h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It has been a busy week in the Holme Valley. I became fifty. And we are down to our very last bag of coal, so I very much hope that Spring comes next week, or I will have to trouble the coalyard yet again. So far this winter, we have spent over £150 on coal. Who says the coal industry is dead! The weather turned colder again this week, so we've actually been burning more coal than would otherwise have been the case. So much so, that on Thursday night, just after I had "bombed up" the fire, we had a knock on the door from a concerned motorist who was just passing and noticed that "our chimney seemed to be on fire". I was able to reassure him that I was just me stoking up the stove and practising for when they elect the next Pope.

Well, what a week. The animals were the only beings to be unmoved by my reaching fifty. That is, unless you count being awakened at 3.45AM on the morning of my birthday by Dusty and Nigel having a nocturnal altercation that ended up with one of them knocking over the propped-up door in the demolished bathroom, but by and large I think only I saw it as somehow significant. By the time a man reaches fifty, says Orwell, he has usually achieved the face he deserves. Something I bore in mind the next morning when the alarm went off at 6.30, and I staggered to the bathroom mirror in my sleep-deprived state.

Baggis has spent the week devouring Sainsburys Beef and Liver cat food, at least we have got him back on to food for the correct species now. Next stop, KD Laing. Kitty, who will eat anything, has been chomping her way steadily through a carton of "Whiskas Senior in Jelly" (sounds like the sort of fare more appropriate for 50-year olds than cats), and it's only us humans that seem to have anything like a degree of uncertainty in our diet. Hence my surprise at the sudden appearance of pizza for my birthday tea, followed by a garishly pink-iced spongecake in the shape of a pig, decorated with mini-champagne bottle candles. The effect is better imagined than seen.

Of course, for us, it's been another week overshadowed by the death of the Pope, and the general election (zzz zzzz zzz) with all the major parties once more claiming that the British way of like encompasses stoning strangers to death and stringing up felons from lamp-posts, or so it seems. What next, Trial by Ordeal? Although I am pleased to say the Royal Wedding seemed to pass me by with barely a mention. Mainly because I was too busy working on the final galley proofs of "Hampshire at War" to pay it any attention.

At the start of the week, for some reason, I heard Jimmy Cliff singing "Many Rivers to Cross" on the radio, while I was driving to the warehouse, and somehow that seems to have become stuck on my own internal jukebox as my theme for the week as a fitting fiftieth birthday theme:

Many rivers to cross

But I can't seem to find my way over

Wandering I am lost

As I travel along the white cliffs of Dover


Many rivers to cross

And it's only my will that keeps me alive

I've been licked, washed up for years

And I merely survive because of my pride

Of course, you can only survive because of your pride for so long. There's only so much "living off the love of the common people" as Prince Charles may eventually find out. On Thursday, we were watching the news, which mentioned that the Cardinals had finally read John Paul II's will. "I wonder who he left the Vatican to", opined Debbie in the background, Later, she claimed she had been joking, but I am not so sure.

On Friday, I found myself tuning in to JPII's funeral, again while driving, despite my earlier vow that neither Papal Demise nor Royal Nuptial should cross my aural threshold. Oh well, I suppose one out of two isn't that bad. Actually, I have to say that I found the event strangely moving. Once I had got over my disbelief that Big G hadn't stuck down Mr Mugabe with a well-aimed lightning bolt, I was carried along on the shifting planes of the chanting, as it rose and fell, like the tides of the sea, bearing me with it in spirit at least.

Bizarrely, just as they were singing "The Lord's my Shepherd" in Latin, I drove past a huge field of sheep, many of which were accompanied by their recently-born lambs. It always tears at my heart to see the lambs at this time of year, and to wonder what fate is to befall such innocent, trusting creatures.

While I would never personally don a balaclava or blow anybody up about it, it does seem to me to be time for a massive re-evaluation of what we are doing in terms of mechanised farming all over the world, and the welfare of such livestock. How anyone can look a lamb in the face and then order it to be sent to an abbatoir is beyond my comprehension. How anyone can then squander natural resources by freezing its chopped up remains and flying them half way round the world, beats me too. Many rivers to cross, and that's just one of them. I know that not all farmers are bad, but it's a job I could never do. And yet I have to feed my dearly-loved pets meat products because in a fallen universe, they ended up as carnivores. Many, many rivers.

Anyway, I digress. I was talking about the Pope. Or the "late Pope". I also have a problem with this concept. On the wall, in the pub I used to drink at, The Murrell Arms in Barnham, there used to be a glass case with a stuffed duck inside. This was the last remains of "Bibbler", a Khaki Campbell, who had formerly been the oldest duck in England, at the time of his demise. The problem was that the caption said that he WAS the oldest duck in England, which was clearly not the case, owing to his being, er, … dead. "Oldest former duck in England" would have been nearer the answer. Despite my mentioning it to the landlord several times, it never got changed. It's probably there to this day.

So remember, JPII was only probably the oldest "former" Pope, and as such, we shouldn't put him the the glass case of Sainthood until he's earned it. However much that process now seems inevitable.

What I meant about the Pope (late Pope, sorry, there I go again) when I wrote about him last week is that you have to admire his refusal to compromise his vision, whether or not you agree with the consequences. As someone wrote about him, very acutely, I thought, he was concerned with souls rather than bodies.

I am not sure I DO agree with the consequences, though. It's a very big problem for all religions. To what extent to you compromise on your original ideals to keep pace with the changing conditions in the world? To a certain degree all religions seem to have the same problem at the moment, in that they are seen to lack relevance to the needs, aims and aspirations of modern life, even the Church of England, which has been rather unkindly described in the past (not by me) as more of a hobby than a religion. Change has been forced by external pressures, as well, such as a society which now sees divorce as nothing special, even in its Royal Family. In some cases, this feeling of being threatened by change has led to a worrying hardening into fundamentalism, both in Christianity and Islam, though thankfully, not so much here in our little island backwater. .

JPII's answer to change was to continue to re-state the fundamental beliefs of Christianity as he saw them... regardless of the consequences. Like the man said, he was concerned wit souls, not bodies, but it was not always fashionable (or desirable) to say so, there and then.

How much and where should religions compromise their ideals, is the central paradox of JPII's life - too much, and you lose the essence of what it is that made your religion what it is, too little, and you become irrelevant to the world as it exists. The former would be like the Quakers saying "OK, we accept that there are now wars everywhere, so we are now going to start enlisting in the army": the latter would be like a church saying well, people shouldn't have extra marital sex and children should only be conceived in marriage and er ... oh. That's what makes JPII such a paradoxical character - you have to admire him for sticking to his beliefs and for standing up against the state capitalism (often erroneously described as communism) of the Eastern Bloc, particularly in its oppressive attitude to personal and social freedom and freedom of speech and worship, but the effects of his stand for traditional Catholic values in places like Africa are sometimes pretty dire (in terms of social policy, though Catholic relief organisations do a lot of good on the ground). Having said that, there are other forces (such as the status of women) than just the Catholic attitude to contraception which conspire together to create the tragic situation over Aids

After hearing all the hooh-hah on both sides of the debate about abortion, for instance I have also come to the conclusion that perhaps personal sexual/medical morailty and behaviour may be an area where the Church should not have absolute power to legislate, or rather, not have the power to legislate absolutely. simply because there are always going to be special features about individual cases that make a mockery one way or the other of any official ex cathedra pronouncements. Abortion may be right for some women, wrong for others, though in the case of abortion, because the woman invariably ends up being lumped with the job of child rearing, the woman should always perhaps have a greater say. Similarly with stem cell research. If you could save Hitler's life by using a "spare embryo" would you want to do this? Likewise, if you could save the life of a morally good person by using the same embryo, would you allow that embryo never to develop? The sort of absolutist, one-size fits all moral stance by the church totally fails to acknowledge the vast spectrum of individual human experience and need. I don't think you can say that abortion is ALWAYS wrong or that stem cell research is ALWAYS right. I am seriously confused by this. Many rivers to cross.

At the end of the day, maybe it's for each individual to reach their own accommodation with God as they see fit, and not for a Pope, Archbishop, or Imam to rule across the board in these matters - except of course that they would say that the job of the church is to give moral guidance based on the revealed truth of God as they see it, but if God really is all loving and all forgiving then God would welcome abortionist and pro-lifer alike into the fold at the end of all things, just as Jesus allowed Mary Magdalen to was his feet, as Big G knows they are all part of his/her/its great plan, which we cannot comprehend. I don't know. Sometimes I wonder why we are trying to live our lives by a book which was originally designed, in part, as a desert survival manual for the children of Israel.

Saying something is always against the will of God seems to me to be sort of reducing the ability of God to be subtle, if you ask me, and can also be used as an instrument of social oppression. This is where I think JPII was at his wrongest, but then at least he was willing to attempt this difficult terrain, whereas most modern leaders would have funked it.

So, this is what has been going through what passes for my mind this week, with not a lot of conclusion. I am sorry to anyone I have offended with these ramblings. It's my age. Like I said, many rivers to cross. Maybe Debbie's question isn't so dumb. Whoever he leaves the Vatican to, JPII will be a hard act to follow.

Whoever the next Pope is, I am glad it's not me, even if he does get to wear a jiffy bag on his head and no one is allowed to laugh.