Tartin Mop: Tree Lives Matter

From: Rev Dr Alana Denmars (She/hers) <woke.liberal@shemail.com>

Sent: 01 January 2023 08:19

To: Ichabod Chapel Mailing List <Ichabod.Chapel>

Subject: Tree Lives Matter

Dear friends

I hope you have been following the work of the campaigning organisation Tree Lives Matter. Although we have already stated that we are now in favour of tree marriage, the Tree Lives Matter movement, which I admire very much and whose protests I shall naturally find the time to support, are bravely exposing the oppression of trees in our nation, both historically and in the contemporary setting. Consequently, many of us have gone around inspecting our chapels and churches to seek and remove evidence of former generations’ exploitation of trees. I am very sorry to have to report that even at Ichabod Chapel, here at Tartin Mop, we have found evidence of some wood-based products which were once living, breathing trees. Cruelly cut down by a less virtuous generation, they were turned into doors, pews and pulpits. We repent of this appalling abuse and misappropriation of the earth's living creatures. I am therefore writing to inform you that from next month, our wooden pews will be removed, our pulpit dismantled and all doors taken down. We will not benefit from oppression of any shape or form! Tree lives matter!

Yes, this is radical. Yes, this might be called ‘extreme’ by uneducated, ill-informed persons, but Christians are people who look out for the latest moral bandwagons and leap aboard, as though we were behind them from the beginning. Let the removal of woods and timbers commence!

Yours Wokely,

Rev Dr Ms Alana Denmars (she/hers), Ichabod Chapel

From: Rev Dr Alana Denmars (She/hers) <woke.liberal@shemail.com>

Sent: 08 January 2023 11:19

To: Ichabod Chapel Mailing List <Ichabod.Chapel>

Subject: Re:Tree Lives Matter

Dear friends,

Sadly, English Heritage and the local authority’s Planning Department have served me with a notice of intended prosecution if we continue to remove historic woodwork from our chapel. I guess they are not moral enough to see the plight of our wood-based lifeforms and are still clinging to the decadent and oppressive past. On the other hand, the absence of pews did mean we had nowhere to sit, and I hadn’t thought of that. Although we could cope without the pulpit (when I ascend it on Sunday I usually run out of things to say- how did past generations have so much to talk about??), we will have to keep it I'm afraid. Anyway, though the pews and pulpit will have to remain, we have still made a powerful gesture to an admiring world. Nevertheless, I have noticed that Bibles are made of paper in the middle, and that this was once pulp from trees. I have looked through our Listed Building record, and guess what? BIBLES ARE NOT INCLUDED! Consequently, we can remove them all and ban all paper-based books -including those awful Bibles.

Yours Wokely,

Rev Dr Ms Alana Denmars (she/hers), Ichabod Chapel

From: Rev Dr Alana Denmars (She/hers) <woke.liberal@shemail.com>

Sent: 09 January 2023 07:19

To: Ichabod Chapel Mailing List <Ichabod.Chapel>

Subject: Re: Re: Tree Lives Matter

Dear friends,

It would seem that we removed all our Bibles several decades ago. Indeed, I could not even remember what one looked like, not having opened one since I was at university. Mabel Haberthwaite said she thought there might have been one left in the Sunday School room's bottom cupboard- an unclaimed Sunday School prize from 1973, but we could not find it. So the good news is that we are a Bible-free church and can be a part of Tree Lives Matter and not feel bad about anything! God be praised! TREE LIVES MATTER!

Yours Wokely,

Rev Dr Ms Alana Denmars (she/hers), Ichabod Chapel