Well, that was a bit of a week for religion …

After stressing that I have no wish to cause offence to anyone – having seen what an honest expression of views brought upon a fellow columnist on this newspaper in terms of intolerance to an opinion the author had every right to express – I have in the past found no difficulty at all in expounding two different points of view in respect of the Roman Catholic Church, for example.

I happen to hold, and have frequently expressed, the view that in its dogmatic and seemingly inflexible attitude towards birth control and abortion, the Catholic Church has added to the worldwide sum of human poverty and misery rather than what could reasonably have been expected of such a body – which is exactly the opposite.

In contrast, I also happen to believe – and, again, have said so in the past – that the attitude of some members of other branches of the Christian faith towards Catholics leaves a good deal to be desired and I cite just a couple of examples. The first was years ago when Herself and I attended a family wedding and were appalled to see a couple of women deliberately encourage three very young children to make a noise during the singing of Ave Maria simply because the words sung did not meet with their approval. The fact that this was the choice of both the bride and groom was an irrelevance to these two as they sought to spoil the occasion.

The second was the decision by those responsible for the running of a bookshop not to allow the sale of the Catholic version of The Bible alongside other versions – yet another display of intolerance in this heathen’s view. Little wonder, I often argue, that many people believe that if all this is an example of the Christian faith in action then they want no part in it. Far better, as one such person told me many years ago, to live your life by the simple creed that if you can’t do someone a favour then don’t do them any harm.

I’ve harped on about religion because it’s been a bit of a week or so for that subject, given the election and then inauguration of Pope Francis in Rome and the enthronement of Justin Welby as Archbishop of Canterbury – you’d have got long odds with Honest Nev just a few months ago against those events happening within a couple of days of each other – and of course what has been happening in our own back yard.

While I do not know the Dean – I have attended just one quite brief service at which Bob Key officiated – he seems from conversations with those who do know him that he is more worldly, down to earth and, dare I say it, ‘with it’ in the nicest possible context than at least one of his predecessors. I would also say that from what I have read – which does not appear to contain a word directly from him but simply a statement from what seems like the prosecution, I find it impossible not to have a large measure of sympathy with Mr Key.

In the context of the next stage of the inquiry I would hope that not only does the ex-Bishop of Chelmsford ensure that he knows the difference between circumstances here and those where he happens to live, but also places Mr Key’s actions and or reactions within the context of what has been described elsewhere in this newspaper as the Dean ‘dealing over a period of years with an implacable, uncontrolled complainant whose obsessive behaviour would have tried the proverbial patience of a saint’.

My reference to circumstances being different here to elsewhere in, for example, the Diocese of Winchester, is something which, to the absolute delight of this bolshie little crapaud, was confirmed in the Big House last week by both the Boss’s deputy, William Bailhache, and a senior Law Officer of the Crown, Solicitor-General Howard Sharp, both of whom said that as a matter of law Mr Key remains Dean of Jersey, he remains entitled to take his customary seat in the legislature and can only be removed by the person who appointed him in the first place, the Sovereign.

While I in no way suggest that the seemingly wrongful decision by the Bishop of Winchester to suspend Mr Key was anything but an honest mistake, it displays the sort of lack of understanding and, to be brutally frank, simple research, about these islands which is becoming increasingly commonplace in the United Kingdom’s corridors of power – be they ecclesiastical or secular.

Last week also saw Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne plucking big numbers from the air – just like the Labour Party has done for decades – in diverting attention from his own administration’s problems by promising the earth in relation to the Crown Dependencies.

By the sound of it the notion that he will claw back £1 billion in unpaid taxes from those dependencies was arrived at using the same tried and trusted scientific method adopted many years ago by the Labour Party’s general secretary – a ‘back of a fag packet’ calculation.

He and Prime Minister David Cameron used to belong to the spoiled brats’ ‘Bullingdon Club’ and were famously pictured as such along with Boris Johnson. It seems they have retained associations with an abbreviated version – the Bullying Club.

And finally,

The boss of the Liberation Group seeks to enhance beer sales by applauding George Osborne’s decision to reduce beer duty. He then spoils it by perpetuating the myth that health concerns over alcohol consumption ‘are unproven’. The man clearly can’t read Medical Officer of Health annual reports.