[blasphemy] another nail in the coffin

Python, Life of Brian, Stoning Scene - script here

Does G-d have a sense of humour? I certainly hope so, otherwise I'm in big, big trouble. If we are made in His image, then it must be so.

So when Ginro reports that Cranmer reports that Gerald Howarth gave his thoughts on the blasphemy bill, a smile played on the lips until I actually started reading:

There was a debate in the House of Commons on Tuesday 6th May about the blasphemy laws, of which the entire debate can be read in Hansard.

This nation has been forged and fashioned down the centuries by its Christian tradition. Every Act of Parliament is prefaced by reference to the support of the Lords temporal and spiritual and the Commons assembled.

That indicates that our Christian faith has played a hugely important part. Therefore, while I have enjoyed the frivolities of this evening’s proceedings, we should be under no illusions that a serious issue is at stake.

I am afraid that I am not interested in the Joint Committee on Human Rights or the European Court of Human Rights; I am interested in my views and beliefs, which are profoundly held and shared by a lot of people in this country.

Those of other religions who have come here down the centuries have done so in the full knowledge that this is a Christian country. One of the reasons why they come here is that our Christian faith is a tolerant faith—one that allows mosques to be built and that allows people to observe their traditions, to bring those traditions with them and to practise them.

It is a mistake that some of them should now assert that, because they have come here in rather large numbers, they should be entitled to overturn centuries of tradition in this country.

The Minister relied, as Ministers of course do, on the assertion of the Government’s new religion, which is discrimination: anything that is discriminatory is to be resisted, if not completely rejected.

Of course the law of blasphemy is discriminatory—but then, as was pointed out to her, so is the fact that the Church of England is the established Church. That discriminates against everybody else ... We are discriminating every day of our lives; we discriminate when we go to the shops.

Furthermore and as has also been pointed out, we have Christian prayers in this place, which you, Mr. Speaker, of course preside over ... Clearly, this is an undisguised attempt at promoting the case for the disestablishment of the Church of England ...

[A] Jewish headmistress, whom I was sitting next to at a lunch ... said, “It is very important to our school that there continues to be an established Church, because it provides some protection to us in the practising of our religion.”

That message must not be forgotten.

It is a time when we desperately need to reassert moral values in this country. The fact that the archbishops have deserted the field is unfortunate, because that again sends out the wrong message, but my simple role in the Church is as a mere church warden.

Our children will not understand if this House says that it is not important, because why then should anything be sacred? That would send a dreadful message to the young people of our country…

“I think that this is no time to be abolishing the law of blasphemy.

When I go to a synagogue, I wear kipar and the prayers are in Hebrew. When I go to a mosque, I dress accordingly and show reverence. When in Rome ...

This dismantling of the rule of law does not really stem from the devout - it stems from Them - the ones this blog has long been railing against. It was so at the Wren Chapel, it was so at Harvard, it is so here. In Robert Bolt's Man for All Seasons, this exchange took place:

William Roper: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!

Sir Thomas More: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?

William Roper: Yes, I'd cut down every law in England to do that!

Sir Thomas More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's!

And if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!

The most fundamental mistake you can make, if you are atheist, agnostic or of another religion, is to think that to go along with this dismantling of a nation's legal and societal underpinning will not rebound on you. I'm talking directly here to fellow libertarians who are anything but Christian.

The most fundamental mistake you can make is to sit back and let this bill go through unchallenged because you disagree with Christianity per se and it's going to come back on you - it is just another nail in the coffin of all our freedoms which the Christian religion has had the decency to allow us in some small measure over the centuries.

The enemy is at the door, his weapon is divide and conquer and far too few realize it.