Private Eye St Albion Parish News

Hullo,
I am sure you will all have given up something for Lent!
I was determined this year to give up getting angry with people, and to try to be more tolerant and forgiving towards all those parishioners who annoy me with their stupid and unnecessary criticisms!
But I have to confess that the cynics and the moaners and the wreckers have become so vociferous that all my good Lenten resolutions have fallen on stony ground, through no fault of my own!
No sooner have we finished with all the nonsense about Mr Enron and the church heating system than the gossip-mongers and peddlars of tittle-tattle have come up with some stupid new story about my friend Mr Mittal.
And may I say first of all that he is not my friend, and I have never referred to him as such.
Indeed, when I wrote a letter to help him in this business, I was very careful to cross out the words “my friend” just in case people got the wrong idea, i.e. that he was my friend just because he had given £125,000 to help me run the parish!
I want to make it clear that there was no connection whatever between the writing of the letter and the giving of the cheque!
As it says in the Good Book, “It is more blessed to receive than to give.” (Revelations of St John the Major.)
There is only one word to describe this kind of malicious slander, and that is “garbage” -- from the Greek “garbos”, meaning “the truth”.
Has everyone forgotten what I said when I came to this parish?
I said that I had come as a new broom, to sweep away all the sleaze and corruption which were only too familiar under my predecessors.
We don’t want to go back to those days, do we, when several members of the PCC were sent to prison and the rest should have been!
Things are very different now, aren’t they? We have new rules about all donations to parish funds, which I have introduced, and if it hadn’t have been for those, nobody would even have heard of my friend Mr Mittal, who, incidentally, has done so much to encourage local business in the parish, even though his offices are on some island in the West Indies and he doesn’t currently employ anyone in St Albion’s.
So let’s hear no more of this hoo-ha on stilts, shall we?
There are surely more important things for us all to be thinking about during this Lent-tide! (Or “The Pre-Easter Time Period”, as Mr Birt has recommended we should call it.)
That’s why if any of you have not yet given anything up, here’s a suggestion for you.
Why not give up criticising the Vicar?
Yours in hope,

Tony

A Special Message To All Our English Co-Religionists

from The Rev. Dubya Bush, First Church of Latter-Day Morons

“Brothers and Sisters in the Lord, I tell you the day is at hand, that day of which we read in the mighty book of the Prophet Enron, when the Great Satan shall arise, spreading his axis of evil over all the world. And note how close the word ‘Satan’ is to ‘Saddam’. Is that a coincidence? I think not, brethren! I ask you all to join with me, along with your pastor, my good friend Rev. Blair, to take up the sword and cast out these Satanic devils as they deserve. For it is written, ‘Go forth and kick ass. Thus saith the Lord.’ And if he doesn’t, then I do! God bless America and no one else. Here endeth the world.”

Mr Vaz, who has been asked not to attend services for a month, for refusing to answer the perfectly polite question put to him by Mrs Filkin -- “Is it true that you are a crook?” Let us pray that Mr Vaz is granted an early release from all the suffering he has caused us in his life, and is taken from us to a place of rest from which he will never return. T.B.

Valete

We were very sorry to say goodbye to Ms Jo Moore who decided to resign at the weekend after a number of burials went wrong. It is a great shame that she is having to retire now rather than three weeks ago.
We wish her every success in her obscurity. A.C.

SPICE GIRL: The vicar’s wife opens the biggest Cash ’n’ Curry Emporium in the parish. Let’s hope it doesn’t get her into “a pickle” about “currying favours” and trying to “vinda-election”!

Lent Talks

Mrs Morris gave a very interesting talk on the theme of “Vocations In Today’s Society”. She began by saying that many children had no natural aptitude for academic subjects, and, instead of being forced to take ‘A’ Levels in them, just to get useless A* grades, they should be allowed to follow their vocation.

This could include such practical callings as Soap Opera Studies, the Management of Lap-Dancing Establishments, the Retailing of Sports Goods, and the Design of Mobile Phone Covers, all of which have a vital part to play in today’s vibrant, skill-based, multi-cultural society. Sesame Toast and Prawn Crackers were served in honour of Chinese New Year. The two pupils from St Albion’s Comprehensive who served the delicacies were awarded top grades in three modules of their Oriental Catering ‘A’ Level course.

Parish Entertainment

Church Hall 8.00pm ‘An Evening With Mr Benn’

Mr Benn relives his long career in the parish and answers questions about how badly the vicar is running things now. (4 hours 24 minutes)

Not suitable for children or adults. A.C.