Thought for the Day, with Justin Webly, more or less Arch. of Cant.

Hullo,

          

Justin here, and on this bright summer’s morning I take a few minutes to reflect on what for me and my lady wife have been a tumultuous few months.

           

It seems that in no time at all I have come from being a humble, high ranking Churchman – and before that a humble high-ranking financial expert - to being ultimately responsible for the spiritual welfare of millions. And of course with that have come many changes. As my lady wife said when we first set foot in the Palace, “Struth, this’ll take some dusting!” – not that we haven’t always shared humble domestic tasks – but now we have a small army of helpers headed up by the indomitable Jocasta and the ever-present young man with the wire in his ear. These two advise and support me as I go about my public duties and often counsel caution in the face of my sometimes impetuous desire to expose and cast out the wicked. As Jocasta so wisely observed after my denunciation of the very dreadful Wonga usurers and the like, “Bloody hell Archie (her rather engaging pet name for me) you’ve opened a can of worms here!” And so it came to pass that she spoke the truth and several public figures were compelled to ditch their Wonga interests. 

Whilst somewhat taciturn, the young man with the wire in his ear takes special interest in guiding me during public walkabouts, often steering me, via an uncomfortable but ultimately harmless pressure point in the small of the back, away from individuals he quaintly labels as “nutjobs”.

And so it is that I shall progress in my long black car with Police escort this afternoon to the tiny village of Balcombe in West Sussex where protests rage over experimental drilling by a company called Caudrilla – a rather clever play on words, I thought. I know about mining, and oil and the like, you see. I have been asked to go there by the local council which is anxious with regard to the numbers of protesters who seem anything but local - some travelling from as far away as Glossop, and who are equally anxious about Caudrilla’s intentions about the unfortunately-named mining technique – “fracking”. I’m really not sure that my presence there will be appropriate. I can see the headlines in certain newspapers now, “ARCHBISH HAS FRACKING BIG PROBLEM”, or, “CAUDRILLA HAS NO FRACKING BUSINESS HERE, says Archie" But as Jocasta points out, now that I’ve made such a fuss about Wonga, I can hardly ignore the depredations of incoming frackers, can I?

       

And its at times like these, hidden away as I am in a cubby hole under the Palace’s superb 18^th century dual action Thomas Tadger reedpipe organ, where the young man with the wire in his ear cannot look over my shoulder, that I ponder and wonder what Jesus would have done.

Toodle-pip!

Yours affectionately,

Justin