OJ:

I've been meaning to ask you about a past comment you made that a "constitutional crisis" would have ensued if Blair had done this during his prime ministership. I'm aware of the historical irony involved and all that, but would this have violated laws still on the books?

IIRC oj previously said that the law still requires the PM be Church of England.

England's constitution is unwritten, but the King can't be Catholic after the Glorious Revolution and, presumably, since the PM has supplanted the monarch he couldn't be either.

Could the PM be a Muslim?

Recall that since the Constitution is unwritten much stuff isn't against the law, per se, but would provoke crisis precisely because there aren't rules to follow.

It's also sensitive because the Prime Minister, acting for the Crown, appoints the Bishops of the Church of England, although one suspects that having a believing Catholic pick the Bishops would be for the best. There's an apocryphal story about a Prime Minister being told by an aide that a CofE Bishop he had appointed had, on his death bed, converted to Catholicism.

"Good," said the PM.

"Good?" said the scandalized aide. "How can it be good that a Bishop we appointed became a Catholic?"

"At least I'm the only PM for the last 100 years who can definitely say that I appointed a Bishop who believed in God."

OJ:

I'd say that's a pretty elastic reading of a document intended to tell James II to buzz off, but let's go with it. In the current political environment, would anybody raise a stink about such a matter? I would think it doesn't make the complainer look good to opine that a PM ought to be thrown out solely over his religion.

That's all the Revolution was.

Yes, unwritten constitutions depend on no one violating their terms. Once any one is compromised the rest are nugatory.