Have you ever read the Mercer Mayer book, The Queen Always Wanted to Dance? I recommend it, even if you don't have kids. The gist of the story is this:

Because he thinks the Queen is unseemly, the King enacts an unjust law forbidding dancing. He follows it up with a similarly unjust law forbidding singing. Nobody wants to be miserable, so finally the entire town winds up in jail. Here are some excerpts:

Hardly anyone in the kingdom was happy about the new law, except a few people who thought dancing was a silly waste of time. They patted the King on the back and said, "Your Majesty, you surely are a wise king." And the King was happy because he was certain the Queen would behave properly now.

But the Queen decided that even if she couldn't dance she could sing.

He passed another law which read, "Singing is forbidden in my kingdom, and that includes the Queen. Signed, The King."

Now the milkmaid couldn't sing when she milked the royal cows. The royal chickens stopped laying eggs altogether....But most important of all, the Queen couldn't sing, because even a queen must obey the law.

The king was happy again. The few people who didn't like dancing didn't like singing either, so they were happy again.

"What do you think of my new law?" the King asked the Queen.

She just smiled and said, "Now you've gone too far."

And almost everyone agreed with her.

As the scullery maid mopped the royal floor, she whispered to herself, "This time the King has gone too far."

While the milkmaid churned the royal butter, she whispered to herself, "This time the King has gone too far."

Even in libraries, where no one is supposed to talk, people whispered, "This time the King has most certainly gone too far."

And the whispering was getting louder. But the very few people who thought that singing and dancing were a silly waste of time, patted the King on the back and said, "We like the new laws, Your Majesty."

The King marched everybody...to jail, where they all sang and danced and had a wonderful party.

By this time the King wasn't sure whether he was happy or not. He didn't like all this whispering. But after all, the law is the law.

All night long he tossed and turned. He felt lonely. Finally he could stand it no longer. "I think I've gone too far," he mumbled.

[By this time the Queen had already arrested herself because she would rather sing and dance in prison than be free and miserable.]

He threw back the sheets, sang a song off key, and danced...down to the jail. He opened the door and crept in. Everyone, even the Queen, stopped singing and dancing and stared at him in disbelief.

"I arrest myself," he announced meekly.

[After that the king changed the law and everyone lived happily ever after, except the people who didn't like to sing or dance and just liked to pat the king on the back.]

Well, here in the Diocese of Camden, we also have an unpopular "new law," and almost no one in the Diocese is happy about it. It seems we also have a "king" who's gone way too far. We hope that, like the king in the story, after losing way too much sleep because his conscience weighs so heavily on him, he one day wakes up and says to himself, "I think I've gone too far."