OK. You Can Get Rid Of That Shotgun Now, Pa

How the world has changed! The Church of England is now adopting a buy one, get one free attitude.

Unmarried couples with children will now be able to baptise their children and get married in the same occasion.

Under new guidelines issued by the Church of England, the two sacraments will be allowed to be combined in one service.

Twenty percent of couples taking part in the marriage ceremony already have children and they hope that by combining the two sacraments, the Church will be meeting the needs of real families who might have been discouraged from having a church wedding.

This sounds like the religious equivalent to vote catching to me!

A spokesman denied that the changes meant the Church was contradicting itself on its own teaching that sex should only take place within marriage.

He said that traditional teaching still pointed to celibacy outside of marriage, and that children are best served by being raised by married parents.

Coming from an age when people stopped short of stoning unmarried mothers to death, this seems rather strange to me.

This comes just a few short years after there were news reports that some vicars were refusing to baptise children if they were born outside of wedlock.

If the Church continues to move the goalposts, is there any wonder why attendances are dwindling?

Predictions of Britain becoming a Muslim country by 2050 are now starting to look like a reality!