The Meaningful Vote

 Hi All,

Meanwhile.. back at Lambeth Palace.

Lightning flashed and clouds bellowed. It was a thunder snow storm over Lambeth Palace. 

The Most Reverend Christine Humphrey, 115^th Archbishop of Canterbury slumped in her chair as she placed the receiver back on the phone. It had been another difficult call and another rejection. This time from the Council of 12 Apostles of the Latter Day Saints, who simply couldn’t commit quadrillions of Saint's money to bailing out the Church of England’s colonial property development. The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, who was visiting the Faithful of Mars, was uncommittable  and Pope Patrick  of Rome, advised in his West of Ireland brogue  that women’s ordination was a stumbling bloc for the Vatican Investment Bank to consider a line of Credit, besides which he wondered aloud why he should invest in a mere 'ecclesiastical community' rather than a 'proper' Apostolic Church ? The Southern Baptist Coalition refused on the basis of ‘so-called same sex marriage’ and the Scottish Presbyterians of the Kirk weren't even answering her calls: like the Methodists and Congregational Reform Church , they'd gone to ground. 

Humphrey been told of the terms of the bailout on offer from Treasury an hour ago. It just seemed too much! Humphrey looked longingly  at the Mini bar and various decanters her predecessor had installed. There was a signed picture of Bishop Spong above it. But now was not the time for a stiff sherry, but a stiff upper lip! 

She called the Royal Bank of England and asked to speak to the Governor; will you really call in our loans today? Yes and you have no choice but to accept the deal!

There was a knock at the door and her Chaplain ushered in the Church accountant, a Partner at one of those prestigious galactic Accountancy and Consulting firms which cost millions, but don't seem to do anything. She quizzed him about a plan b, other than the one that was on offer. He said that the only on on offer was this one and the alternative was bankruptcy, which would be a catastrophe for the banks and the economy. She asked him if they'd done any work on such an outcome? He replied that they hadn't, she insist that they did. The accountant took note and said they would start on it right away. 

Once he was back in his offices at Canary Wharf the accountant contacted his real client, whom he didn't know, but who paid for 'information'. Pleased that his regular fee of £25 million has already been put into his e-vault, he advised his contact of the conversation that he'd just said. 'OK' was the terse reply. Seconds later he got a ping saying £100 million had just been deposited into his e-vault. 'Keep us informed:  bonus due  the moment they tell you to sign off a bankruptcy petition'.

It was 8.00am in the morning.  Archbishop Humphrey along with an assortment of clerics, dressed in a multitude of different garb, was led into the Cabinet Room of No 10 Drowning Street, the centre of British government. It was to be a meeting of the Church Commissioners.  

She was Commissioner No1. 

Humphrey took the chair on the left of the table, her Chaplain, Gary Smith to her left, Acting Commissioner No2, as the Throne of the Province of  York was vacant. Gary being a 24 year old from the charismatic tradition didn’t wear a clerical collar, but ripped  jeans and a t-shirt around a scruffy leather jacket which gave him kudos on the street and rather than wearing a Canterbury cap wore a baseball cap, flipped round to the opposite side that it should be.

To her left sat the  Dean of Oxford Cathedral, Commissioner No 3,  Mikey Chatty: he looked like a human flamingo, sporting a bright pink clerical shirt and flashing electrical rainbow collar, who was unsurprisingly from the liberal-catholic part of the church, liking all the smells and bells, gay priests, but no female ones ,  but only about a quarter of his own bible.

Opposite them was the Bishop of Venus, Commissioner No 4, a liberal firebrand, representing the secular liberal wing of the Church, liking almost none of her own bible and thought that any church called 'st paul' should be renamed as it was 'sexism and homophobia glorified' ,  whose main interests  include far left politics and campaigning - enhanced by her position in the British House of Lords and Venusian Senate an adoring Witter following- for ‘abolition of slavery of and for the civil rights of the robot, holographic and android communities, especially if said robots, holograms and androids were' people of  colour,  lesbian, gay, transgender or bisexual’. 

Flanking the Bishop of Venus, was the General Synod Chairperson & Vicar -General of Canterbury Province, James Blackwell, Commissioner No 5 who was dressed in black from head to toe, with a trimmed beard and wore a black sombrero, he looked more like a magician, but being  Catholic than Catholic he unsurprisingly represented the Anglo-Catholic part of the Church. 

On the other side of the Bishop was  a man who, if he wasn’t silently reading his big leather black bible on one hand, with book of common prayer on the other, could have been mistaken for an FBI agent, dressed as he was in a black suit and tie,  but then FBI agents don’t come with a big wooden cross around their chest or long bushy beards. Timothy Buckerim, the Bishop of the Planet Mercia, represented the Conservative Evangelicals. Commissioner no 6.

At the top end of the table was the General Secretary of the Commissioners, Ian Jolly , who  welcomed everyone and explained that there was supposed to be 27 others present , but as this was a mere formality, he'd decided it wasn't worth the fuss of getting 'everyone together': The PM and the Chancellor both like their lie ins.  But he assured he'd got those absent to  vote by e- ballot. The motion was to accept the bailout of The Church Commissioners, noting that to vote no meant that the Church would go into automatic bankruptcy.  He informed those present that he did not have a vote, that he was merely chairing the meeting. 

Jolly said that there were currently 14 votes in favour and 13 against. He went around the room, saying that as the last shall be first and the first shall be last, that he would start with Commissioner no 6 and go upwards. 

Buckerim  voted against saying the Church was 'selling its soul to the Devil'.

Blackwell voted against .

The Bishop of Venus, surprisingly extremely quiet. She  voted for. The vote was now tied.

Chatty voted for the motion.  A majority for the motion. 

Smith seemed like he was in a zen like state of prayer: his eyes opened . Declaring he'd had a vision from the Lord, he voted against. The vote was tied again.

All eyes were on the Archbishop. Feeling pressure like she'd never done before, she said- as she sent instructions to the accountant that the Church wasn't  to go into insolvency-  . 

'I vote yes'