KEY POINTS:
Oh the joy, oh the glee, oh the satisfaction! Just when I was about to transfer my allegiance to petanque, paddleball or ping pong, the Black Caps have come right - and how!
We didn't just lift the Chappell-Hadlee trophy for the first time from the mighty Australians
- we whitewashed the world champions in the three-match series.
The trouncing of the green and golds at Wellington - we're the only team in history to have beaten them by 10 wickets - was the beginning of a sweet revenge for all the disappointments, the cringes and the downright humiliations the Aussies have served up to us in recent years.
Then at Eden Park came the successful chasing down one of the bigger totals in international one-day cricket, and with eight balls to spare. And on Tuesday, in one of the most entertaining and exciting games of vintage one-day cricket, we chased down an even bigger total and achieved the series hat-trick.
Matthew Hayden's bludgeoning big ton for Australia, Craig McMillan's fastest century ever for New Zealand in one-dayers, Mark Gillespie's cameo knock and Brendon McCullum's game-winning stand were the stuff one-day cricket is made of.
And the best of it is that the Black Caps can now head off to the World Cup in the West Indies with renewed confidence and we can sit at home and watch with renewed optimism.
And now to more mundane matters. I am becoming more perplexed at the kerfuffle over the creation of a draft national statement on religious diversity, partly because such a proclamation is both pointless and unnecessary, but mainly because of the reaction of some sections of the Christian Church.
Why anyone would object to the statement that "New Zealand has no state religion" is way beyond my comprehension because it is unarguably true. New Zealand has never had a state religion.
What we have is a Christian tradition that goes back to the very foundations of our nation as a British colony and which survives to this day in our spiritual, social, business and political life as New Zealanders.
And those who have come lately to join us who are of other faiths have, by and large, been accepted into our social fabric in spite of their sometimes hugely different traditions and backgrounds.
The Christian tradition is part of who we are, and that will always be so. We don't have to apologise for it, nor do we have to compromise it to accommodate those of other faiths.
We don't have to alter our way of doing things, either. The very idea that we should, for instance, water down Christian prayers in Parliament or at Anzac Day services is preposterous. They, too, are part of who we are and if anyone objects to that, then it is they who have a problem.
It's almost as if those who are kicking up such a fuss are terrified that the Government is out to get them and if they don't put the kibosh on this unnecessary document, then it will lead to the proscription and/or persecution of Christians.
Now there is a chance that, subconsciously, those who initiated this inane, politically correct discourse would just love to put paid to the influence of Christianity on our society - the atheists, agnostics, secular humanists, navel-gazers, crystal-gazers and star-gazers who infest our politics and bureaucracy.
But even if that was the ultimate aim, what is there for Christians to worry about? Under the lordship of Jesus Christ, the son of the most high God, and empowered by his Holy Spirit, the Christian Church has nothing to fear.
In fact, a bit of persecution wouldn't go astray. The strongest and fastest-growing pockets of Christianity in the world today are those whose believers are under extreme persecution and dying for one's faith is not uncommon.
At least it would serve to excise from the Church in New Zealand the complacency, the easy-believism and the emphasis on money, property and prestige that renders so much of its ministry incestuous, irrelevant and ineffective.
It seems that the objectors have forgotten whence the Church came and the promises given to the Church it by its founder.
Perhaps they should read again the 16th chapter of Matthew's gospel, particularly that part which reads: "[Jesus] said unto [the disciples], 'But whom say ye that I am?' And Simon Peter answered and said, 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.'
"And Jesus answered and said unto him, 'Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood has not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And I say also unto thee that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it'." That's good enough for me.
