On Occupy St. Paul's

1. Let's be clear and call the protest what it is, not what it claims to be. It's causing problems for St. Paul's, and this morning's news was reporting that small businesses like restaurants in the area have also seen trade drop off massively. This is hardly damaging the business of the stock exchange (not that I wish damage on the LSE either, of course), but it's immensely damaging to St. Paul's.
2. The health-and-safety point is probably over-done; they normally are. But even without the H&S busybodies, the cathedral was hardly going to be able to function normally, was it? This is why protestors camp outside the headquarters of large corporations or power stations to which they object: it stops them from functioning normally.
3. The protestors are, at least, being consistent. They're protesting against property rights, and to illustrate their point, they deprive the Church of England of the ability to use its property. As a side-note, may I point out that they are flagging up why property rights are necessary for a civilised society. Imagine living in a world where any idiot could camp in your home or your business, without any way for you to get rid of them. Or imagine a world in which the government trumpets its commitment to free speech but then allows anyone to stop any printing press they like. Property rights matter, because without them individual freedoms are meaningless.
4. On the other hand, they are also being inconsistent: I should expect most of them dislike collateral damage, and yet they are willing to impose it in the pursuit of their cause. There is a difference between killing civilians in the pursuit of a (just) military objective and inconveniencing tourists and Anglicans, of course. But there is also enough similarity to give any thoughtful individual pause for thought.
5. Some protestors say that they will park their own opinions and stay until a vote is taken to move off. To subject your own conscience to majority vote is insane. To require everyone else to subject theirs to majority vote is democratic tyranny. That, I believe, is what lots of the protestors genuinely want: a society in which morality and individual exercise of liberty are subject to majority vote. It's the elevation of democracy to the status of high principle. They think this will make for Paradise; I think it would be hell on earth.
6. Finally, although I expect that this is becoming a case of trespass, I could well understand it if the cathedral authorities didn't particularly want to go to law to sort this out; it looks as if they would prefer to use moral influence. The irony is that protestors of this ilk tend to trumpet their morality loudly to any poor unfortunate in the vicinity; and yet they are evidently not liable to moral suasion. To coin a phrase, they can dish it out, but they can't take it. What a surprise.