Monty Python, the Lost Ecclesiastical Years

One of our loyal readers and comments-box denizens, Fr. Mike, unearthed this as-yet-unpublished example of British humor. Here it is, with a few small revisions to account for the coffee stains obscuring certain key words:

Bishop Arthur: Old woman!

Dennis: Man!

Arthur: Man. Sorry. What Abbot lives in that Abbey over there?

Dennis: I'm thirty-seven.

Arthur: I--what?

Dennis: I'm thirty-seven. I'm not old.

Arthur: Well, I can't just call you 'Man'.

Dennis: Well, you could say 'Dennis'.

Arthur: Well, I didn't know you were called 'Dennis'.

Dennis: Well, you didn't bother to find out, did you?

Arthur: I did say 'sorry' about the 'old woman', but from the behind you looked--

Dennis: What I object to this, that you automatically treat me like an inferior!

Arthur: Well, I am Bishop!

Dennis: Oh, Bishop, eh, very nice. And how d'ya get that, eh? By exploiting the laity! By hanging on to outdated papist and apostolic dogma which perpetuates the religious and spiritual differences in our society. If there's ever going to be any progress with the--
Old Woman: Dennis, there's some lovely filth down here. Oh! How d'ya do?

Arthur: How do you do, good lady? I am Arthur, Bishop of this Diocese. Who's Abbey is that?

Woman: Bishop of the who?

Arthur: This Diocese.

Woman: Oh, you got a disease?

Arthur: No, no, no! Di-oh-cese

Woman: What's a Diocese?

Arthur: Well, we all are part of a diocese. It is this regional Church. We are all Catholics, and I am your Bishop.

Woman: I didn't know we had a Bishop. I thought we were an autonomous faith community.

Dennis: You're fooling yourself. We're living in a dictatorship: a self-perpetuating autocracy in which the working classes--

Woman: Oh, there you go bringing class into it again.

Dennis: That's what it's all about. If only people would hear of--

Arthur: Please! Please, good people. I am in haste. Who lives in that abbey?

Woman: No one lives there.

Arthur: Then who is your abbot?

Woman: Oh, we dropped the habits years ago!

Arthur: Not habit, abbot, ABBOT!

Woman: We don't have an abbot.

Arthur: What?

Dennis: I told you. We're an anarcho-syndicalist commune. We take it in turns to act as a sort of executive officer for the week...

Arthur: Yes.

Dennis: ...but all the decisions of that officer have to be ratified at a special biweekly meeting...

Arthur: Yes, I see.

Dennis: ...by a simple majority in the case of purely internal affairs...

Arthur: Be quiet!

Dennis: ...but by a two-thirds majority in the case of more major--

Arthur: Be quiet! I order you to be quiet!

Woman: Order, eh? Who does he think he is? Heh.

Arthur: I am your Bishop!

Woman: Well, I didn't vote for you.

Arthur: You don't vote for Bishops.

Woman: Well, how did you become Bishop, then?

Arthur: The Vicar of Christ, the Successor of St. Peter, the Bishop of Rome...

[Angels singing.]

...clad in the purest shimmering white watered-silk sash, was enlightened by the Holy Spirit, signifying by Divine Providence that I, Arthur, was to fulfill the apostolic succession in this diocese.

[Singing stops.]

That is why I am your Bishop!

Dennis: Listen. Albino pigeons swooping out of the air and hovering over an old man in an Italian Baroque Museum is no basis for an ecclesial hierarchy. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical pneumatic ceremony.

Arthur: Be quiet!

Dennis: Well, you can't expect to wield supreme executive power just 'cause some guy in Italy heard voices come from a tongue of fire?

Arthur: Shut up!

Dennis: I mean, if I went 'round saying I was an emperor just because my uncle Vito in Rome gave me a hot pink hat, a hot pink sash, one of those robes from The Matrix but with red piping and a big gold ring, they'd put me away!

Arthur: Shut up, will you? Shut up!

Dennis: Ah, now we see the abuse inherent in the Church!

Arthur: Shut up!

Dennis: Oh! Come and see the abuse inherent in the Church! Help! Help! I'm being oppressed!

Arthur: Ruddy layman!

Dennis: Oh, what a give-away. Did you hear that? Did you hear that, eh? That's what I'm on about. Did you see him oppressing me? You saw it, didn't you?