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Good morning. There was a time when November 5th began in church for many people. They would gather to thank God for the Nation’s deliverance from gunpowder, treason and plot. The set prayers commemorating the events of 1605 were politically very incorrect by today’s standards. The notions of Popish tyranny, wicked conspiracies and malicious practices were linked and condemned. Parliament abolished the observance as long ago as 1859, removing it entirely from the Book of Common Prayer. By then Catholic emancipation was a generation old. It was thought Guy Fawkes Night would die through lack of interest. It hasn’t. In my youth many children still sought a penny for the Guy. That custom has almost completely disappeared. It’s now rare to see any figure on a bonfire. There’s a proper sensitivity to Catholic sentiment. The fireworks have also largely moved out of our back gardens into public parks. The rockets go higher and the displays become ever more lavish. Risks have been reduced and safety has become paramount. Hardly anyone now associates November 5th with politics and religion at all. Or so I thought until I heard of the Bonfire Night party last weekend in the village of Speen in Buckinghamshire. There they burnt a model of the HS2 train in protest. We saw striking pictures of the blazing locomotive in yesterday’s press alongside young people giving a thumbs down signal. Last year the village burned a replica of the Houses of Parliament, presumably a deliberate irony since on November 5th we are meant to be commemorating the deliverance of King, Lords and Commons. It’s not the first time that Bonfire Night has been appropriated for other ends. As long ago as 1831 a mob in Devon replaced the Guy with an effigy of the Bishop of Exeter, so unpopular was he at the time. I’m not aware of anyone doing that in Norwich – yet. Bonfire Night lends itself to protest. The old prayers were in themselves a protest against sedition. Protest has a hallowed place in the Judaeo-Christian tradition. The Hebrew prophets protested against corruption and unfaithfulness in ancient Israel. Amos warned of fire consuming the people. In St Luke’s Gospel Jesus protests against those who neglect justice and make their neighbours bear heavy burdens. A healthy society needs to enable protest to be part of its life. But all societies find protest challenging. The rituals of November 5th, so heavily sanitised in almost every other way, may offer fresh opportunities for safe but explicit protest. But let’s not bring back guys or human effigies. In that way, the people in Speen may be on to something.