Trick or Trick: Sydney's Halloween Greeting.

“I would suggest that Anglo-Catholicism as we know it today is a later development within Anglican history. It is not part of the original Elizabethan settlement and in its current form involves a repudiation of many of the things which I would argue are at the heart of authentic Anglicanism.”

Rev. Mark “Duck” Thompson
Anglican Church League Grand-Poobah-at-Large
Diocese of Sydney, Australia

Just moments after finding this marvelous quote in the comments here, the following picture of one of Dobby’s fellow house-elves mysteriously arrived:


While his identity is unknown, the warm, happy, and welcoming expression immediately identifies him as a Sydney Evangelical clergyman eager to share Calvinist Joy with his international inferiors.

Astute Sinners will also notice he’s wearing Jensen-approved Halloween rags: despite the recent façade of support for ACNA the reality is Mordor has no respect for Anglicans whose heritage extends beyond English Puritanism. Hence for Anglo-Catholics and other “Sub-Christians” there are no treats, just tricks and more tricks. And before Dobby or his fellow Jensen family slaves impudently dare to deny this, take a look at the comments on a later post at Ducky’s blog for an idea of what those courtiers closest to the Jensen throne really feel about Bobby Duncan’s sect:

“You may well be right about the current American situation. I don't really know enough to give a definite opinion - just enough to have my doubts that evangelical Anglicans will have a continuing home in the new arrangement.”

Yep folks; that’s the head of Sydney’s Anglican Church League again. The same gang for whom the Viagravillains are giving thanks and praising God. With friends like that who needs the Vatican?

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Perversion for Profit.

I've been showing this important documentary to young people since it was first produced in 1965 by the Citizens for Decent Literature Inc. (headed up by the Concerned Christian, Morals Campaigner, and Convict (4 1/2 years - fraud, racketeering and conspiracy) Charles Keating), and it's high time all of you, my Dearly Beloved Sinners, were also enlightened by the truly impressive collection displayed here for purely educational purposes. Stay tuned to the end and no matter what your tastes you'll find George Putnam has a magazine for you.

Watch also for the subtly antisemitic depiction of a pornographer at 2:45. When you're offending people it's a vital GAFCON principle to ensure no minority is overlooked.

I'm Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Dobby squawks for his supper.

Observant Sinners will have noticed Dobby Ould indulging in a little trans-gender commenting on a truly disgraceful blog, but I’m relieved to say he’s recovered his original identity, and is once again posting in his own name on such balanced and insightful sites as Viagraville, where he’s been talking up his master’s recent expression of support for little Bobby Duncan’s sect.

Of course what he isn’t mentioning is that given Lord Volderjensen’s unfortunate gambling habit there isn’t any money left to keep paying cheeky little house-elves like Dobby, so he’s currently trying for all he’s worth to find someone silly enough to keep putting a roof over his endearing-but-creepy little head. Consequently we can all expect to see a lot more impressively slimy pieces from Dobby around the traps as the boy tries to raise his chances of grabbing a nice schismatic piece of stolen real estate in ACNA should his golden future in Jensenland turn out to be really made of lead.

To help increase the chances of this happening Dobby’s rags are now sporting a subtle new message guaranteed to invoke sympathy in his American friends: if this doesn’t work his only hope will be that some generous Nigerian soul finds it in their homophobic heart heart to send food parcels...



I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

+Mark Lawrence gets logical.

Try as I might I still haven’t been able to get the problem of little Bishop Lawrence’s address out of my head: what exactly is the man going to do that he hasn’t already done? Permit any congregation wishing to leave for ACNA to take parish assets with them? In which case do you think he’ll let me also steal something: I’m not sure his car is suitably macho for a man of my stature, but I have heard his wife is a very good cook, and as long as his computer isn’t running Vista it’s now mine, y’all understand?

Mind you, I think I may have found some idea of what’s behind the process which might for brevity’s sake be referred to as his “thinking” – on page 7 of the address little +Mark claims homophobia is something “even the Natural Order reveals”. As Biblical Christians everywhere should know “Natural Order” (+Mark quite correctly capitalizes this proper noun) is something (someone?) to which Jesus repeatedly referred, and which he saw as even more influential than His Father, whom He depicts as a fairly minor figure by comparison.

Nor am I so spiritually tactless to mention how important appeals to “Natural Order” were in the promulgation of anti-miscegenation laws, or their part in the argument against letting those not of Martyn Minn’s ethnic persuasion be anything other than cleaners in the Nigerian Anglican Church. In fact I’ve a long history of supporting the notion of “Natural Order”: a few years ago I discovered that the Dani people of the Baliem Valley in Western New Guinea believe “Natural Order” dictates all men over the age of puberty should go about their daily business clad in nothing more than a penis-gourd, and as a result did everything within my power to see this clearly natural practice introduced to Ichabod Springs.

Sadly we had to abandon the practice once winter came; the cold resulted in things becoming humiliating for even a man of my estimable Doctrinal Dimensions. Still, there’s no denying the logical consistency of my stance, and given the climate of South Carolina is a little more temperate than that of Ichabod Springs I’m certainly hoping to see the dear Bishop and his followers abandoning synthetic fabrics in favor of honestly grown natural sheaths from the Lagenaria siceraria plant (although many of my Conservative brethren may find the smaller Nepenthes mirabilis a more comfortable fit).

Additionally we can all expect them to boycott dentists, to forgo the use of anesthetics in surgical procedures, and to rejoice in a world where even the most minor of infections can frequently prove fatal. What could be less part of the “Natural Order” than modern medicine? The Church Fathers certainly never contemplated circumventing an honest dose of gangrene with some contemporary piece of pharmacological tomfoolery: you’d better believe they could recognize the “Natural Order” when they saw it oozing out of somebody’s leg.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Bishop Mark Lawrence announces Nothing.

Can somebody out there please explain exactly what Bishop Mark Lawrence means by announcing that he and his Diocese of South Carolina will “begin withdrawing” from the Episcopal Church into which he was ordained, and by whom he was consecrated Bishop and given the pointy hat of which he’s clearly very proud?

I’ve read and re-read his convention address, but still can’t find much more in it than a collection of rather meandering anecdotes. While there’s no denying these prove he’s reasonably entertaining for a Bishop (it’s not as if the standard's very high), and the story he attributes to an anonymous Nun involving an angel kissing newborn infants on different parts of their anatomy certainly helps explain my childhood nickname of “Tripod”, none of these shed any light upon what +Lawrence intends to do other than to keep whining about God's love for people irrespective of their sexuality.

Nor does anyone here at St. Onuphrius’ have any idea. Consuella thinks the whole thing is just a ploy to stop little Rev. Steve “My dirty pants don’t stink” Wood (ever thought that maybe the only reason people didn’t complain about your stench was that good-old southern courtesy kept them from saying anything, hey Fr. Steve?) and his congregation from running off, although it does seem an awful lot of effort to go to in order to hang on to just one parish. After all, it’s not as if the hotel chambermaids are going to miss changing Rev. Wood’s sheets if he’s no longer a delegate to General Convention.

Evangelical Eric, on the other hand, thinks “this will be sending a tremendous message”, although like the conservative sites from which he’s stolen this cliché, he’s got no idea what that message is. Then again he’s still just miffed because I sold the pain-relievers he was prescribed after surgeons reattached his foot. While filling the parish Hummer I’d got talking to a couple of long-haul truckers who were having trouble sleeping at the end of a run, and dealing a little pastoral assistance was the least I could do; my foolish Curate still can’t get it into his head that being in ministry means not always putting oneself first: I'm beginning to fear he may be in some way related to the Ould family.

Meanwhile Bishop Quinine thinks the whole address was allegorical, and has found more hidden meanings than Dan Brown at a Shriner’s meeting. Personally I’ve got no problems accepting his theory when it comes to +Lawrence’s bit about squirrels running through hollow branches (read the address if you don’t know what I’m talking about) being a covert reference to something distinctly unhealthy involving gerbils, although what Bishop Quinine reads into the paragraph about some woman moving into a bedroom down the hall is too much for even Kendall Harmon to contemplate. Although I dare say David Virtue would be more than interested in buying the film rights.

Personally I think the most likely explanation is that +Lawrence is just trying to follow my example of sitting on the fence and playing everyone off against each other. It’s highly probable that he and Mrs. Lawrence like nothing more at the end of the day than to snuggle up to each other in bed and in the quiet of the evening meditate together upon my Sound Bible Teaching; and doubtless this is where His Grace discovered his new strategy of pretending to not really be part of the apostate liberal church hierarchy while still continuing to enjoy the perks and kudos associated with being a real Prelate, as opposed to just being one of countless pretend ones in a pretentious new sect operating out of Pittsburgh.

How long he’ll be able to keep fooling the ECUSA hierarchy in this way is another question. Playing off the ACNA crowd will be easy, since not only are none of them the brightest lanterns on the boardwalk (or else they wouldn’t have let little Bobby Duncan talk them into throwing away their vocations), but like any desperate huckster they’ll keep smiling and pretending to be friendly for as long as there’s even the faintest hope of making a sale. However the Presiding Bishop is made of smarter stuff, and if +Lawrence thinks he can keep her at bay for long by sticking his fingers in his ears and hiding with Teddy in the toy box he’s in for a very big surprise.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Modern Evangelicalism: the Vista of Church Operating Systems.

As faithful Sinners will recall my computer was recently destroyed as a result of a certain curate’s carelessness during our recent parish excursion; despite little Philip Ashey’s famous comment about “blowing things up” it’s obvious clergy today aren’t taught to take same care when handling explosives as they were in my day.

Fortunately Eric’s first compensation check has finally arrived from the Diocesean Insurance Scheme; we told them he was injured as a result of a freak thurible explosion, and since church officials everywhere are taking so much trouble to ensure there’s no doubt about parish property and infrastructure belonging to the diocese they had no choice but to accept liability. Consequently I’ve just used his money to purchase myself a magnificent new multi-media laptop as replacement for the one he ruined, parts of which were blown so high I believe they now can be officially classified as space junk.

Now I know the majority of my readers are Apple aficionados, and I’ll admit my original intention was to join you over there on the smug side of computing’s great divide. However Brother Richthofen and his friends from Seminary have spent a great deal of time pirating the software we use here at St. Onuphrius’, and abandoning all the dishonest fruits of their honest labor seemed churlish to say the least. Consequently I succumbed to the call of my unceasingly pastoral heart, and remained true to dear Bill Gate’s bloated and inaccessible (but easily hacked) vision.

Thus the World’s Greatest Doctrinal Warrior currently finds himself locked in a desperate battle with the astonishing monster known as Vista: I know I should have been more suspicious when the only good thing the salesman could say was that I’d qualify for a free copy of whatever it is that’s superseding the system I was buying, but having spent many years wrestling with Windows thought Vista couldn’t be that bad.

Dearly Beloved Sinners, it’s not often you’ll hear that I was mistaken, but on this dark instance it’s true that I most certainly was. Vista isn’t that bad – it’s worse. Much worse. If I’m told just one more time that “You don’t have permission to access that folder” when it’s something on my USB drive that I created and have used nearly every day for more than a year – and this after first responding to no less that four pop-up windows asking “Are you sure you wish to continue?” (No you hexadecimal pillock – what I’d really like to do is waste an entire day answering mindless questions from an operating system.)

Yet as I’ve been coming to grips with one of the stupidest inventions since uranium-powered cars (“Hi Hank – from up here in the traffic chopper things look pretty good on the roads this morning, with just one small freeway incident that’s reduced a third of the country to dust and looks like causing a nuclear winter which’ll to make things kind of overcast for the next twelve millennia.”) it’s occurred to me that Vista is actually exactly like today’s Evangelicalism.

Just like Vista, modern Evangelicals are a shallow pastiche of their heritage. Yesteryear’s Evangelicals may have campaigned for some rather foolish causes, such as an end to the employment of children as chimney sweeps, but they also struggled long and hard to build up parishes which at the time nobody wanted. They were once a movement which fought to proclaim Christ in the darkest of places, and which was fearless in breaking new ground; today their specialty is “upgrading” those who’ve already heard the Gospel elsewhere.

Indeed, the Evangelicals of old may have often been unwieldy, and at times quite comical, but there’s no denying that given the right circumstances, like earlier versions of Windows they did actually work. Whereas both their descendants demand a bloated infrastructure to do little more than tell everyone how much better they are than any of the alternatives. And both cases their maker’s documentation suggests they’re already redundant.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

An emergency call regarding a large balloon.

Hello, you’ve called 911. How may I help you?

Please…you’ve got to help! The balloon... it was tethered, but it ’s lifted off… and they’re all inside. Help!!

Ok Sir – can you tell me your name please?

I’m His Holiness the Most Venerable Primate of the Province of the Anglican Church of North America, His Grace the Ineffable Reverend Robert William Duncan, Defender of the Orthodox not Part of Some Previously Communist Foreign Place, International Scourge of Homosexualists, Pinup Boy of Smooth-Faced Schismatics in Binghamton, Global Inspiration and Savior of…

Uh-uh – you’re who?

The guy with the funny eyebrows who used to be Bishop of Pittsburgh.

Oh right – him. And how can we assist you?

I’d built a balloon... It was supposed to carry a whole bunch of Newman impersonators lacking his integrity, insight and intelligence away from Anglicanism, and into my sect. But it’s taken off too early… and I think they’re all onboard.

Right… I see… Where are they at present?

Somewhere lost in the clouds. Probably all headed for Rome!

Ummm.. Sir? They’re headed where?

I told you, ROME! It's full of hot air and it was supposed to carry them to me, but it’s taken off too early AND THEY’RE ALL INSIDE!!

Can you see this balloon at present Sir?

Little Jack Iker thinks he can. He’s sent a message warning them against making any “hasty decisions or quick resolutions” to land without considering the ramifications… but he’s no longer in a position that anyone takes seriously. Besides, as far as thhe Vatican’s concerned he’s just another layman. The Forward in Faith boys were going to bring them all here, but…

Excuse me Sir, but I’m having problems understanding this. Are you sure all these people are actually onboard this balloon? Emergency services have already been notified, Sir, but I need to check these people are not just all hiding in the basement, or…

…OF COURSE they’re not in the basement!!! Please!!!!! I’m from ACNA – not some pathetic reality show!!!

…or have you looked for them in the closet?

…CLICK…

…Sir? Are you there? ... Is anyone still on the line?...

I'm Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Hey ho, hey ho; It’s off to Rome we go.

Dearly Beloved Sinners will know that when it comes to realignment I’m happy to sign up with anyone willing to throw a few a few benefits in our direction. Dear me; for a time St. Onuphrius’ was even part of the Hare Krishnas until none of us could stand anymore of the gas all their crappy free curries were giving Evangelical Eric: I’d always thought potatoes and chilies originated in the Americas, so why Vishnu and his fellow multi-armed blue deities are so obsessed with their followers eating these in some moldy combination was something I was never able to ascertain.

Consequently it shouldn’t come as a surprise to I've already begun trying to find out what the Vatican is prepared to offer: news has just broken that they've become the latest group of schismatics to try their hand at grabbing a bit of Anglican property. Mind you, we did pinch most of our assets from them in the first place, and all they seem to be interested in trying to steal is clergy, so it’s not as if they’re after anything particularly valuable. In which case my Curate is bound to be of interest: hopefully he'll fetch at least a few bottles of Chianti and decent pasta.

Unlike the Roman-Romans, it appears the new Canterbury-Romans will be permitted to remain wedded in holy matrimony if they were so entwined prior to their ordination: although whether the ordination to which this refers is the one which Anglicans think valid but Roman’s deny, or the subsequent recognized by Rome but considered superfluous by Christians is something I’m not too clear on.

Then again, there’s a lot about this proposal I’m not too clear on, although there’s one thing of which I am certain: marriage (at least of the kind at which Benny Ratsfinger is prepared to let his boys don their man-lace and officiate) isn’t exactly a big concern with most of the chaps interested in swimming the Tiber. Which is fine with me, but may prove something of a shock to His Holiness a few years down the line. ++Rowan William’s plan to drop one of his largest groups of troublemakers in somebody else’s basket might help him fracture the strange ultra-Evangelical/über-Tractarian alliance that’s been keeping women down, but give them a little time and great many of those switching sides are going to find their closet is still a closet. Just because the new one was made in Rome won’t make it any the less constricting. In fact it might even be a whole lot worse...

I'm Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Perhaps air freshener would hide the stench?

There are some services, such as dentistry or embalming, when it’s always advisable to engage the services of a professional rather than attempting to fix the problem oneself. Other matters, such as, for example, explaining the loss of a paltry $160 million, can be handled without outside assistance – but only if you’ve either got a degree of expertise in the field, or you’re a cult leader dealing with a large number of really gullible disciples.

In little Archbishop Peter Jensen’s case it appears he’s not leaving anything to chance: not only is the GAFCON faux-primate attempting to generate his own oily cover up, but he’s also engaged a personal spin-doctor (no sense wasting what little money remains on anything trivial, like clergy stipends); an almost-famous journalist who formerly worked the graveyard shift on an all-news public broadcaster, and who in the course of this cutting-edge role on occasion communicated to as many as several dozen people, some of whome might even have been actually listening.

Now I’ll be honest about this: I prefer to not mention the Diocese of Mordor in any of my homilies more often than once a month. A most dear great-uncle of mine was on a number of occasions convicted of practicing proctology without a license, and referring to Jensenland more frequently than this gives the unpleasant feeling that I may be starting to follow in his footsteps. Yet in this instance little Peter’s potential Pullitzer prize winner (he also occasionally filled in on Sunday afternoons when rain cancelled the football) has set a new standard in gloss too bright to ignore: with the finesse of a flat-footed ballerina his weekly news summary segues his whitewash (“the effects of the GFC”) into a report that “one in three Australian families had faced some financial hardship in the first six months of this year” (not as big as the Sydney Diocese’s, they haven’t), after which (see point 3) he attacks American Lutherans in one of the most charming examples of the timeless GAFCON principle of ignoring any inconvenient planks in one’s own eye since Nigerian Christians cast the first stone at western “immorality” while torturing and murdering children accused of witchcraft. (Special thanks to the Beloved Sinner who sends me links like that one: nothing so effectively puts little Martyn Minns in perspective, and no doubt his canonical co-residents shall one day look truly resplendent attired in their specially selected millstones)

Yet the final word on all this doesn’t come from little Pete’s professional. Nor does it come from Noble Wolf or Alcibiades Caliban, two Beloved Sinners daring to defend Anglicanism from within the heart of Jensen’s Heretical Stronghold. No, the truly definitive comment – the one which with breathtaking naivety most effectively sums everything up - must surely be this:

“There has been from the diocesan hierarchy disclosure, honesty, soul-searching and taking of responsibility. I know this first hand and from reading what has been written.”

It’s written by little Pete’s son and heir apparent, who quite naturally doesn’t have to worry in the slightest about whether or not he’s going to have a job next year. You can find it in the comments of an hilariously censored thread here. And after all, if little Jensen Jnr. says he’s seen “disclosure, honesty, soul-searching and taking of responsibility” the matter should be settled then. Claiming he’s not capable of making an objective evaluation is a ludicrous as claiming Kim Jong-il can’t be trusted when he says he routinely hits three or four holes-in-one every time he plays.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Archbishop Jensen didn't lose $100 million after all!

From the moment I first heard allegations that little Archbishop Peter Jensen and his band of merry relatives had managed to squander a mere $100 million I knew there was more to the story than everyone was letting on. After all, these are the creative geniuses who claim lay presidency is an expression of historical Anglicanism, and who accuse the rest of the church of heterodoxy while themselves embracing a doctrine of the Trinity which would have warmed the very cockles of old Arius’ heart.

Consequently when I saw the Jensen family house-elf Dobby Ould starting a new puff-piece at Viagraville about how the Sydney ‘Anglican’ diocese isn’t really like the Third Reich (of course it isn’t – Hitler never gave all the top jobs to his close relatives!) and that the Jensenistas actually have a very positive view of women’s ministry (providing, of course, that this ministry is unpaid and involves producing plenty of babies in a life of utter servitude), I knew something was afoot.

A few days later, when Lord Volderjensen permitted Dobby to make another post regarding the liberatingingly inferior position bestowed upon women in the Diocese of Mordor, despite the house-elf’s first effort having been torn to shreds by the more liberal Viagravillains (i.e. any who believe it acceptable for female children to learn how to read), it became clear +Sydney is serious about distracting folks away from more interesting matters. Sure enough, thanks to a truly disgraceful Beloved Sinner currently trapped in the land that theology forgot, I’ve discovered why: Little Peter Jensen never lost $100 million after all!!!!.

That’s right: the whole thing was just a disgraceful falsehood designed to besmirch our favorite pseudo-primate: Archbishop Jensen and the Sydney Anglican Diocese actually lost $160 million!!!! - a full 55.4 million greenbacks more than all the apostate liberal doubting-Thomases originally thought him capable of irresponsibly wasting. Forget the paltry figures earlier bandied around: the real figures in in the local media shows how well Anglicanism’s funniest fundamentalists run their own affairs – never mind everyone else’s.

The best quote of the whole affair, however comes from dear little Bishop Falstaff: the man who would have won the race to wear the Sydney Archbishop’s business suit if only his closest friends hadn’t spilled the beans when it came to the pre-election character analysis (my contacts among the Beloved Sinners of Sydney tell me everything!). This fine Calvinist hate-monger by day and bon vivant slumlord by night (who must never be allowed out on the town with Bishop Quinine), can always be relied to bring a smile (or at very least a grimace) to everyone’s face, and on this occasion he summed things up wonderfully:

''We can't work harder but we have to work wiser, more disciplined and more prayerfully.''

Coming from someone whose idea of “hard work” involves attending a wine-tasting I can’t imagine what he's threatening by announcing life in Jensenland is going to be “more disciplined”, but you’d better believe Dobby and the other house-elfs are worried it’s going to leave scars.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Putting things back together again...

Bless me, but we all enjoyed a wonderful time at our St. Francis’s Day Dynamite Fishing Party. Unfortunately we didn’t get to catch any fish, since Evangelical Eric accidentally exploded the bait while getting it out of his car. Fortunately this only blew off his foot, so it’s not as if anyone was actually hurt – the lad can hop, after all. Even so, Consuella rightly pointed out there’s no sense in the parish paying for an expensive medical insurance plan if we don’t claim on it (especially as we'd negotiated some wonderful under-the-counter kick-backs with a local hospital - yet another reason why Obama's evil plan for fair and equitable health care must not succeed) and she ensured the wayward semi-limb was packed in ice and called the paramedics.

You’ll be delighted to learn that microsurgeons have subsequently reconnected the boy and his podiatry, although I was disappointed they failed to heed my advice and put it on backwards. I’ve always said evangelicals don’t know which way they’re heading, and this would have made for a wonderful illustration of my point.

Still, the greatest disaster was the loss of my notepad, which had been on the back seat of what was once Evangelical Eric’s car. I’d been intending to live-blog the festivities. since a parish dynamite-fishing day is almost as explosive as General Convention, and there are no boring speeches. Consequently I’m now a little handicapped when it comes to keeping up with the latest developments in the glorious world-wide schism, and even worse my important socio-theological research must once again depend on whatever our local newsagent chooses to stock on that ‘special’ shelf at the rear of his shop. Yet thanks to Evangelical Eric’s compensation payout he’ll be getting more than enough money to buy me new top-of-the-line lap-top, so you’ll all be relieved to know my inconvenience is only temporary.

Meanwhile I’m most grateful to The Lead for alerting my attention to a parish of fine Los Angeles property thieves who trashed the Church they’d been unjustly ordered to return to its rightful owners.

Rarely has there been such a clear example of GAFCON stewardship in action, and the whole account reminds me of something in Scripture. Since I’m normally much too busy teaching the Bible spend any time reading it some of the details may be a little foggy, but I recall an instance when two women brought a dispute concerning some item of petty property (it may have been a child) before King Solomon. In his wisdom the ruler with more wives than a Nigerian Rector’s warden was able to determine the true owner of the bauble by their concern for it: the real owner, Solomon decided, was the woman who didn’t care what happed to the property, the one whom announced that if she couldn’t have it then no-one should. Or something like that: you can read the story for yourselves here.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Nobel: no prize for GAFCON priorities.

Few things push the bossa-nova button on my organ as satisfyingly as a parish picnic, and this Sunday afternoon St. Onuphrius’ will be holding our annual St. Francis’ Day dynamite fishing party. Originally scheduled last weekend, the merry festivities were postponed due to a combination of inclement weather and someone tipping off wildlife conservation officers, but having contacted the relevant authorities and reminded them I still have pictures of their last visit to our Pole-dancer’s Fellowship things can now be guaranteed to proceed smoothly.

Indeed, as true Christian Sportsmen everywhere know, there are few ways of spending an afternoon more pleasant than meditating upon Our Lord’s love for all creation as His little fishy friends float stunned to the surface; their newly glazed eyes reflecting the shock of suddenly finding themselves in His presence. Perhaps it just my Franciscan love of nature, but I simply can’t wait.

Until then, and as we’re speaking of dynamite, it would be remiss to not mention the Nobel Committee’s decision to award President Obama the 2009 Peace Prize. I’m aware that my fellow Conservative bloggers have - as a Dearly Beloved Sinner has already noted - been slow to comment on this award, but that’s obviously because my weaker brethren are clearly unaware of the history behind the Nobel prize.

You see, having developed the greatest gift to angling since S.U.V. bumper stickers saying “I Fish & I Vote” Alfred Nobel wasn’t content to take things easy, to maybe just hang with his buddies and occasionally blow up an old car, or a big pile of tires down the bottom of the yard, while faithfully attending a Bible-believing Anglican Church and giving his fortune to the Rector to fritter away on legal bills and attending seminars. Instead he sadly went on to found a prize which specifically fails to reward those whose expertise is in Orthodox Bible Study. He left nothing for Spurious Church Growth, or Inciting Schism, or wearing funny hats and complaining about educated Americans. No, the only fields honored are the useless secular areas of chemistry, medicine, physics, physiology, literature, or peace – none of which help anyone achieve something really worthwhile in life – like becoming an ACNA ‘bishop’. All this prize shows is that people who don’t respect vapid self-interest recognize Obama as intelligent, insightful, and sincerely dedicated to making the world a better place. And how’s any of that going to help Bobby Duncan's sect pay their legal bills?

Besides, if the award was really for peace it would have already been given to George W. Bush Jnr. What could possibly be more peaceful that a couple of dead Iraqis laying on a pile of rubble? Or 19yr old kid from Kansas whose gamble on dodging an IED in return for a college education didn’t quite pay off?

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Obama and the Olympics: The Christian Perspective.

Regular readers will know I’ve never said so much as a single bad word about President Obama – even if he is a pagan son-of-perdition who’s not really an American (and Bishop Quinine knows for a fact that the President is really a shape-shifting alien lizard who kidnapped Elvis). Still, my Christian courtesy to the one God has mistakenly appointed to rule America until 2012 (when President Palin shall be sent to deliver the world from this temporary triumph of reason and compassion over fundamentalist rhetoric) must in no way be mistaken for any kind of tacit support for the socialist monster currently preparing to devour our children (although not, it grieves me to say, any of those for whom I am liable to pay child support).

Consequently there's no doubt I’d like to add my voice to those well-meaning and politically-balanced individuals condemning him for losing America the 2016 Olympic Games, and I fully understand they’ve reached their conclusion through conducting an entirely objective review of the facts, but as a servant of the Truth I must on this occasion disagree with them – even though that doesn’t in any way diminish my prayerful support of their moaning.

After all, anyone could have seen that given the International Olympic Committee’s proud fascist history it was inevitable the old men with a predilection for uniforms would select Rio. Given a choice between Chicago and a city where women can legally parade topless - not to mention all the smooth skinned café-latte boys - there was never any doubt about which town would come up trumps.

Besides, while as a Christian I'm not too familiar with the finer points of worldly matters like foreign geography, but isn't Rio de Janeiro somewhere near little Greggy Venalball’s Province of the Southern Cone? Which would explain why the place is famous around the world for completely shunning any kind of immorality whatsoever. No; I predict history will ultimately come to consider 2016 as “The GAFCON Games”, so profound will be the Christian witness presented by a whole sub-continent of Bible-believing Christians. I've been reliably informed the city is in Brazil - not Argentina, (those places are all the same to men of my Christian maturity) so while technically not in Greggy’s Province yet (but by 2016 I doubt there'll be anywhere that hasn't realigned away from the dying apostates), it's close enough for plenty of border-hopping missionaries to ensure there’ll be nothing swept under the carpets of any Russian women weight-lifters in e, that’s for sure. And it’ll be a surprise if anyone’s allowed to so much as even say the words “Greco-Roman Wrestling”.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

“And as usual, next will come the gloating…"

Or so bewails a distraught Viagravillain on their thread concerning little Bobby Duncan’s latest legal whipping, news of which was just thoughtfully conveyed by a Dearly Beloved Sinner in the comments of my previous important homily.

Personally I think that’s just a tad pessimistic; I can’t believe that after being told time and again how Courts around America will positively encourage the theft of Church property any Wicked Apostate Sinners, Homosensualists, and Priests-Without-A-Penis would be so ungracious as to gloat over little Bobby’s loss. Especially as my Conservative Brethren have never said an unkind word to any of the filthy godless swine daring to question their right to a monopoly on Jesus..

After all, it’s not as if the game’s over for good. Having wasted this much of his sect member’s money in pursuit of the legally unattainable, it’s unlikely Pittsburgh’s Favorite Eyebrows will be able to wean himself off what’s clearly become an addictive pastime. As long as there’s a higher court with the most tenuous of jurisdictions (I hear there’s a tribunal somewhere in Malta which was established during the Crusades, that might well - according to a long-forgotten canonical tradition and a hitherto secret papyrus little Phil Ashey ‘just happened’ to find under the back seat of his car – have the final authority to decide in this matter), and a lawyer prepared to accept his money (now that’ll be hard to find. Not.) I’m sure little Bobby will keep on fighting to keep what obviously doesn't belong to him.

Indeed, one look at the Court’s ruling shows how close the decision really is: if findings like

“Regardless of what name defendants now call themselves, they are not the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh of the Episcopal church of the United States of America.”

aren’t ambivalent I don’t know what is. Or how about this one concerning the Prince of ACNA and his vassal’s biblically creative claims:

“There is no basis in law or fact for their position.”

See how difficult the Court found it to reach a conclusion? With statements this ambiguous you’d better believe there’s still lot’s of fighting left to be done in Pittsburgh before little Bobby moves into a trailer park. Especially while some of his followers still have homes they can sell to finance a campaign which has been so obviously blessed by God.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

St. James' Newport Beach

After reading the distressing news that stealing church property is still illegal I thought I’d just do a little searching on “St. James Newport Beach”. Just look at the inspiring advertisement that Google was paid by little Layman Croker and his failed larcenists to place at the top of the results:


When it comes to advertising you can always tell a true Conservative Christian Leader by the way they don't waste time on little things - like proof reading - before splashing their parishioners' money around. Or does this mean St. James' has already split from ACNA and started a new sect of their own called “Angelicanism”?

I'm Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Lord, by this time he stinketh! (Jn 11:39)

For reasons he won’t discuss, Evangelical Eric has become obsessed with this in a way that none of us think can be considered wholesome.

And while we’re sniffing around the subject of little Rev. Steve Wood, it appears his 40 day process of discerning if it’s ok to steal church property didn’t actually commence until today. Personally I think any one so enamored with their own scent as to wear the same trousers for 21 consecutive days without washing them (click the link in the first paragraph if you haven’t already done so and don’t know what I’m talking about, but make sure you’ve a sick bag handy if you’re of a sensitive disposition) will be in perfect company with Messrs. Duncan, Minns, and Ashey. Although I suspect the Forward in Faith dearies will politely offer him a seat downwind when he’s attending ACNA meetings.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.

Roman Polanski: a GAFCON perspective.

Since every other orthodox blogger is currently squeezing their muse for something to say about Roman Polanski (his parents should have realised nothing good would come from giving their child an unreformed name like Roman) it seems only appropriate for me to also climb onboard the bandwagon. Especially since it’s such a novelty to see people arguing about something can’t possibly result in anyone threatening to boycott the next big party at Lambeth.

Bishop Quinine stands firmly alongside Whoopi Goldberg when it comes to thinking anything occurring within the context of an innocent nude modelling session involving a 43 year old adult and a 13 year old child can’t possibly be considered an act of rape. Then again Bishop Quinine’s idea of the perfect romantic evening also incorporates plying young people with champagne and quaaludes, which is why I wholeheartedly support Consuella’s recommendation that we employ armed security guards to ensure he’s never permitted to get within 300 yards of any children. If only someone would do the same for Ms. Goldberg.

Brother Richthofen, on the other hand, sees the whole sordid affair as an inevitable by-product of the moral decline which began when the Church began permitting the Ordination of heterosexuals. “The message this sent to society” he insists, “was that heterosexuality is not of itself a sin, resulting in society heading down the slippery slope which has not only resulted in openly heterosexual Bishops, but also in all manner of perversions such as paedophilia and the NRA flourishing in the wake of the Church no longer adhering to its God-given moral compass.” Brother Richthofen may indeed have a point, but I can't help feeling David Virtue won't appreciate his logic being used in this way.

For my part, as a Conservative Evangelist my primary concern must always be to seek ways of exploiting whatever has captured the public’s attention so that the Church might grow – if not financially, then at least numerically. Regardless of how sad or sordid any event may be, it’s my responsibility to glorify myself and God by milking whatever can be extracted from it. In this case I’ve come up with a winner that should make even more money than both little Donny Armstrong and +Peter Jensen combined have managed to fritter away.

In fact as soon as I finish posting this I’ll be heading around to enlist the help of our local popish emissary of Satan, my good friend Father McCracken of St. Catamite’s, in selling my plan to the Vatican. It’s simplicity itself: rather than spending all that money on covering up sex scandals of the past, or, worse still, paying out compensation to the abused victims of predatory clergy, Benny Ratzfinger and his boys need to ensure their evil priests are taught how to make movies. Not wholesome, family friendly ones with car chases and gun fights, but long arty ones that transform the simple act of buying a ticket into a statement telling the world you’re more artistic, sensitive and intelligent than the average guest on Jerry Springer, and you’re not ashamed of who knows it.

All any paedophile priest will then need to do is produce a few grainy masterpieces – preferably in shades of sepia and black and white – and instead of wanting to imprison him people will be falling over themselves to argue that since the ‘incidents’ occurred years ago it’s unfair to punish the perpetrator today, and that it’s wrong to judge a ‘genius’ by the same standards as everybody else. The end result will be a massive improvement in the reputation of sleazy clergymen, and an immediate reduction in the amount of bad publicity getting thrown Benny’s way. It’s an idea the inventors of man-lace are sure to positively jump at.

I’m Father Christian and I teach the Bible.