Cary Gee – Out and about
THE only memorable answer – and the only one with which I agree – Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has given to a question since he started leading his party further along the road to oblivion is the one-word reply he gave when asked if he believed in God. Clegg’s unqualified “No” marked him out as either remarkably honest or painfully naïve and possibly both. Certainly it was the answer of a man who realises he will never be Prime Minister.
Despite the fact that few in this country practise any religion, there is an expectation that our political leaders will behave differently and that, when we are in a mess, those who got us into it will have a higher moral authority to turn to. To discount the possibility that someone else knows more than they do smacks of arrogance. However, we are rightly suspicious when they put a call straight through to heaven without consulting us first.
Tony Blair’s assertion that God would judge his actions in Iraq might have helped him sleep more easily, but was not necessarily any comfort to the families of the thousands of dead soldiers and Iraqi civilians.
Meanwhile, churchmen (there are, as yet, no women bishops) should stick to spreading the gospel without damning elected politicians for doing their jobs – what they think is best for those who put them in Parliament.
Cardinal Keith O’Brien, leader of the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland, has called on politicians to resign rather than follow the Government whip on to the Human Fertility and Embryology Bill.
This is tantamount to asking MPs to place their personal faith before the faith – or lack of one – of their constituents. Regardless of whether our religious beliefs coincide with those of our MPs, that is not likely to be why we voted for them.
It might have been foolish for Gordon Brown, in the first place, not to allow a free vote on the embryology bill, as is usual on a matter of conscience, but to make a damaging U-turn in the face of religious hysterics has allowed God to enter British politics in a way that has not happened before.
Do not believe that religious leaders would be content to inflict just one defeat on the government of the day. It would soon become necessary to scrutinise every parliamentary paper prior to publication in order to make sure no major religion was offended. It would become impossible to pass any but the most inane legislation. Policies such as the introduction of civil partnerships and increased child benefits for all children under 16, regardless of whether their parents are married, would run aground as politicians placed self-preservation before what was good and necessary.
Cardinal O’Brien has also given the false impression that a “God divide” exists between Britain’s two main political parties, similar to the one in the United States between the Republicans and the Democrats.
That divide runs so deep that a book on the subject, Jim Wallis’ God’s politics – Why the American Right Gets it Wrong and the Left Doesn’t Get it, spent several months on the New York Times bestseller list. There are signs that America’s God divide will narrow if Barack Obama wins the White House. Ironically, it might be those who claim to have a hotline to God who stop him getting there.
In the case of the embryo research bill, in common with prophets before them, the likes of Cardinal O’Brien are guilty, not just of conflating faith with morality, but scaremongering. It seems that, just in case the evidence as it exists is not enough to secure victory, they have manufactured some of their own.
So it unsurprising that some MPs have received correspondence from serial letter-writers concerned they may be served by a half-man, half-cow on a future visit to the shops. None of this can possibly be in the public interest and that which relies on fabrication should be discounted immediately.
When Brown’s predecessor faced a similar intervention from the leader of English Catholics over the introduction of the Equality Act, which made it legally possible (although highly unlikely in practice) for the Catholic Adoption Agency to place children with gay parents, Blair bravely faced down his critics. As a supreme political operator and despite his own strong religious convictions that led him to convert to Catholicism after he left Downing Street, Blair realised that, in order to make changes to benefit many, it is sometimes necessary to override individual articles of faith.
Blair stood his ground and drove through legislation whose significance far outweighs any practical benefit. Compared to the row over adoption by gay parents, none of whom have so far applied for a child through the Catholic Adoption Agency, the benefits of passing the Human Fertility and Embryology Bill, which will allow human-animal hybrids to be created for research into diseases such as Parkinson’s and multiple sclerosis, are potentially huge.
Brown may again have unwittingly made himself a hostage to fortune, but it would be disastrous for his Government and the many millions who stand to benefit from embryo research to climb down at this stage. In a secular society, we do not need religious leaders to make martyrs of elected officials.
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