It has, perhaps predictably, been a lively weekend for the debate about religion in public life. The most interesting conversation however wasn’t the indomitable former Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, taking a pop at David Cameron, nor a group of churches attacking the government on welfare reform. A more entertaining, and I think more telling debate was going on on Twitter between arch-secularist Evan Harris and Christianity’s poker playing defender, Victoria Coren. This highly engaging dingdong seems to be exactly what the medium was invented for. Impossible to capture in a screen grab, if you go to Evan Harris’s profile (@DrEvanHarris) and scroll down to 30th March you should be able to follow the thread.
Ian Blair, Baron Blair of Boughton, former Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, delivered the third annual Theos lecture on 16th November 2010.
The future of religious freedom in the UK was the subject of the Theos Courts and Conscience event on Wednesday 6th February at Portcullis House, as panellists Professor Roger Trigg (Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick), Professor Maleiha Malik (Professor in Law at King’s College London), and Michael Rubenstein (General Editor of the Equality Law Reports) engaged in a strong but friendly debate on religion and law.
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There’s little reason for us Christians to cry “Praise be!” about yesterday’s decision by the European Court of Human Rights. Nadia Eweida won her right to wear a cross as a BA employee, but a nurse was denied a similar right when it infringed health and safety regulations and two public servants were told that they couldn’t refuse to carry out work that contradicted their beliefs on homosexuality. The ECHR has green-lit the bearing of religious symbols but denied the freedom of Christians to articulate the beliefs that those symbols imply.
Today’s judgements on religious liberty have sent out the wrong message about the position of religious faith in Britain today, Theos, the religion and society think tank, has said.
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Reading Rowan Williams is like going hill walking without a map. You set off vigorously. The first part of the journey is bracing. Then the gradient kicks in. You slow down, sometimes to a crawling pace, often find yourself lost, occasionally retrace your steps, and wonder where exactly you are. If you persevere, which you know you should, you find the view from the summit exhilarating. You can see further and clearer now than before, and the excitement carries you all the way to end of your journey. But while the whole exercise is illuminating and sometimes even inspiring, it is also exhausting, and you can’t help thinking that there were quicker and simpler ways to have made it to your destination.
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