Sir Elton John, short, flamboyant superstar and devoted husband to Canadian film maker David Furnish, is disappointed that his initial bid to adopt a Ukrainian infant has been rejected. Click here to read the full story:

Dear Elton
Regarding your attempt to adopt a Ukrainian infant, I have to agree with the minister for Family, Youth and Sports, Mr Yuriy Pavlenko, who thinks you’re too old and too gay.
Elton, have you thought about how that poor little Ukrainian infant will turn out, with you and your ‘same-sex partner’, mincing round that huge mansion, being fed Advil every time a tooth comes through? Pain-killers are of course, DISGUSTING! We Scientologists have to ask: How can you and your gay lover be positive role models to that innocent child, if you insist on giving him over-the-counter medication?

Yours,
Tom Cruise

Mon Cher Elton
During my last séance with Michael, he instructed me to contact you toute suite. ’Call my little fag friend Elton,’ he wailed, ‘and tell him if he really wants a child, to get  together with Debbie Rowe…she is free at last, free at last!’
Strange, haunting words, Elton, but who are we to understand those who have passed on to the spirit world?
By the way, I take private bookings and will be in the UK from September to November.

A Bientot,
Madame Gris-gris

Dear Sir Elton
We’ve never met, but I have been a fan of yours since I was little. Now I have kids of my own – 14 in fact, and I’m looking for a good home for some of the latest batch. I think you and your partner David would make ideal parents. Can you take 5 or 6? This would help pay for liposuction on my upper thighs

Hoping to hear from you,
Octomom

PS: I only use one name for those kids, because they all look alike

Dear Readers
Hewdge is sometimes the only true sanctuary that a person of consequence might flee to when avoiding the savage glare of the international media spotlight. In the case of Italy’s prime minister, Sylvio Berlusconi, who has been accused of sleeping with prostitutes and even of being a sex addict, the Italian press has rendered him the object of amusement among Roman matrons and the butt of tasteless Viagra jokes worldwide. Click here for the full story: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/6174403/Silvio-Berlusconi-threatens-to-sue-call-girl.html
However, the promiscuous prime minister does have loyal friends who are ready to support his decision to sue Patrizia D’Addario, a woman who claims that Mr Berlusconi slept with her on a number of occasions for money. One such ally is Roman Catholic Cardinal Gustavo Porchi, Sylvio Berlusconi’s boyhood friend. Hewdge publishes the Cardinal’s open letter, in the hope that the Italian media might pause to consider the damaging impact of its political witch-hunt.

Open letter from Cardnal Gustavo Porchi:

I wish to publicly defend my dear friend and prime minister, Mr Sylvio Berlusconi, against this blatant smear campaign orchestrated by the Italian and international press.
Mr Berlusconi’s private life is his own and he should not have to defend against hearsay, or rather – ‘whore-say’ , from that little tart, Patrizia D’Addario, who is the very worst kind of creature that God ever put on this earth. Why, at night I have heard Sylvio crying, crying into his pillow because of the damage to his reputation! That PUTANESCA is going to burn in the devil’s hell fires for her wickedness!!

At least I am grateful for one thing, that Mama Berlusconi (God rest her soul!) is not here to see her little Sylvio being branded as a common sex addict. I fervently pray that the press allows our prime minister to get on with the serious business of running the country, but should his enemies continue hounding him, we have excellent lawyers permanently on call at the Vatican who are deft at defending against trumped-up allegations in matters of the flesh, if you know what I mean….

For my part, I will immediately cross out that whore’s telephone number from my piccolo libro nero, recite ten Hail Marys, and flagellate myself until my pizza arrives.

May God Bless You And Keep You,
ex toto corde paenitet me,

Cardinal Gustavo Porchi

The Hewdge article about a group of atheist animal lovers, who for a fee, promise to look after any ‘left-behind’ pets, after their Christian owners have been taken up to heaven or “raptured”, has sparked a firestorm of debate among our evangelical readers

The article, posted on Saturday, features the American website: http://www.eternal-earthbound-pets.com

To follow, a few of the letters Hewdge has received.

What the hell kind of fag blog-site are you running anyway? Jesus!!! Who the hell is interested in Eternal Earthbound-Pets services, fer chrissakes?! As a hetero-practicing Christian, who is due to be paroled next month, why in hell would I let a commie-liberal-nancy-atheist take care of my best friend?”
F**k that website…..Hewdge mistake! Amen
BIG JOHN McGRAF, Birmingham, Alabama

I think Eternal Earthbound Pets is a wonderful idea and I believe God will forgive those atheists (in some small measure) for their good works.  I have already signed up Ginger for the scheme, because I’m worried he might get stuck up a tree when I’m not around
ROSETTA STOWNE, Prioria, Illinois

I’m not sure about this scheme  – can we Christians really trust people like atheists to be honest and look after our beloved pets when we’re sitting at God’s right hand? After all, these people are self-confessed sinners. I think I would rather leave my pet with the Confucians up the road (as long as Mr Kim Yeong and his family promise not to cook and eat my little Bobby in a curry after I’ve gone)
JEREMIAH QUINTIN BELL lll, Jacksonville, Florida

STAPHORST, Netherlands — A 90-minute drive from liberal Amsterdam, a pocket of orthodox Calvinism thrives where women shun trousers, swearing is banned and television is scorned as an ungodly intrusion.

Pious sobriety dictates politics, fashion and other aspects of daily life in the town of Staphorst, nestled near the top end of the so-called Dutch Bible Belt that stretches from Zeeland in the southwest to northeastern Overijssel.

“People here see themselves as the true heirs of John Calvin,” the reformist Protestant theologian born 500 years ago last month, 82-year-old Jan de Wolde told AFP of the town he moved to 54 years ago and has written widely about.

“They view much of the rest of the world as godless.”

Statistics from cable company Ziggo show that nearly 80 percent of locals have no television, explained by De Wolde as an attempt to shutter out the hedonistic outside world.

Residents flock to church in their thousands twice every Sunday, when no buses run, and shops and the town swimming pool are closed.

The topics of euthanasia, abortion and gay marriage, which the Netherlands was first in the world to legalise, are taboos here. And four years ago, the municipal council banned swearing, though imposing no penalty.

In the most recent municipal elections, most residents voted for the SGP Christian party which bars women from holding public office.

“From the outside it can appear medieval,” a 66-year-old inhabitant told AFP.

“But people are mostly tolerant of others. And it is comforting to live in such a tight-knit community.”

The town of 16,000 people has one of Europe’s highest birth rates, few career women, fewer restaurants, and nearly 1,000 women who still wear the chaste, cover-all outfit of their great-grandmothers.

The traditional ensemble comprises over a dozen items of clothing in summer, including a calf-length, black, pleated skirt; apron; shawl and bonnet, and black shoes or wooden clogs.

Key are the black thigh-high socks, traditionally hand knitted and fastened with an elastic band, that gave rise to the Bible Belters’ nickname of “zwartekousen” (black stockings).

Even among women who have abandoned the traditional dress as old-fashioned, hardly any wear trousers which they regard as “men’s clothing, unbiblical”, according to De Wolde.

“A dress is what I feel comfortable in,” said Jentje Veijer, 21, adding she had no desire to visit Amsterdam with its famous red-light district and cannabis-vending coffee shops, “because they have different values there.”

Half of young people in Staphorst move directly from their parental home to marriage. Only one in 30 babies are born to unmarried parents and the enclave has one of the Netherlands’ lowest divorce rates: 39 per 1,000 residents.

Women must wear a hat to enter the town’s biggest church, and the most widely read paper is the Reformatories Dagblad (Reformed Daily), which has no sports pages and much church news.

“It is too stifling,” said 19-year-old Vic van Vuuren, who studies in nearby Zwolle, proclaims to be an atheist, and hopes to find work outside his native Staphorst.

“Everything is closed here on Sundays, except for church. That is no way to live.”

Church historian Mirjam van Veen believes the Bible Belt had its origins in the Dutch 80-year war against Spanish dominion that ended in 1648.

“It lies where the frontline between government and Spanish troops used to be.”

The government of the Netherlands of the time, she said, “promoted the emergence of an orthodox Protestantism in the area as a barrier against the Catholic Spanish influence from the south.”

Bible Belters have remained true to these roots, and still pride themselves on thrift and hard work.

Those who do leave the town are quickly replaced by others who wish to raise families in a traditional environment, said Van Veen.

But De Wolde said these “outsiders”, along with industrialisation, were changing the town’s character.

“There is a disco here now,” he shrugged, and more and more people have the Internet at home.

The traditional opposition to inoculation as interference with God’s will has also abated, with some 80 percent of Staphorsters now vaccinated against polio compared to less than 50 percent when an outbreak hit the town in 1971.

“Whatever people may think, time has not stood still in Staphorst,” said De Wolde.

“But some things will always remain the same: religious dedication and a strong sense of community.”