Sometimes it is embarrassing to be an Anglican

... like when Anglican inanity can be mentioned in the same article about the plight of women as Islamic cruelty, as Rosemary McLeod has done recently, writing for Fairfax Media, under the title of Vital Work for a Ruling Gender.

Among the stupid and painful things involving women suffering from male dominance she highlights this:

"But maybe the quaintest treatment of women is currently in the Anglican cathedral in Blackburn, England.

Worshippers there are offered a separate supply of "untainted" communion bread for those who object to its being consecrated by a woman priest.

A special container of bread blessed by a bloke is produced during Sunday morning service there if a woman is presiding, as may now be the case, since Sue Penfold has become one of its three canons.

She may have an advanced degree, but you never know where she's been, or if her fingernails are clean.

Worryingly, visitors from out of town could attend services at which she presides without knowing that proper male- blessed bread is available.

They could find that she had blessed it, having consumed it, and come over all queasy.

The church hierarchy at Blackburn opposes women's ordination, so how Dr Penfold sneaked in there is a mystery.

The congregation normally numbers 200, six of whom are known to reject her blessing on the grounds that women should not be ordained in the first place.

Such shenanigans are of great interest to lapsed Anglicans like myself, who never had such vital, pressing matters to torment ourselves with - it was all men in my day.

Nor did we ever wonder why they wore frocks, which were sometimes lavishly embroidered.

I always assumed this was in natural deference to the superior sex who carried out the most vital work in the place or worship. I refer, of course, to their splendid flower arranging."