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The Criminalisation of British Christianity

18 February 2014

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Ed West warns that Christianity is becoming criminalized in Britain

Journalist Ed West raised concerns that heavy-handed policies are increasingly criminalising Britons who hold to the Christian perspective.

In an article for The Times (which can be read on Anglican Mainstream here), Mr. West suggested that even non-Christians should be worried about how people who hold unpopular views on sexuality are increasingly being strong-armed into silence.

If those who hold views different from the mainstream really are guilty of hate crimes, West asks, then shouldn’t those individuals be suspended from work or arrested? If so, do we really want to live in a society that criminalises opposing opinions?

In his article West drew attention to the reaction of London Mayor Boris Johnson to the bus campaign advertising conversion therapy for homosexuals. (Read our report of the event from last April here.) Although West disagrees on the effectiveness of ex-gay therapy, he argues that such ads should not be banned simply because liberals find them offensive.

The past half-century has seen a social revolution akin to the Protestant Reformation, in which previously accepted orthodoxies have become heresy within a generation, and homophobes are the new Catholics. And when something becomes unspeakable, it is easy to push it out of the public sphere or even criminalise it, especially when politics acts as a replacement communion of belief. If, as many believe, traditional views on homosexuality are more hateful than misguided, why shouldn’t those who express such things be suspended from their jobs or arrested?

West goes on to warn that “as our Christian blasphemy laws were finally put to rest in 2008 they were being replaced with ‘hate’ laws…neo-blasphemy laws in all but name.” Instead of religion as the untouchable element in their lives, many in Britain are now striving for a complete, criticism-free identity. Liberalism advocates this identity by “categorizing every view with which it disagrees as offensive.” As such, liberalism is well on its way to becoming the newest 21st century-religion, but with its ideals trampled in the climb to the top.

West’s concerns echo warnings issued in 2006 by Dr. N. T. Wright, then the Bishop of Durham, who told the House of Lords that there were quickly developing a new class of crimes which “have to do, not with actions but with ideas and beliefs.” He continued:

“People in my diocese have told me that they are now afraid to speak their minds in the pub on some major contemporary issues for fear of being reported, investigated, and perhaps charged. My Lords, I did not think I would see such a thing in this country in my lifetime…. The word for such a state of affairs is ‘tyranny’: sudden moral climate change, enforced by thought police.”

Christian Voice has reported on a number of high profile cases where Christians have found themselves on the wrong side of the totalitarian thought police (see the section ‘Discrimination Against Christians in Britain’, at the end of this article.) Just last month we reported on the arrest of an evangelist in Dundee for nothing other than preaching the gospel. To such tendencies West raises an important questions that liberals would do well to heed: do even liberals wish to see a society in which every belief other than their own is treated as a criminal offense?