While choosing his Sunday sermon, Harold wanted to draw from the Finance Bill 2023 and all the proposed taxes. Apparently, he has no qualms with taxes if they do not touch his alcohol.
When he was leader of the village, he thrived off raiding people's pockets. As a pastor, he still does this.
Feeling funny, he said: "We should tell this government that where there is a levy, tick us!" And so he taught from the book of Leviticus.
Written by Moses, Leviticus details ritual, legal and moral behaviour expected of the Israelites and advises them on how to distance themselves from sin. In this village, where nobody has the ability to mind their own business, a lot of theories have been flying regarding why Harold remains unmarried.
Seeing that his ex Sue is now a powerful woman in the village, many would have expected a sudden change of mind from Harold, a known opportunist.
So donning his crimson cassock which he also uses as a doormat, Harold took his congregation through the holy writ, telling them that a priest could not stoop to levels some of them hoped he would.
"They must not marry women defiled by prostitution or divorced from their husbands, because priests are holy to their God," he read Leviticus 21:7, and reminded the faithful that both Sue and Clarissa were divorced from their husband, Harold.
"The woman he marries must be a virgin," he went on reading.
At the end of the sermon, we were sent out with the duty of looking out for a suitable suitor for an ageing priest, a lady who ticked all the boxes to be marriageable to my uncle. It should have been a much lower bar, I thought. And while Leviticus further on warns against offerings by those with defects, Harold should top the list of the next edition among those not allowed anywhere near the altar.
From being the village's most accomplished (read infamous) drunkard, to being a deadbeat uncle, stealing from the village's coffers, dumping two girlfriends (wives, depending on where you stand), and entrenching corruption in his government, Harold is probably the least fit person to stand on the altar and offer any kind of sacrifice.
But with a new wife, a virgin preferably, he hopes that all his transgressions will be behind him as will his countless sins.
Also, that alcohol prices are not touched, otherwise all other levies come straight, and are rubber-stamped, from above (read the national government if you may; heaven if you are very religious).
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