it is the only sound of this level that can be heard, and has the effect of a blow around the head. Unless the minister has received a blow round the head, in which case the volume is irrelevant.
First 10 seconds after minister announces the plan to move the tea light stand	Zero	Sweat running down back
Empty chapel on a quiet day	20	Calm Reflection
Murmur of doves on a sunny day	30	Closeness to God
Morning prayer when only the vicar turns up	40	Vicar wakes up 3 hours later with edge of pew indented in forehead
Agreed volume the bass player in the music group is allowed to play "so as not to upset the older people"	60	Causes sulky looks and frustration.
Child in the play corner, when asked to be very quiet because something holy is going on.	70	Congregation's glasses steam up, loud tutting, vicious looks, child does not go to church any more.
Church bells, heard through an open window in the new estate on the other side of the village.	80	Complaints to the council, police and Queen by the new couple who just moved in from Hampstead. Letters to the council. Scurrilous headlines in the local paper.  Nasty looks at the husband when he tries to go for a quiet pint in the local.
Vicar's Moped at 25 feet	90	Causes complete lack of attention in motorists
Mrs Cholmondeley in the Quire	100	Probable hearing damage over 1 hour exposure. Mr Cholmondeley has used this as an excuse for years.
Thunderstorm during a service	120	Unexpected need to visit toilet, repentance, awkward questions about the minister's beliefs and sex life.
Committee has had 10 seconds to digest the plan to move the tea light stand	140	Chaos
People arriving to set up for the next service, trying to be quiet outside while the early service is still going on.	160	Disorientation, confusion, skipping of prayers.