I TAKE as my text: "And the house was filled with smoke" (Isaiah 6:4) It's official. We have been warned.

The secularising authorities, politically-correct branch, have decreed that, from next year, churches must put up "No Smoking" signs. This is a crazy gesture if ever there was one, since I have never seen anyone attempt to smoke in church - no, not in 37 years as a priest and ten years as an altar boy before that. Even we altar boys knew better than to light up in the sanctuary! Will they try to ban incense next?

I was listening - well, sort of - to Tony Blair's long goodbye on Radio Four when I heard one of the commentators wonder aloud why our Tony had made such good friends of three notable right-wingers: Bush, Chirac and Berlusconi. Blair's spokesman answered that at least he had toppled "the most right wing man of the century - Saddam Hussein". Barmy. Why do media commentators always suppose that dictators are right wing? Saddam was a secularist and socialist of the Baarth party.

Who were the biggest dictators of the last century? Answer: Hitler, Stalin and Mao. Hitler was a National Socialist and the other two were Communists. Anyhow, why is "right wing" a dirty label? I suppose one of the most prominent right-wingers of our time was the late Enoch Powell. And no one was a greater champion of parliamentary democracy than Enoch - that's why he opposed the EU because he recognised it as an institution which constantly tries to overrule our national government. There is a phrase: "to the right of Genghis Khan". Are those who use this phrase trying to persuade us that the imperialist tyrant Khan was a supporter of parliamentary democracy.

I'm afraid I would have got the giggles if I'd had to officiate at the Christening of Gerri Halliwell's baby, Bluebell Madonna. Actually, my favourite scurrilous magazine is Viz and the best column in it is Modern Parents. You should see modern parents in real life, when they have a spasm of churchiness and ask to have their sprog dipped. Usually the miraculous child will labour under some exotic name certainly not found in the Bible or among the saints: Sky - I've had two Skys. Born out of the hippy parents' nostalgia for their backpacking days under the Aussie firmament. Mi came as a surprise. "You don't mind Mi, Rector?"

"Not at all. Once had a Ray. I'm aiming for the whole tonic sol fa".

They all drift in noisily a minute before the service is due to start. Already three or four of the offspring are screaming. Others have discovered that they like the church's echo and join one another in antiphonal shouting. The modern parents smile approvingly. Aren't they cute?

We have a cupboard of soft toys, but the children don't like soft toys - they like hard toys. And the parents have thoughtfully supplied plenty of them. There's the one that sounds like an amplified ratchet. There's the one you hit with hammers. Then there's the motorbike that little Hector revs up by running it violently across the pew, screaming "Brum! Brum!" as loudly as he can. And when he drops it noisily, the modern parents smile sweetly at him, kindly pick it up and hand it back to him so he can start the manoeuvre again. Suffer the little children...

* Peter Mullen is Rector of St Michael's, Cornhill, in the City of London, and Chaplain to the Stock Exchange.