FROM OUR RELIGIOUS AFFAIRS STAFF

“IT WAS OUR LGBTI VOLUNTEER’S INTENTION to paint the statue of Lord Edward Carson at the Quisling Stormont Parliament in rainbow colours as a protest against his role in the ruin of Gay Irish writer Oscar Wilde,” reads a short Irish Republican Army (IRA) statement obtained by the Kookarburra Bugle. It continues: “Due to the appearance of the Virgin Mary, our Volunteer withdrew and the operation was abandoned. We lost the paint.”

It was Edward Carson’s cross-examination of Wilde during a defamation trial in 1895, among other things, which led to Wilde’s ultimate imprisonment for Gross Indecency and his subsequent exile in Paris, where he died in 1900.

Carson then went on to lead Ulster Unionism’s fight against Home Rule, which resulted in the establishment of Northern Ireland as a self-governing part of the United Kingdom.

His statue dominates the driveway to Stormont Parliament Buildings, long the seat of Protestant/Unionist dominance over Catholic/Nationalists in Northern Ireland; now the location of a power-sharing arrangement between the two.

The Parliament is currently not sitting because the Democratic Unionist Party refuses to enter Government in protest against the consequences of Britain’s leaving the European Union, which it supported.

The IRA, in its current forms, refuses to recognize the political settlement which sees Unionists and Nationalists sharing power since 1998. Members have been responsible for a number of attacks since the peace was declared.

“So I was about to paint old Eddie’s feet when I looked up and saw this light, and in the centre of the light was a woman dressed in robes, carrying a wee pink flower,” the IRA woman explained in a Zoom interview. “You could have knocked me over with a feather.”

“She handed me the flower, said all you need is love and told me not to be afraid. Christ, I was shitting myself.”

The IRA woman, who we understand has now left the organisation to pursue a career in reality television, said she ran up to the Stormont Parliament Buildings “out of pure terror” and knocked on the doors, but there was no one in.

“Nobody there,” she said. “Can you believe it? You spend your bloody whole life despising the place and all those lackeys inside, wishing it wiped off the face of the earth, and the one time you might need them, they aren’t there. Typical.”

Catholics are preparing to set up a small Marian Shrine at the Carson monument. Plans to hold Rosary Vigils there are in progress. “Imagine, thousands of Irish Catholics venerating a statue of the Virgin Mary right beside the Carson monument,” said a local journalist, before breaking into uncontrollable laughter.

Extreme Unionism, often called Loyalism, has, as expected, exploded in anger. “Not only do they want us to bow down to the *Fenians, now they want to pollute Ulster’s most sacred ground with Roman Catholic idolatry,’ said Sammy Kincora, a leading Loyalist, from his remand cell, where he is facing charges for distributing cocaine. “We will not stand for this. What next? Signs in the **Taig tongue? The Pope of Rome, the Antichrist, saying Catholic Mass on our blessed Protestant soil. Glasgow Celtic jerseys draped over Carson? Bono leading a ***Papist candlelight vigil? Never. Never. Never. ****No Popery. *****Croppies lie down!”

The Reverend Billy Orange, who leads the First End Of The World Is Nigh Church of Divine Retribution near Belfast, has offered to conduct a Pray The Gay Away service at the Carson statue. “Sodomite seed shall not stain our statues,” he roared.

The Vatican refuses to confirm that the Pope would say mass on the site. “We need proof,” a spokesman said. “A miracle. Perhaps if the Demoratic Unionist Party came back to Government, His Holiness might consider it.”

*Derogatory Protestant term for Irish Catholics

**Another derogatory Protestant term for Irish Catholics

***And another derogatory Protestant term for Irish Catholics

****Yes, you guessed it.

*****Oh boy!