Peter Brown wrote:Other issue I have with the liars for religion is their false argument that England was based on Judeo-Christian Laws. 90% of the time, and especially the major laws were anti biblical efforts. Eg Biblical stance = Divine right of Kings vs pre Christian custom of Anglo Saxon Equality = a war ending in the Magna Charta being signed (Christianity lost, pre Christian tradition won). The history of England is littered with the power battles between Church and State, and didn’t really end until Henry 8th took both jobs and hats.

(nb I deliberately left out other members of the UK because they had their own unique history and traditions, and much of English Law was grounded deliberately in traditional Anglo Saxon Laws and customs being kept by William the Conqueror [to decrease civil uprisings] decades before the Union or English expansionism started.)

jez9999 wrote:Savannah: Yep... Scotland is totally secular.

Savannah wrote:Scots law also comes from the native Celtic, Picts, Scots Irish and Norse customs. David I brought Normal feudalism to the country and justice ended up completely in the hands of local sheriffs, not the king; then after the Wars of Independence we didn't really want to copy English law, so instead we looked to our trading partners across the North Sea, so Scots law is also a lot to do with the Justinian Code, even tho we were never really invaded by the Romans much. (Justinian Law it should be noted included such niceties as entrenching Christianity as the state religion, banning pagan customs and excluding non-Christians and heretics from citizenship)

Like England, Scotland has more than its fair share of religious civil war. Scottish Covenanters were fighting right into the reign of Charles II. (And my CoS grandmother keeps going on about those freedom-fighters .) Religious wars in Britain (not including Northern Ireland of course) didn't really end until the battle of Culloden. At least wars useing broadswords, religious wars are still ongoing, only they're wars of words. Don't think that this lovely religious background has left the kirk with just coffee mornings, they're officially anti-choice, anti-right to end of life, pro-religious people sticking their noses into public life all in the name of inclusiveness and tolerance.

The good thing about scottish history is that it has left us without an established church or state religion. If Warsi thinks she's got it bad in a country with an established church, imagine how I feel living in a secular country with a secular parliament of its own, but has to cow-tow to the medieval bishops from a foreign religion, from another parliament in another country. Scotland is so bloody close... Warsi is an arse.

j.mills wrote:Muslims aren't supposed to go around routinely killing each other either, surely?

Jovan wrote:She's not considered a "proper" muslim, by those "more devout" ones either.

Paul wrote:

Jovan wrote:She's not considered a "proper" muslim, by those "more devout" ones either.

Yep. They throw eggs at her!

How many 'militant secularists' have even raised their voice at her?

Tory Muslim peer pelted with eggs

She of course claimed at the time that he assailants were not true muslims

Precambrian Rabbi wrote: Beautiful, beautiful Luton. Why did I ever leave you?

The Hanging Monkey wrote:

Precambrian Rabbi wrote: Beautiful, beautiful Luton. Why did I ever leave you?

You learned to drive?

Baroness Warsi and her gang of pious politicos are out of step with the nation

I'm sure Baroness Warsi's speech to the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy in Rome today will please its audience. She promised to support the Pope in his desire to return Christianity to the centre of public life in Britain.

It also seemed to chime with the mood in this country — at least the mood of the media — which was, apparently, fizzing with fury at the modest High Court judgment that ruled that it was not legal to include prayers on a council agenda – because they are not council business.

Under extreme bombardment from the press, we at the National Secular Society were preparing to barricade the doors – until we noticed a sudden and unprecedented upsurge in people joining us.

Something very strange was happening. The media was almost unanimous in its disapproval — or, in some cases, hysterical condemnation — of the ruling. Strangely, it was the Sunday Times alone that gave unequivocal support to the ruling – and in an editorial even suggested that it should be extended to cover prayers in Parliament.

Another strange phenomenon is the disparity between what newspapers are writing above the line and what their readers are writing below it. As an example, look at the reaction to Baroness Warsi's courting of the Pope in the Daily Telegraph – thousands of reader responses and a vast majority of them hostile to what she is doing.

Then this morning comes the result of an Ipsos Mori poll commissioned by the Richard Dawkins Foundation which shows that overwhelmingly, those people who ticked the 'Christian' box in the last census don't want religion to have any influence over public policy. That's 74% of self-defined Christians who do not agree with Baroness Warsi.

She may be an enthusiast for religion, but her enthusiasm is not shared by the nation. The Ipsos poll also revealed that the 72% of people who said they were Christian in the 2001 census are nothing of the kind. They ticked the box because they thought they were good people or because their parents were Christian – very few of them actually believe in the precepts of Christianity, and even fewer actively practice it.

So, who is out of step here? If you read the newspaper commentators it is most definitely the National Secular Society. But if you listen to the people, you'll find that it is the pious politicians who seem to be threatening us with theocracy.

Baroness Warsi led a delegation of senior British Government Ministers to the Vatican to have a 20 minute chat with the Pope. She wants to assure him that religion will be returned to the centre of public life, just as he called for on his recent trip to this country. She will assure him that his visit was highly successful and its success must be built on.

Unfortunately, it was not highly successful; it was not even slightly successful. A year after the visit, the Catholic Church commissioned a poll to see what lasting impact it had had on the nation. According to the research, hardly anyone remembers that it actually happened. And 91% said it made no difference to their moral outlook at all. Strangely, the Church doesn't seem anxious to draw attention to the results of this poll, which was carried out by Opinion Research Business among 2,049 adults.

In fact, 29% of those who were questioned said they couldn't remember hearing or seeing anything about the visit. 6% of those who say they did recall that the visit happened say they can't remember a thing about it.

Of the individual events — meeting the Queen, speaking in Parliament, meeting the Prime Minister — typically only 1% — or less — of those who had any memory of the visit recalled them. (A few were up to 5%.)

The biggest proportion of those who recalled anything about the visit (albeit only 11%) remembered our protest campaign about the enormous cost of the jamboree to the taxpayer.

And as for the impact it had – 91% of respondents said the Pope's visit made no difference whatsoever to their personal or spiritual values.

You hadn't heard of this poll? I wonder why.

So given this, why is the British Government courting the Holy See in this way? Why should the last absolute theocracy in Europe be invited to participate in the affairs of the British Government?

Well, it might be argued, the Holy See participates — indeed in some cases, interferes — in every other Government's affairs. Only last week it succeeded in forcing President Obama to compromise his health reforms and in Britain it is gearing up to give the Cameron plan for gay marriage a real kicking.

Lady Warsi talks of "militant secularism" with some distaste. But secularism's militancy is as nothing compared with the aggressive tactics of the Catholic Church when it is not getting its way.

And besides, as the Dawkins poll illustrates quite plainly, secularisation is a process that people choose for themselves. Taken together with the Church's own plummeting attendance figures, it clearly shows that people are voting with their feet. If they do not believe the precepts of a religion, why should a Government try to force it upon them? Religion only has value if it is freely chosen. Coercion kills it stone dead.

Baroness Warsi may be a woman of principle, but she is swimming against a very strong tide that is not controlled by the National Secular Society or by the Church of England or the Holy See or anyone else. Turning away from religion is a choice that the people have made of their own volition and using their own conscience. It is not the Government's job to tell them that they are wrong.

Lady Warsi risks starting a culture war that she cannot win, and neither can the Conservative Party. If religion is given too much of a say in our day to day life, then there will be a reaction that David Cameron will not like. It will take place at the ballot box.

Baroness Warsi wrong again

At a speech to be given during a visit to the Vatican, Baroness Warsi will once again criticise 'militant secularisation' as 'intolerant' and 'illiberal' and call for Christianity and 'Christian values' to be reaffirmed in Europe. It is not the first time that the minister has called secularism ‘intolerant and illiberal’. She has also said that religious people contribute more to society than the non-religious, has championed religious groups as being at the heart of the ‘Big Society’, and even tried to amend the Equality Bill in a way which would leave humanists unprotected against discrimination and unequal treatment in the provision of, and access to, public services, employment, education, funding, and elsewhere.

The British Humanist Association (BHA) has expressed its dismay that the minister continues to misrepresent the nature of secularism and has condemned her call for a greater role for Christianity as outdated, unwarranted and divisive.

BHA Chief Executive Andrew Copson said, 'With government proposing to hand ever more schools and other public services to religious groups with only limited protections for the rights of staff and service users of the "wrong" or no religion, the need for an inclusive and secular approach to our public institutions has never been greater. At such a time it is surreal to hear secularism being condemned as intolerant - it is not secular schools that select pupils according to their parents' beliefs, it is not secular agencies that reserve employment opportunities for staff according to their beliefs, and it is not secular organisations which lobby to maintain privilege and have exemption from laws - like equality laws - that should affect everyone equally.

'Constant talk of the Christian nature of Britain denies the fact that most British people today are not Christians, and ignores for no good reason the many pre-Christian and non-Christian influences that have shaped our society for the good, sometimes in opposition to Christianity. What is Lady Warsi's point in constantly repeating this theme? As a factual claim it is ahistorical and plainly untrue of contemporary society; as policy it is chauvinist and unnecessarily divisive. In an increasingly non-religious and at the same time diverse society, we need policies that will emphasise what we have in common as citizens rather than what divides us.'

BHA Head of Public Affairs, Pavan Dhaliwal said, 'There is a deep irony that Lady Warsi's latest comments come on the same day that new research shows that many self-described "Christians" in fact are not Christian in a religious but only in a residual inherited cultural sense, and have the same social and political attitudes as the liberal mainstream of British society. Research like this demonstrates that government policies constructed on the false assumption that Britain is in fact a Christian country are doomed from the start - we really do need better from government ministers than that.'

Paul G wrote:They're digging their own grave.