It is no way to start the New Year; going down with the mother and father of all colds, bronchitis, asthma, pneumonia, pleurisy, allergy? Whatever it is I have spent the last couple of days mostly in bed with the wheezes, the snivels and the rheumy eyes. Hope it passes soon.
Tearing up old newspapers the other day with which to light the fire I came across an article from an old ‘Mail on Sunday’ (July 20) I don’t remember reading and wish I had had it to hand when I wrote my Christmas Day blog regarding old Infallible and his message to the faithful. Faith is the only word to describe people of the highest intelligence who can be brain-washed to the degree they are. This article is about a Church of England rector, the Rev Martin Dudley and the big black headlines read – “Rector in gay marriage row stages £1,800 ‘weddings’ for Japanese.”
This is all down evidently to the Japanese having developed a craze for Western style ceremonies so, although couples are already married by Japanese custom , they go through this expensive ritual for the fun of it really, something to boast about to the neighbours? One upmanship? Or should that be one uppeopleship according to PC? Keeping up with the Joneses anyway. Maybe that’s not allowed either in case it upsets the Joneses. It’s all tres confusing. Of course the one thousand eight hundred is a basic fee; there are obviously extras to pay on top of that like travel and accommodation and, would you believe, the photo album? So it is quite an expensive business when you think of it. Evidently only about one percent of Japan’s teeming millions is Christian so what does one make of this phenomenon? Well, as far as the churches that provide it is concerned, although their excuse is that it introduces the Japanese to Christianity, it’s simply about making money. If Tellyevangelicals and fundamentalist universities like Bob Jones can do it, why shouldn’t they? God is an endless seam of gold if you know where and how to mine it and the churches have been doing it for eons.
The main reason though as to why the journalists were spreading the muck is because, as the headline states, the good Rector was previously in a row over gay marriage, not simply because he joined two guys together but because they both happened to be priests. What! Gay priests? Never! I don’t believe it! Heavens to Betsy whatever next? Don’t worry though Your Infallibility, these were not holy Roman clergy but Anglicans, known in the US as Episcopalians, that lot old Henry Eight deprived you of.
Came across another cutting, this time in the bottom of my outbox. Goodness only knows how long it’s been lying there it is so yellow with age. The headline to this one is “Abhor religions – they can warp the mind and make life hell” but we will leave it to another time.