Hot on the heels of the announcement that the number of UK scouts has risen dramatically in the last few years comes the news of a developing rift between the Scout Association and the Catholic church.
After hearing that the Scout Association needed more adult volunteers, to help staff new groups and bring down its steadily increasing waiting list, a Catholic Archbishop offered the help of his priests.
"We have several priests who we need to urgently reassign due to unforeseen circumstances." said the Archbishop, "Given their loving nature, they would be perfect for the job and could easily be moved to areas where there are large numbers of young people in need of the loving pastoral care that the church is so well known for."
The problems started when the Archbishop's offer was politely but firmly refused .
"The rejection is quite obviously due to the 'problems' being reported in other areas of the world." complained the Archbishop. "If you look at the facts, this is a completely unwarranted attack on what is a genuine offer of help. We have had virtually no such problems in England and Wales since we shipped our worst offenders off to Ireland many years ago."
When asked what the 'unforeseen circumstances' were that had triggered the need to relocate some priests the Archbishop admitted that "one or two" of the priests have had allegations made against them but he quickly added, "However, these are men of God and they have promised us that they are innocent. We are happy to give them the benefit of the doubt and so should you. It's the Christian thing to do."
