A new priest in Brighton has described the place as “Britain’s most Godless city” and promised to sort that out.
I think he has a point though: the Argus has a poll attached to that story (Is Reverend Archie Coates right to repeat the description of Brighton as “Godless”?) and the results at the moment are:
- yes, and it’s good he intends to help change this: 3%
- no, it has its troubles but it is generally a good place:Â 2%
- being described as Godless is a compliment: 95%
Looks like the people of Brighton respond to accusations of being godless the way they would respond to accusations of being gorgeous or intelligent 
Ironically, if you were to trust online polls (which is probably not a wise thing to do as a rule) Brighton is marginally less godless than the national average. This is going by a poll on the Alpha website. On this site they have a poll which just says “Does God exist?” The results are:
- Yes:Â 2%
- No:Â 97%
- Probably:Â 1%
Mind you, I have not discounted an organised mischievous campaign by those pesky atheists to frig the result by going there to vote no. Even so, it must be right. If God did exist then he would have a vote, and his vote would be like the old union block votes at Labour conferences and outweight all the others. So either he does not exist or he abstained, and I know which option I am inclined towards.
I have to say, I saw the original Alpha posters and thought “that’s ripe for some co-ordinated voting”. I think they thought they were being clever with the ‘probably’ option.
I have seen some (or at least seen photos of them) where people with spray cans have added their own cross.
I feel bad about mentioning it though – I do enjoy going along to the local Alpha course pub quizzes as a ringer and get on very well with them.