Surprised By Kitsch

Although the Church of England has so far modernised itself as to ordain women except where misogynists forbid it, and to confine its gay-bashing to the non-celibate, there is still arguably some way to go. Since God has drifted into the habit of neglecting His real estate in the northern powerhouse, one Yorkshire church has decided to thrust its way into modernity by replacing its eroded mediaeval statues with graven images from the Chronicles of Narnia. Produced as recently as sixty-five years ago by a prolifically patronising academic bigot, the Narnia books resonate such robust wisdom as: the idea that mediaeval absolutism is the best form of government (the series passim); the idea that comprehensive education causes bullying, and the implication that bullying is encouraged by those who try to find out what motivates it rather than simply thrashing out six of the best (The Silver Chair); the idea that dying in a train crash is good for you (The Last Battle) and, perhaps worst of all, the idea that "always winter and never Christmas" is somehow an undesirable state of affairs (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe). Both The Last Battle and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader also feature some swarthy foreign types who trade in slaves (doubtless Narnian servitude relies more on the old feudal spirit) and who pretend that their god is the same as the real one. "The story has much resonance for today," gushed the local vicar, whose bishop has already dropped in to mumble the magic words that give the theme park its place in Eternity.