A Few Thoughts on Religion and Politics From The Blair Conversion Story
There's an interesting piece in this week's America Magazine (a national Catholic weekly) on former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's conversion to Catholicism. A couple of things jumped out at me , particularly relevant during this U.S. presidential primary season.
Blair felt he couldn't speak publicly about his faith while in office without being perceived as either a nut or a hypocrite. America Magazine writes: "It is a grand irony that in the United States, where church and state are separated by high constitutional walls, it is helpful for politicians to speak often of God, whereas in Britain, where the Anglican Church is 'by law established' and the state officially Christian, it's advisable for politicians to steer well away from the subject."
And if Blair had spoken about his faith -- or converted to Catholicism! -- while in office, how would he have dealt, America Magazine wonders, with the questions: "how can a Catholic oversee 200,000 abortions a year, appoint Anglican bishops, encourage British experiments on embryos and approve gay marriage?" The minefield here, it seems to me, is one also walked by by American politicians. "...for a practicing Catholic, it is a no win situation. Vote with the Vatican and you are a Roman stooge; vote against and you are a hypocrite." I don't think those are the only two choices, though. Ideally, a politician in a pluralist country doesn't vote with his church or on the command of his pastor. He votes with his conscience and his reason -- and while his faith plays a major role in the formation of the conscience, the distinction remains crucial. A politician should be free to tell you how his conscience is formed, though he shouldn't have to. What matters are the positions his conscience compels him to take. And once he's made those clear, it's up to me as a voter to filter those through my own conscience (formed of course by my faith, which I may share with him or I may not) and decide how I will vote.
Blair felt he couldn't speak publicly about his faith while in office without being perceived as either a nut or a hypocrite. America Magazine writes: "It is a grand irony that in the United States, where church and state are separated by high constitutional walls, it is helpful for politicians to speak often of God, whereas in Britain, where the Anglican Church is 'by law established' and the state officially Christian, it's advisable for politicians to steer well away from the subject."
And if Blair had spoken about his faith -- or converted to Catholicism! -- while in office, how would he have dealt, America Magazine wonders, with the questions: "how can a Catholic oversee 200,000 abortions a year, appoint Anglican bishops, encourage British experiments on embryos and approve gay marriage?" The minefield here, it seems to me, is one also walked by by American politicians. "...for a practicing Catholic, it is a no win situation. Vote with the Vatican and you are a Roman stooge; vote against and you are a hypocrite." I don't think those are the only two choices, though. Ideally, a politician in a pluralist country doesn't vote with his church or on the command of his pastor. He votes with his conscience and his reason -- and while his faith plays a major role in the formation of the conscience, the distinction remains crucial. A politician should be free to tell you how his conscience is formed, though he shouldn't have to. What matters are the positions his conscience compels him to take. And once he's made those clear, it's up to me as a voter to filter those through my own conscience (formed of course by my faith, which I may share with him or I may not) and decide how I will vote.
posted by Ernesto at 8:31 PM
1 Comments:
I'm woefully untravelled and I'm just writing off the cuff, but it sometimes seems Britain is like a two-party religious system and the Anglican church is somewhat like the liberal party and the Catholic the conservative. I know there are other denominations in Great Britain, but it doesn't seem, from afar, to be blessed (or cursed) with the hurly burly of religious discourse that rumbles through America. Some of the most evident forms of the evangelical movement in England, like Alpha, are extensions of Anglicanism. Compare that to the countless Days of Purpose and Focus on the Family and Bill Gothard and Evangelism Explosion movements that pop up in America, all from different churches of various denominations or non-denominations, it makes the conversion of Blair seem a fairly orderly maneuver, less a conversion than simply a reorientation.
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