An Unholy Threesome

That gifted entertainer, Lord Carey of Blathering-in-the-Dotage, has been holding forth from the fringes of the Conservative conference about how he treasures his Christian heritage and thinks everybody else should be made to treasure it too. Opponents of gay marriage, among whom Lord Carey is one of the most amusing, have been described as bigots; though not by Wee Nicky who meekly censored the word out of a speech last month. Nevertheless, Lord Carey took exception, and so far forgot his treasured heritage as to compare the situation of Christian gay-bashers to that of the Jews in Nazi Germany. "What started against them was when they started to be called names. And that was the first stage towards that totalitarian state" which, in its persecution of Jews, heretics and homosexuals, made such a regrettable break with two millennia of Christian tough love. Ann Widdecombe, who appeared alongside Lord Carey with the back-bench god-botherer David Burrowes, said that the three of them were "defending marriage", apparently on the eminently sane grounds that the extension of a right to some people equals the cancellation of that same right for everyone else. Lord Carey also claimed that in some countries where gay marriage has been made legal, there have been unforeseen consequences such as marriages involving more than two people. Obviously, this Solomonic depravity is too awful, although Lord Carey of Blathering-in-the-Dotage might be comforted to know that nobody, not even the gays, is likely to compel him to marry both Ann Widdecombe and David Burrowes unless it should prove absolutely necessary.