Religion and politics: God – He's back

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/17/religion-politics-god-is-back

Version 0 of 1.

David Cameron is doing God. As the Austro-Hungarian statesman Metternich remarked in another context, what does he mean by that? British prime ministers, historically, keep their faith – even the question of whether they have one – a very personal matter. But Mr Cameron has told the Church Times that it is his Christianity that drives him to try to change people's lives. He says people who espouse a "secular neutrality" fail to grasp its consequences, although he does not spell out what those are. He describes his own deep respect for Christian traditions and advocates a greater Christian self-confidence nationally. Last week, he was talking about his personal faith too, describing himself as a practising Christian, and talking warmly of the peace and pastoral care he has found through his local parish church.

These Eastertide interventions may simply be a heartfelt response to the bishops' mass attack about poverty. There is, alternatively, a widespread view that they are a piece of cynical political manoeuvring, intended to strengthen his appeal to the core Tory vote that is still bewildered by his determination to legislate for same-sex marriage, and flirting alarmingly with Ukip. It could be something of both. But these days, faith is a more contentious matter than it has been at any time since Irish Catholics held the balance of power in a string of constituencies from Lancashire to Glasgow. He is taking a bigger risk than simply looking like a political hypocrite.

David Cameron is not the first Conservative prime minister in recent times to be provoked into a public examination of their faith after finding themselves under fire from the churches. Margaret Thatcher was predictably robust after the publication in 1985 of Faith in the Cities, a report commissioned by the then Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcie, that was strongly critical of the impact of her economic and social policies. The bishops were reacting to a watershed, the slow deconstruction of the substance of the postwar settlement. The Thatcher message, that the good Samaritan had to get rich before he could become charitable, was a brutal encapsulation of what she believed. David Cameron couches a similar message in the gentler language of cultural Christianity. Mrs Thatcher was impressed by the uncompromising rigour of the Old Testament, Mr Cameron by the easier virtues of compassion, love and humility. His language echoes, distantly, Clement Attlee's. He was a discreet non-believer who said he liked the ethics but not the mumbo jumbo.

If Mr Cameron's purpose is to argue that his motives are good, so therefore his actions justifiable, then it is conventional enough politics, even if it is questionable philosophy. The wider point is the wisdom of so consciously promoting himself as a Christian politician, and with it his new emphasis on Britain taking pride expressly in being a Christian country. This is a distinct break with the past, just the step that Tony Blair – a political leader whose Christianity was much more than cultural – refused to take when Alastair Campbell made his famous pronouncement about not doing God. It contains the risk of setting up Christianity not for what it is, an important part of British national life, but as a distinguishing aspect of British identity. It also breaches the historic determination that, however carefully calibrated some calculations about religious interest are in private, religion and politics are never overtly mixed. That is what has fostered the evolution of a tolerant state and society despite the constitutional oddity of having an established church whose governor is also the head of state.

And it begs the question of just how Christian Britain really is. The last census found around 60% of Britons described themselves as Christian – down from 70% ten years earlier – and dwindling church attendances are a fraction of that. For this 60%, Christianity may well be part of who they are. But that is not the same as saying it is part of what makes them British and it is dangerous to suggest that it is.