There are only two countries in the world that automatically give places in their parliaments to clerics.
One is Iran, that bastion of religious brutality where the morality police can arrest women for failing to wear the hijab in the prescribed manner and, as in the case of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini last month, they may die in custody.
The other country? That'll be the United Kingdom, where 26 bishops are guaranteed seats in the House of Lords.
This is just one of the anachronisms that the government should be spurred into reforming by the census data released this week.
For the first time, fewer than half of those answering described themselves as Christian - 46.2%, hugely down from 59.3% in the 2011 census.
The number of people saying they had no religion was up by eight million people to just over 37%.
If ever there was any justification for one religion having automatic votes in our democracy, there isn't any more, just as there's no justification for the hold that religion has over our schools.
Exemptions to the Equality Act allow state faith schools to use religion to discriminate over which pupils they admit, who they employ and what they teach.
The result is that the state collaborates in the segregation of children by religion, something that can only breed ignorance, suspicion and even hatred at an early age.
Schools that are paid for by taxpayers should be open to the children of all taxpayers, yet around 16% of places are religiously selective.
I speak from painful personal experience, having had to pretend to be Anglican for several years just so my children could get into the local primary school, where the Church of England monopolised half the places.
There are only four countries in the West that allow state-funded schools to select pupils by religion - the UK, where one third of state schools are Christian, plus Ireland, Israel and Estonia.
Even the non-religious schools in this country are compelled to have a daily act of Christian worship, something that no other country enforces.
In other areas of life, Christianity overwhelmingly dominates pastoral care provision in hospitals, prisons, and the armed forces, and humanist marriages are still not legally recognised in England and Wales. In Parliament, where there are more members than seats, places are reservered by putting down "prayer cards".
Don't expect religious groups to surrender these privileges voluntarily.
In responding to the census, The Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell said the church would continue to "play our part in making Christ known".
Which I guess means, among other things, continuing to preach to young captive audiences in schools.
It's time for this to change, argues Andrew Copson, chief executive of Humanists UK.
"‘One of the most striking things about these census results is how at odds the population is from the state itself," he said.
"No state in Europe has such a religious set-up as we do in terms of law and public policy, while at the same time having such a non-religious population.
"Iran is the only other state in the world that has clerics voting in its legislature. And no other country in the world requires compulsory Christian worship in schools as standard.
"The law has failed to keep up with the pace of change, and as a result, the enormous non-religious population in England and Wales face everyday discrimination – from getting local school places to receiving appropriate emotional support in hospitals.
"This census result should be a wake-up call which prompts fresh reconsiderations of the role of religion in society."
Stephen Evans, chief executive of the National Secular Society, said: "The current status quo, in which the Church of England is deeply embedded in the UK constitution, is unfair and undemocratic and looking increasingly absurd and unsustainable.
"We need fundamental reforms to become a true secular democracy – one that reflects the reality of our irreligious and diverse people and is fit for the 21st century."
This isn't a fight against religion, it's a fight for equality.
There are several thousand world religions, no one should get preferential treatment just because they follow one of them.
