Bishops Can't See The Irony

Next to the state and possibly the monarchy, probably the wealthiest landowner in the UK is the Anglican church. The church of Rome is similarly rich.

Yet what do they actually do to accumulate this great wealth? Very little.

I'd like to say, they do sod all, but they do perform certain ceremonial duties and I have to admit that there are still people who desperately need something to cling to.

Yet today, in another foot-in-mouth feat of (Douglas) Adamsian irony, five top Anglican bishops are have criticised the government for failing the poor. Bishop of Manchester the Rt Rev Nigel McCulloch said that Labour is "beguiled by money" and "morally corrupt".

Hey buddy - look in the fucking mirror will you!

I don't see either church handing out millions of its accumulated wealth to the poor. Sure, they preach to their followers to "give generously" (often to them, of course) but do they give any back.... errrrr....

Now I won't argue that in recent years, Labour has lost the plot. But in recent years, led by Tony Blair, the party has massively extended the City Academies programme. This education initiative was supposed to help the poor by building massively expensive, state-of-the-art super schools in the heart of deprived areas.

Hot on the heels of Sir Peter Vardy, Bob Edmiston and Graham Dacre offered to sponsor academies. Each one a car dealer, each a "Christian" and all three amazingly rich - a factor fuelled almost entirely by the consumer credit explosion. In all three cases these "Christians" only had to stump up less than 10% of the cost of the schools, got to set the agenda while the taxpayers got to carry the rest. For ever.

Then what happens? The offspring of well-to-do families are bussed (or more usually driven) in while the poorer children are pushed to one side. All this does is widen the gap between rich and poor - and the naturally better performing richer kids make everyone hail the Academy a success - where the opposite is true.

The Bishop of Durham, Rt Rev Tom Wright said:

"We have not seen a raising of aspirations in the last 13 years, but instead there is a sense of hopelessness. While the rich have got richer, the poor have got poorer."

Yes indeed - like three representatives of your flock that I've just mentioned, Reverend.

Jesus would be ashamed of the lot of you.

UPDATE (29/Dec/2008):

Liam Byrne MP came out punching, he said "Labour had fought hard to narrow the gap between rich and poor." And Sir Stuart Bell, MP, the Church's own Commons representative, called the bishops' claims "nonsense".