For the past three years, GW Foote & Co. Ltd have been working on a project to digitise the complete run of print versions of the Freethinker from 1881 to 2014. This project has now been completed and everyone can access this extraordinary back catalogue free of charge here.

In the first instalment of this series, I explained my own interest in freethought literature and my continuing career as a part-time bookseller for over 40 years. I have had the privilege of handling thousands of freethought books, pamphlets, journals, and other ephemera. However, the occasions when I have come across past issues of the Freethinker have been remarkably few. I have handled early bound volumes just twice and even later examples are rare, with dealers often demanding prices best described as speculative. I have asked myself why this is and guess that the attitude to newspapers is generally that you read them and then throw them away.

What is more, the printed Freethinker was always published in a relatively large format—the first copies were foolscap size (approximately 34 x 20 cm). This lasted for many years and made them difficult to store. The copies I have come across have almost always been bound volumes sold at the end of the calendar year. There were two types of these, one leather bound and one bound in sturdy green cloth. The former did not age well, with the leather cracking and the boards detaching, but the latter stood the test of time. I am delighted to say that one of the two sets I have handled still adorns my bookshelves and continues to provide me with hours of instruction, distraction, and entertainment.

If you agree that the Freethinker has been the dominant voice of British secularism and freethought for 143 years, and that secularism and freethought are central to a free and democratic society, then the Freethinker is precious, and it is troubling that up to now the archive has been so difficult to access. For most, it has meant an arduous physical visit to a copyright library. This is why the conclusion of the GW Foote & Co. digitisation project is cause for cheers and celebration.

As a tentative pointer to what readers might enjoy about the archive, I offer the following comments on the Freethinker’s history and an indication of what I have discovered over the years in my own printed collection.

In a previous article, I wrote of George Willam Foote’s (1850-1915) early life, his founding of the Freethinker in 1881, and his year-long imprisonment for blasphemy. An additional matter that deserves recognition is that Foote’s actions involved a large element of self-sacrifice. He was a cultivated, bookish man, a librarian with refined literary tastes who wrote beautifully. For him, the abrasive, satirical, and outrageous style of the new journal was initially alien. However, he was so incensed by the treatment of the President of the National Secular Society (NSS), Charles Bradlaugh, and the deprivation of Bradlaugh’s right to sit as an MP for Northampton, that he determined to take the fight to the ‘bigots’.

He was also influenced by the established tone of freethought publications, epitomised by George Jacob Holyoake’s (1817-1906) writings which were thoughtful, worthy, totally lacking in humour, and, for many, rather boring. Foote reasoned that humour was a devastating weapon when employed against pompous authority figures in the established church and against religion in general. He reasoned that nobody takes seriously an individual or idea that has been laughed at and he also noted the satirical power of cartoons, which he was to employ with great effect and which led to his conviction for blasphemy. Some things never change; cartoons have not lost their power to provoke in the modern world.

Foote’s years as editor were not only characterised by his pungent attacks on the religious and religion. After his accession to the NSS Presidency in 1890, the Freethinker emerged as the NSS’s ‘in-house’ journal, acting as a type of noticeboard providing details of lectures, meetings, and publications. I particularly enjoy Joseph Mazzini Wheeler’s tightly written historical and biographical articles. Here was a man who grasped the significance of the intellectual and historical traditions of freethought. It is a great pity that his poor health and early death scuppered his plans to write a history of those traditions.

By the beginning of the First World War, Foote was ailing. Although he nominally remained editor, he had relocated to Westcliff-on-Sea for the sea air and occasionally commuted into London. Much of the actual editorial work and writing was being carried on by his sub-editor and loyal deputy, Chapman Cohen (1868-1954). Cohen formally took over the editor’s position and became President of the NSS when Foote died in 1915. He was known to a generation as CC, remaining editor until 1951. The Freethinker had had just two editors in its first 70 years. 

Like Foote, Cohen came to dominate the journal and make it his own, but there were differences in approach, substance, and style.  By the time of Cohen’s accession, the days when freethought was associated with radical political campaigns and working-class activism were long past. CC had little or no contact with politicians and always resisted political interventions in his many public meetings. His writings were characterised by a relatively sober critique of the illogicality, contradictions, and self-serving nature of religion and the religious. His arguments were rooted in philosophy, natural and social science, and literature. Foote’s biting satire was no more, and the cartoons long forgotten.

To my mind, Cohen’s greatest attribute was his ability to make the logical case for freethought in terms accessible to general readers. He never talked down, he just wrote logically and clearly in elegant, plain English that all could understand. Forty years ago, when I started book dealing, there were a few older customers who knew him. More than once I heard him described as ‘my greatest teacher’. To this, I would add that there was not a freethinking argument advanced by Bertrand Russell that CC had not made before. This is not to belittle Russell; rather, it is to recognise Cohen. For those who want to understand the case for atheism and the dangers of religion, just go to the Cohen years in the archive.

Before moving on, I must recognise CC’s sheer hard work. Each week through the 1920s and 30s he edited 12 or 16 foolscap pages, some of which he wrote. He corresponded with readers, provided the NSS with leadership, and spent his weekends speaking publicly. In the summer, that meant ‘outdoors’, in parks and public spaces. From September to April, he was ‘indoors’, travelling the country giving lectures (sometimes three in a single weekend). For example, during the 1919-1920 indoor season he spoke at no less than 34 venues on more than 50 occasions. This was a pattern and level of activity that he maintained throughout the interwar years.

One contributor whose writings will be enjoyed by those with an interest in freethought and radical history is Herbert Cutner (1881-1969), although he did not restrict himself to historical subjects. He began his contributions in 1920 and by 1959 had had his 1,000^th article published.

Since Cohen’s resignation the turnover of editors has been more rapid, at times too rapid, although an important exception was Barry Duke’s 24-year tenure beginning in 1998. One editor who had a particular impact on me was Bill McIlroy (1928-2013), who served three separate terms totalling more than 14 years. As well as commissioning some important historical essays, and networking with individuals such as politicians Tony Benn and Michael Foot and academics Edward Royle and David Berman, Bill had a talent for punchy, witty headlines. Here are some examples to whet the appetite. ‘Pious Indoctrinators Tighten Grip on Classroom Captives’ (July 1988); ‘Embryology Bill: “Pro-Life” Dirty Tricks Campaign Aborted’ (May 1990); ‘Patten Links Crime Rate with Decline in Fear of Fire and Brimstone’ (May 1992).

Another relatively recent contributor who should be mentioned is Jim Herrick (1943-2023), a stalwart of the freethought and secularist movement in general, editor of the Freethinker from 1977 to 1981, and contributor on a diverse range of subjects over many years. I have particularly enjoyed Jim’s theatre reviews and historical articles. An invaluable contribution is his centenary history of the journal, Vision and Realism: A Hundred Years of the Freethinker, published in 1982.

So, the Freethinker lives on as a contemporary digital magazine rooted in its historical archive. Not everything published in its pages over the past 143 years has been impressive, although much of it is. But for me, it is a kind of intellectual treasure trove hidden away for too long and unavailable to even its most fervent supporters. There is nothing quite like it, with its alternative and critical take on religious belief, contemporary events, and social developments. It is also a testament to those who have gone before and who have on occasion sacrificed their own interests rather than surrender their intellectual freedom. The digital archive will be invaluable in keeping this intellectual tradition, once termed ‘the best of causes’, alive for a long time to come.

Editor: The Freethinker digital archive is a great achievement, the work of many hands. Though it, like the Freethinker today, is free to read, many resources were put into it and donations from readers are much appreciated. Anyone who donates over £500 will not only have our immense gratitude but will be publicly recognised, with their name proudly displayed in the archive itself (if they so desire). For technical reasons, please get in touch with us if you wish to donate £500 or more rather than using our usual donation form. Meanwhile, enjoy the archive.

The post Books from Bob’s Library #4: The ‘Freethinker’—over a century of issues now available as a digital archive appeared first on The Freethinker.

This article was originally published on the NSS’s website on 23 July 2024.

It’s easy to see how the idea of being saved by an act of ‘divine intervention’ might well appeal to a narcissist like Donald Trump. But his claim that he had ‘God on his side’ during the recent failed assassination attempt is more likely to be the sentiment of a grifter exploiting religion for political gain.

But sincere belief in the supernatural isn’t necessary for Trump and his cronies to dismantle America’s wall of separation between church and state. His nomination of conservative justices to the Supreme Court during his previous term of office paved the way for the overturning of Roe v Wade—a significant win for evangelicals. With a return to the White House looking distinctly possible, more laws to enforce the doctrines of his Christian support base could be on the cards.

The rise of Christian nationalism in the US is another indicator of a backsliding of secular liberal democratic values, the foundation upon which many successful modern societies are built.

Right across the world, wherever religion and political power are entwined, the chips are down for liberalism. Whether it’s Protestant evangelicalism in the US, Hindu nationalism in India, or Islamism in the Middle East, the closer clerics are to governance, the lower the likelihood that individual rights and freedoms can flourish.

Europe, too, is facing testing times.

American Christian Right organisations are pouring millions of dollars into the continent to fuel campaigns aimed at diminishing the rights of women and sexual minorities. Christian identity politics has become intertwined with nationalist ideologies, shaping the political landscape and contributing to the growth of far-right movements across the continent.

Meanwhile, mass migration and a failure to integrate sizeable Muslim populations have contributed to the undermining and challenging of fundamental liberal values like free speech, equality, and state neutrality.

One of secularism’s most important roles in protecting liberal values is in preserving freedom of expression—making sure that individuals are free to voice their ideas, beliefs, criticisms, and scorn of religious ideas without the threat of censorship or punishment.

Here in the UK, an incident at a Batley school starkly illustrated the erosion of this freedom. A teacher who used a cartoon of Muhammad to teach pupils about debates on free expression faced immediate and credible death threats and now must live under a new identity.

The writing has been on the wall ever since the Rushdie affair. But a spate of violent protests and murders across Europe since has sent the clear message to European citizens that, even if blasphemy laws have been abolished (and not all have been), they remain in place for Islam, and will be enforced by intimidation and violence.

Meanwhile, growing numbers of women and young girls on the continent are compelled to obey sexist religious modesty codes and thousands of children from minority backgrounds are attending illegal schools run by religious extremists.

Meaningful debates on these matters have become increasingly challenging due to the pervasive influence of ‘Islamophobia’, a term once noted by Christopher Hitchens as strategically employed to insinuate a ‘foul prejudice lurks behind any misgivings about Islam’s infallible message’. The language of Islamophobia has fostered a fear of being labelled ‘racist’ or bigoted, causing many liberals to refrain from criticising any manifestation of Islam, however worthy of disdain. This has created a void that is exploited by extremists on the far right.

Meanwhile, a crisis in confidence that secular liberalism can counter the ascendancy of radical Islam and ‘wokery’ has led some public intellectuals to be lured by the notion that Christianity is somehow indispensable in safeguarding the Western way of life. Daniel James Sharp and Matt Johnson have presented compelling critiques of this ‘New Theism’ and its defence of Christian privilege. But entrusting the preservation of liberal democracy to a belief one considers untrue yet expedient seems precarious at best.

All this is to say that the current climate for liberal values and human rights is challenging.

Amidst the ongoing threat posed by religious fundamentalism, a renewed embrace of the Enlightenment concept of separation of religion and state is sorely needed to safeguard individual rights and freedoms.

These are the issues we’ll be addressing at Secularism 2024, the National Secular Society’s upcoming conference on October 19th. A diverse range of expert speakers will shed light on some of the contemporary challenges faced by liberal societies and explore the role of secularism in protecting liberal values and social cohesion.

To be part of this important conversation about democracy, freedom of speech, individual rights, and the rule of law, join us at Secularism 2024. Tickets are on sale now.

Related reading

What secularists want from the next UK Government, by Stephen Evans

Secularism and the struggle for free speech, by Stephen Evans

Donald Trump, political violence, and the future of America, by Daniel James Sharp

A reading list against the ‘New Theism’ (and an offer to debate), by Daniel James Sharp

White Christian Nationalism is rising in America. Separation of church and state is the antidote. By Rachel Laser

Reproductive freedom is religious freedom, by Andrew Seidel and Rachel Laser

The rise and fall of god(s) in Indian politics: Modi’s setback, Indic philosophy, and the freethought paradox, by Kunwar Khuldune Shahid

Campaign ‘to unite India and save its secular soul’, by Puja Bhattacharjee

The resurgence of enlightenment in southern India: interview with Bhavan Rajagopalan, by Emma Park

Three years on, the lessons of Batley are yet to be learned, by Jack Rivington

Keir Starmer must bring the UK’s diverse but divided people together, by Megan Manson

Islamic identity politics is a threat to British democracy, by Khadija Khan

The hijab is the wrong symbol to represent women, by Khadija Khan

Britain’s blasphemy heritage, by David Nash

The perils of dropping a book, by Noel Yaxley

Free speech in Britain: a losing battle? by Porcus Sapiens

Cancel culture and religious intolerance: ‘Falsely Accused of Islamophobia’, by Steven Greer, by Daniel James Sharp

British Islam and the crisis of ‘wokeism’ in universities: interview with Steven Greer, by Emma Park

Rushdie’s victory, by Daniel James Sharp

The Satanic Verses; free speech in the Freethinker, by Emma Park

The post An upcoming secularist conference on the safeguarding of liberal values in a time of crisis appeared first on The Freethinker.

As the UK prepares to elect a new government on 4 July, this seems a good moment to reflect on Charles Bradlaugh’s heroic stand for democracy against the religious reactionaries of his day. Bradlaugh, the founder of the National Secular Society (NSS) and an open atheist, was prevented by bigots from taking the parliamentary seat he was elected to represent and was subsequently imprisoned for insisting on his democratic right to do so. Emma Park, in the New Humanist, tells the story:

‘At the time, MPs were required to swear an oath of allegiance to the monarch on the Bible. Quakers were allowed to affirm, but they were the exception. Bradlaugh asked to affirm on the grounds of his atheism. A select committee decided, by one vote, that he was ineligible. He then tried to take the oath, but before doing so, wrote an over-confident letter to The Times in which he declared that the oath included “to me . . . words of idle and meaningless character”. As Bradlaugh’s biographer, Bryan Niblett, has shown, this merely encouraged those who disliked his atheism to argue that the oath would not be “binding on his conscience”. Others feared that, as a republican, he would not be loyal to the Crown.

In June 1880, Bradlaugh was told by the Speaker of the Commons that he was allowed neither to affirm nor to take the oath. Bradlaugh, in his own words, “respectfully” refused to withdraw, on the grounds that it was “against the law” for Parliament to prevent a properly elected MP from taking his seat. After a dramatic vote, in which only seven MPs supported him, he was arrested by the Serjeant-at-Arms and spent the night in custody in the Clock Tower beneath Big Ben – the last MP ever to do so.

Between 1881 and 1884, Bradlaugh was elected three more times in Northampton. It was not until the fifth attempt that he was finally allowed to take the oath, in January 1886. By this time, the stress of the campaigns, combined with legal and financial worries, was affecting his health. He would only live for another five years before dying of kidney disease and heart failure at the age of 57.

His story is a blot on Parliament’s record: a clear case of the abuse of political power fuelled by prejudice. It demonstrates the importance of having a constitution in which everyone’s right to “speculative opinions” is respected, and in which, equally, there is no stigma attached to the free criticism of others’ ideas.’

Though the struggle shortened Bradlaugh’s life, he triumphed in the end with the success of his campaign to enact the Oaths Act in 1888, which gave MPs the option to make a secular affirmation rather than swearing to God when taking their parliamentary seats. The lithograph above tells Bradlaugh’s dramatic story in two parts: from prisoner of conscience to victorious champion of democracy. Today, indeed, a bust of Charles Bradlaugh stands proudly in the halls of Parliament itself.

As the 2024 election looms, it would be well to bear in mind the central lesson of Bradlaugh’s struggle: freedom is never granted, it is always fought for. And that fight is far from over, even in an advanced democracy like the UK’s. After all, we still have an established church and a hereditary head of state (both of which were also opposed by Bradlaugh). The story of the struggle for democracy in Britain, which goes back as far as the 17th-century Levellers if not much further, and which takes in Thomas Paine, the Chartists, the suffragettes, and numerous others—well, that story is very far from over.

Further reading

Bradlaugh’s struggle to enter Parliament, by Bob Forder, NSS website

Charles Bradlaugh and George Jacob Holyoake: their contrasting reputations as Secularists and Radicals, by Edward Royle

Image of the week: Charles Bradlaugh’s study after his death, by Walter Sickert, by Bob Forder

Review of ‘A Dirty, Filthy Book’ by Michael Meyer, by Bob Forder

‘I do not think you are going to get a secular state without getting rid of the monarchy’: interview with Graham Smith, by Daniel James Sharp

Is all publicity good publicity? How the first editor of the Freethinker attracted the public’s attention, by Clare Stainthorp

Freethought and birth control: the untold story of a Victorian book depot, by Bob Forder

On trial for blasphemy: the Freethinker’s first editor and offensive cartoons, by Bob Forder

From the archive: imprisoned for blasphemy, by Emma Park

Secularism and the struggle for free speech, by Stephen Evans

What secularists want from the next UK Government, by Stephen Evans

Islamic identity politics is a threat to British democracy, by Khadija Khan

‘This is not rocket science’: the Disestablishment of the Church of England Bill 2023, interview with Paul Scriven by Emma Park

The case for secularism (or, the church’s new clothes), by Neil Barber

Blasphemy and bishops: how secularists are navigating the culture wars, by Emma Park

The post Image of the week: Charles Bradlaugh’s struggle and triumph appeared first on The Freethinker.

The UK that goes to the polls on 4 July will be the most religiously diverse in election history. Less than half the population of England and Wales describe themselves as ‘Christian’. Most people in Scotland are now non-religious. And there are now more Catholics than Protestants in Northern Ireland, but even here we are seeing more and more people turning away from religion.

This sustained shift in demographics demands a radical response from the state. Entrenched Christian privilege and a laissez-faire approach to social cohesion are ill-suited to a religiously diverse, pluralistic population. That’s why the National Secular Society is calling on the next Government to seriously rethink the role of religion in public and political life.

Here’s what we want to see from the incoming Government.

Secular, inclusive education

Schools play a key role in shaping future generations and fostering a culture of tolerance and understanding. But faith schools build division into the system.

A third of all schools are faith schools. This isn’t sustainable. Already, the prevalence of religious schools means many nonreligious families have no choice other than a faith-based education for their children. This needs to be addressed.

Dividing children by religion leads to ethnic segregation, too. The next Government should commit to phasing out faith-based education to better encourage integration and ensure that every child can receive a secular education.

The calling of the election means that the outgoing Government’s plans to abolish the 50% admissions cap in faith-based academies hit the buffers. The Conservative manifesto revives plans to lift the cap and allow faith schools to apply 100% religious selection, paving the way for yet more discriminatory faith schools.

Worryingly, Labour didn’t oppose plans to scrap the cap and will come under pressure from regressive religious groups to reinstate this policy. They should resist.

Religious selection means faith schools are not only less religiously and ethnically diverse; they admit fewer children from poorer backgrounds, children in care, and children with special educational needs and disabilities. Any government interested in tackling unfairness and discrimination in education can’t afford to ignore the pernicious effects of faith-based admissions. That’s why it is alarming that Keir Starmer has said a Labour Government would be ‘even more supportive of faith schools’ than the current Government.

In all state-funded schools, even the two-thirds without a religious character, daily acts of ‘broadly Christian’ collective worship are required by law. This law, dating back to 1944, has no moral or educational basis. Teachers don’t support it and many schools flout it. Imposing worship in schools undermines children’s freedom of religion or belief and opens the door to evangelism in schools. We will encourage the next Government to support its repeal as soon as possible.

England’s outdated model of religious education dates back to a similar era. Labour’s plans to modernise the school curriculum must not shy away from reforms to liberate this subject area from the inappropriate control of religious interest groups. All children and young people should have an equal entitlement to an objective and critical education about worldviews, citizenship, and ethics.

We will also push for new legislation to boost Ofsted’s powers to crack down on unregistered religious schools operating illegally. The creation of a register of children not in school is a key part of this. During their time in office, the Conservatives made plenty of encouraging noises but ultimately failed to tackle the problem. The required legislation for a register was in the Schools Bill which was ditched by the Sunak Government in 2022. The Tory manifesto promises to revive the register plans.

Labour’s manifesto makes no such commitment, but the Shadow Secretary of State for Education, Bridget Phillipson, has previously signalled her support for a home-school register to deliver better oversight of home education, which in too many cases leads to children being indoctrinated with fundamentalist dogma in unsafe and illegal schools. She also says she wants ‘every child to receive a world-class education’. To achieve this, the next Government will need to stand up to religious lobbyists who impede attempts to protect the educational rights of children in independent and unregistered religious schools by spuriously claiming that such attempts violate religious freedom.

Free speech

For all its faults, the Conservative Government has shown willingness to protect the right to free expression. It was slow to do so when Islamic fundamentalists descended on a school in Batley in 2021. But after a parent was left pleading for mercy after her son was involved in the scuffing of a Quran in Kettlethorpe last year, the Home Secretary robustly asserted: ‘We do not have blasphemy laws in Great Britain, and must not be complicit in the attempts to impose them on this country.’

A recent recommendation for the creation of guidance to better protect schools and teachers facing blasphemy accusations should be adopted and implemented—as should the recommendation from Sara Khan, the Government’s Independent Advisor on Social Cohesion and Resilience, to create a special unit tasked with responding to ‘flashpoint incidents’ such as blasphemy protests.

The next Government needs to find ways to address anti-Muslim prejudice in ways that don’t impede the freedom to scrutinise and criticise Islamic beliefs, ideas, and practices. It needs to be clear that there is no right not to be offended—and no legal obligation to be reverent towards any religion.

In opposition, Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Scottish National Party, and the Greens have all shown a worrying disregard for free speech by uncritically adopting a definition of ‘Islamophobia’ proposed by the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG)  for British Muslims. The concept of Islamophobia unhelpfully conflates hatred and discrimination against Muslims with criticism of Islam. This blurring is intentional. The silencing of scrutiny, criticism, mockery, and anything deemed ‘offensive’ has been a long-term aim of Islamist groups, some of which have been too close to Labour for comfort. Labour has promised to reverse the Conservatives’ decision to downgrade the monitoring of anti-Semitic and Islamophobic hate incidents that fall short of criminality. There are also fears that a Labour Government will seek to incorporate the APPG definition into law.

Hindu groups have jumped on the bandwagon, calling on the next Government to criminalise ‘Hinduphobia’. Any attempt to do so will be met with fierce opposition from secularists and free speech campaigners. Resisting the politics of competitive grievances and sectarianism is something the next Government needs to do if Britain is to avoid becoming increasingly fraught with ethnic and religious tensions.

Towards a secular democracy

It makes no sense for one of the most diverse and secularised nations in the world to retain an established religion.

One manifestation of the Church of England’s established status is the twenty-six unelected Anglican clerics sitting as of right as legislators in the House of Lords. In 2022, Keir Starmer called the Lords ‘undemocratic’ and ‘indefensible’. He launched plans drawn up by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown to replace the upper chamber with an elected Assembly of the Nations and Regions. The plans would bring a welcome end to reserved seats for bishops.

Despite originally suggesting the plans be implemented within the first five years of a Labour Government, the party is now promising a much more incremental approach. Replacing the House of Lords with an alternative second chamber remains the goal, but the manifesto commits only to ‘immediate modernisation’ of the Lords by introducing an upper age limit of 80 and scrapping hereditary peers. Secularists will be arguing that any immediate modernisation must also include the removal of the archaic, unfair, and undemocratic bishops’ bench.

But we need to go further. A state religion is incompatible with a democracy in which all citizens of every religion and belief are equal. The announcement of the election unfortunately spelt the end of a bill backed by the National Secular Society to disestablish the Church of England.  But we’ll urge the next Government to engage with this long overdue democratic reform to transform the UK into a fully secular democracy, free from religious privilege.

A new administration will bring fresh hope for other necessary reforms, such as assisted dying, making wedding law fairer for all, outlawing caste discrimination, removing the advancement of religion as a charitable purpose, and effectively protecting children from abuse in religious settings.

Ultimately, Britain needs a new political framework to foster unity and keep religious fundamentalism in check by balancing religious freedom with other fundamental human rights. Secularism offers such a framework.

That’s why we’ll be urging the next Government to adopt secularist principles and policies which move us towards a freer and fairer society, where people can live by the creed they choose but where no particular religion or belief is privileged or imposed.

Related reading

Faith schools: where do the political parties stand? by Stephen Evans

Secularism and the struggle for free speech, by Stephen Evans

Religion and belief in schools: lessons to be learnt, by Russell Sandberg

The case for secularism (or, the church’s new clothes), by Neil Barber

Three years on, the lessons of Batley are yet to be learned, by Jack Rivington

Secularism is a feminist issue, by Megan Manson

Blasphemy and bishops: how secularists are navigating the culture wars, by Emma Park

Bad Religious Education, by Siniša Prijić

Silence of the teachers, by Nath Jnan

The perils of dropping a book, by Noel Yaxley

Britain’s blasphemy heritage, by David Nash

Cancel culture and religious intolerance: ‘Falsely Accused of Islamophobia’, by Steven Greer, by Daniel James Sharp

‘This is not rocket science’: the Disestablishment of the Church of England Bill 2023, interview with Paul Scriven by Emma Park

The post What secularists want from the next UK Government appeared first on The Freethinker.

On 6 April, a celebration of Terry Sanderson’s life was held at his newly erected grave in Brookwood. Terry’s partner and current National Secular Society President Keith Porteous Wood wrote about this event, and Terry’s life, for the Freethinker. You can read more about Terry and his many achievements here.

The post Image of the week: Terry Sanderson, secularist hero, 1946-2022 appeared first on The Freethinker.

Michael Meyer has produced this splendidly researched and written account of the 1877 trial of Charles Bradlaugh and Annie Besant for republishing the American doctor Charles Knowlton’s infamous birth control pamphlet The Fruits of Philosophy (1832).

This pamphlet was the most influential nineteenth-century tract of its type. It provided cheap but useful advice on how to prevent conception. Within months, a British edition appeared, published by a succession of freethought publishers. By 1876, the plates were in the hands of Charles Watts, then secretary of the National Secular Society (NSS) and a close ally of the NSS’s President, Charles Bradlaugh, and one of its Vice-Presidents, Annie Besant. The pamphlet had been selling steadily but in small numbers, perhaps 700 per annum. In 1876, a Bristol bookseller, Henry Cook, was sentenced to two years’ hard labour for selling the pamphlet adorned with ‘obscene’ illustrations. We can only guess how ‘obscene’ these were, as no illustrated copies survive. Now, with their appetites whetted, the authorities decided to press on and prosecute the publisher, Charles Watts. To the extreme disgust and fury of Bradlaugh and Besant, Watts pled guilty to publishing an obscene book and was let off with a suspended sentence.

Meyer argues that it was Besant who showed the greater resolve and persuaded Bradlaugh that the booklet was defensible. Others have argued that Bradlaugh needed no such persuasion. In any event, the pair broke all connection with Watts and determined to republish the tract, with new medical notes, themselves. For this purpose, they founded the Freethought Publishing Company, taking out a lease on a small shop close to Fleet Street.

On the day the pamphlet went on sale, there were crowds in the street when the shop opened.  Bradlaugh and Besant were both there and 500 copies exchanged hands in the first twenty minutes, with 125,000 sold in the first three months. Bradlaugh and Besant made no secret of their activities and were duly prosecuted. The importance of the case was underlined by the appearance of the Solicitor General, Hardinge Giffard, as chief counsel for the prosecution.  Bradlaugh and Besant defended themselves with skill and passion. Regarding Besant, it was virtually unheard of for a woman, and a young woman at that, to represent herself, but Besant did so without hesitation. The arguments used by the pair were wide-ranging, but a common theme was that they were representatives of a morality superior to that of their persecutors. This was not to deter their opponent Giffard, who uttered the following words in his summing up:

‘I say this is a dirty, filthy book, and the test of it is that no human being would allow that book to lie on his table; no decently educated English husband would allow even his wife to have it…’

Despite the judge, Sir Alexander Cockburn, summing up in terms favourable to the defendants, the jury returned an ambiguous verdict, concluding that although the book was calculated to deprave public morals, they could not find that the defendants had corrupt motives.  A perplexed Cockburn interpreted this as a guilty verdict but the defendants appealed and succeeded in having their conviction overturned on technical grounds.

Although the trial is Meyer’s main focus, he also goes much deeper. He explains the backgrounds of both Bradlaugh and Besant and shows how they came to hold their opinions. He also explores the consequences of their actions for themselves. For example, and tragically, Annie Besant was to lose custody of her daughter, Mabel, in 1878, having been deemed an unfit mother. Custody passed to her husband the Reverend Frank Besant, from whom she was estranged and whom she loathed. The consequences for Bradlaugh were not quite so drastic, but Meyer describes his subsequent struggle to be elected an MP and then take his seat. He was prevented from doing so by religious opponents incensed by his atheism and what they saw as his associated low morality. Such contextualisation is further provided by periodic references to events in wider society relevant to public and establishment attitudes to birth control.

For Meyer, the life and career of the extraordinary Annie Besant is central to his narrative. Her vitality, courage, energy, and sparkling intelligence are nothing if not inspirational and he is astonished that she is not better known and celebrated. Of this, I am unconvinced. There have been several biographies, the best of which is Arthur H. Nethercot’s superb two-volume account, although this dates from the early 1960s. She also often takes a place of honour within the many books charting the history of the birth control movement. Annie was associated with other vitally important events and ideas in radical and working-class history, including her pioneering feminist writings and her support of the Bryant & May matchgirls’ strike of 1888.  However, by the late 1880s, she was moving away from organised freethought and from Bradlaugh, embracing first socialism and then theosophy. For the first, she could be forgiven and accommodated, but not for the second.

Still, it is true that she was ultimately seen as having betrayed her secularist comrades, who would undoubtedly have relished celebrating her achievements more had she stayed within the fold. She would also almost certainly have succeeded Bradlaugh as NSS president upon his untimely death in 1891. Her former friends watched her go with sadness rather than rancour, but sadness is not the positive emotion that provides a good basis for celebration. Perhaps it is strange that the Labour Party has not had more to say about her, particularly as she passed through a Fabian and socialist stage. But the Labour Party has never shown great affection for freethinkers, generally favouring its non-conformist and Christian socialist roots. Besant spent the second half of her long life in India, where she is better remembered for her championing of Indian nationalism.

By focusing on Annie Besant, Meyer may be responsible for failing to fully recognise the role and significance of her mentor, colleague, and confidant, Charles Bradlaugh. For example, although Besant’s role in the Knowlton trial was spectacular, it was Bradlaugh’s extraordinary self-taught legal knowledge that guided them and made their defence possible. And, though the consequences were dire for Besant, Bradlaugh had to suffer the anguish of a six-year struggle to take his rightful seat as an MP, facing deliberate efforts to bankrupt him through prosecutions designed to result in huge financial penalties. His daughter and disciple, Hypatia, always argued that it was this struggle that contributed to his early death in 1891. Unlike Besant, Bradlaugh remained steadfast and consistent in his opinions, and it is symbolic that Bradlaugh’s grave and monument at Brookwood is surrounded by those of his fellow birth control pioneers and freethinkers while Annie was cremated on a different continent.

The Knowlton case was significant for other reasons too. Central were the issues of freedom of speech and bodily autonomy; the trial’s outcome represented a significant victory on both counts. This battle goes on, is never won, and remains central to the freethinking, secularist tradition. As for the birth control movement, it would be nice to assume that prosecutions ceased, but they did not. Booksellers continued to serve prison sentences and have stock seized. The year after the Knowlton trial, Edward Truelove, the veteran freethinking publisher, was imprisoned for four months in London’s grim Coldbath Gaol for publishing Robert Dale Owen’s Moral Physiology, a work generally regarded as milder than Knowlton’s. But perhaps these prosecutions were final, futile attempts to resist change. I am sure Meyer is correct when he writes of the case as a ‘quantum leap’ which ‘[legitimised] contraception as worthy of public discussion, and [as something that was] morally permissible to practise at home.’ That was some achievement.

A Dirty, Filthy Book is a superbly written model for those who aspire to write significant but accessible history. Perhaps this is only to be expected from such an experienced journalist and author whose main academic post is as a Professor of English at the University of Pittsburgh. The book fizzes along and deserves a bumper sale. It also partly provides something desperately lacking— a highly readable history of the National Secular Society, founded in 1866, the UK’s oldest extant radical campaigning pressure group. 

Of course, it only deals with what might be termed the ‘heroic’ phase from 1866 until Bradlaugh’s death in 1891, but it is welcome for all that, leaving just 134 years to cover for some other enterprising writer. The individualistic, intellectual tradition represented by organised freethought and secularism has been deficient when it comes to recording its own history and substantial achievements—a marked contrast with the churches, who wallow in their perceived past glories. Most of what has been written about secularism is to be found in academic treatises, worthy in their way, but unappealing to the general reader. Michael Meyer’s book is a sparkling exception and I, for one, am grateful for this.

A Dirty, Filthy Book can be purchased here. Note that, when you use this link to purchase the book, we earn from qualifying purchases as an Amazon Associate.

Further reading

Freethought and birth control: the untold story of a Victorian book depot, by Bob Forder

The post Review of ‘A Dirty, Filthy Book’ by Michael Meyer appeared first on The Freethinker.

I am in a minority. As an atheist who supports the aims of the National Secular Society and Humanists UK in almost every other area, including abortion, I find I am at odds with most of my fellow humanists on the issue of legalising assisted suicide and euthanasia (ASE). But there are excellent secular reasons for opposing ASE.

Assisted suicide—or, as some euphemistically call it, ‘assisted dying’—is in the news again, thanks (among other things) to the tabling of an ‘assisted dying’ bill in the Scottish Parliament and the publication in February of a Health and Social Care Committee on Assisted Dying/Assisted Suicide report. Countless legislative attempts have taken place in this and other countries to legalise ASE. Keir Starmer, who favours legalisation, may well dedicate government time to the issue, should he become Prime Minister.

First, we need to be clear about what we are discussing. Euthanasia (from the Greek ‘good death’) is where the doctor acts to end life. It can be voluntary or involuntary. Passive euthanasia is death by omission, i.e. when doctors, either of their own volition or at the request of the patient, purposefully end medical treatment, leading to death. Passive euthanasia might also include a patient refusing food and drink but still being kept comfortable by medical attendants. Such acts are legal. Assisted suicide is when the doctor provides the means but the patient takes the final action. ‘Assisted dying’, or ‘Medical assistance in death’ (MAiD), appears to be a compendium term that might or might not include some of the above. It does not bring clarity to the issue. In fact, as we shall see, it confuses people.

We should also be clear in our language—and humanists should be suspicious of a campaign that uses comforting but vague terms like ‘assisted dying’ to market its ideas. We atheists reject mythology and face facts, yet this term is used uncritically. If a doctor hands you a gun and you shoot yourself, that’s assisted suicide. If she hands you a rope and you hang yourself, that’s assisted suicide. But if she hands you poison and you ingest it knowingly and with the intention of ending your life, we are meant to believe that it is not suicide but ‘assisted dying’? It is no good substituting comforting new myths for old ones.

Moreover, the term ‘assisted dying’ does not help public understanding. In a UK poll conducted in 2021, when asked ‘What do you understand by the term “assisted dying”?’, 42% of Brits polled thought it meant ‘Giving people who are dying the right to stop life-prolonging treatment’. As noted above, this is a right that they already have. When proponents of ASE argue that the majority of Brits support the legalisation of ‘assisted dying’, it is useful to remember that much of what they support is already legal.

I am against a change in the 1961 Suicide Act, not to the rare situations where death is hastened as a byproduct of preventing suffering. Assisting a suicide should remain a crime, as should giving someone a lethal injection, even at their request. I am not against someone hastening their own death by refusing medical treatment or refusing food and water, which is already legal, because individual freedom from unwanted physical intervention trumps our need as a society to save lives.

There are four basic reasons why humanists should join with religious folk in opposing legalized assisted suicide and euthanasia. First, it is not necessary, being built on an irrational fear of a bad death. Second, though many who support the campaign do so out of compassion, utility is the real force behind campaigns; some citizens—particularly those who are disabled or elderly—are inevitably valued less than others. Third, where it has been legalized, real harms have occurred. Fourth, one need not believe in God to conclude that we, as a society, should strive to prevent rather than assist or encourage suicide. Let’s take these arguments in turn.

A fear-mongering campaign

The campaign to legalise assisted dying often plays on people’s fears of how they and their relatives might die. Indeed, many of us have witnessed difficult deaths. But organizations like Dignity in Dying play on our fears. In 2019, the CEO of Hospice UK, a charity that works with those experiencing death, dying, and bereavement, publicly chastised Dignity in Dying for the ‘sensationalist and inaccurate’ portrayal of death in a video to accompany its ‘The Inescapable Truth’ campaign.

Dignity in Dying removed that particular video but it continues to claim that 17 people will suffer as they die every day. What it does not say is that that number is about 1% of an estimated 1,700 people who die every day in the UK. Moreover, ASE will not help those at the end of life. In the Netherlands, where it is legal, up to 42.8% of people experience pain and/or restlessness in their last hours of life. And tellingly, in Oregon, one of the supposed success stories of ‘assisted dying’ legalisation, pain does not feature in the top reasons why people opt for death. This is about existential, not physical, pain.

The (relative) value of lives

ASE’s progressive image is undeserved. Euthanasia was but a branch of the campaign for eugenics when it was first raised as an idea. As the German zoologist Robby Kossmann put it in 1880, ‘the human state . . . must reach an even higher state of perfection, if the possibility exists in it, through the destruction of the less well-endowed individual . . .’

In 1920 Karl Binding and Alfred Hoche published a pamphlet entitled Permitting the Destruction of Life Unworthy of Living. They argued that ‘there are indeed human lives in whose continued preservation all rational interest has permanently vanished’. The German psychiatrist and neurologist Robert Gaupp targeted mentally disabled people when he said that it was time to remove ‘the burden of the parasites’. In this context, we need to remember that Canada today is considering extending euthanasia to those who suffer only from mental illness.

The utility reasoning also exists today, though proponents of ASE are shyer about mentioning it than their predecessors. A Canadian government report entitled Cost Estimate for Bill C-7 “Medical Assistance in Dying” sees savings of up to $53,264 per patient with ASE. Are we meant to believe it when the report’s authors demur that ‘this report should in no way be interpreted as suggesting that MAID be used to reduce health care costs’?

Let’s look at the evidence from countries where ASE is legal. Though every country where it is legal justified changing the law with reference to cases involving the terminally ill, the use of death as a solution for medical and social problems followed. Thirty-nine people suffering only from autism and/or other intellectual disabilities—nearly half of them under fifty—have been euthanized in the Netherlands, where assisted suicide and euthanasia have been legal since 2002. One was an autistic man in his twenties. His record said that he was a victim of regular bullying, that he ‘had felt unhappy since childhood’, and that he ‘longed for social contacts but was unable to connect with others’. On this basis, and at his request, his doctor euthanized him.

Across the Low Countries (Belgium legalized euthanasia in 2003), prisoners, children, those suffering only from dementia, and young people with clinical depression have been euthanized.

Given that, in one large study, over half of the patients predicted to die within a particular period of time lived longer than expected, it is likely that thousands of people who have died from euthanasia have had their lives cut short. Those who, like me, oppose capital punishment worry that innocent people will be killed by an imperfect system, yet few seem to use the same reasoning when it comes to ASE.

Should we prevent suicides?

Perhaps the biggest harms, however, are intangible. There are signs, particularly with the COVID-19 crisis, that some no longer adhere to the principle that human lives—whether rich or poor, black or white, young or old—are equally worthy of protection. We view suicide as generally negative because we value our fellow human beings, even if they do not value themselves. Not all suicides are wrong, but it should be our basic position that we prevent suicides when we can.

As the humanist sociologist and pioneering author of Suicide, Emile Durkheim, remarked over a hundred years ago:

‘. . . [S]uicide must be classed among immoral acts; for in its main principle it denies [the] religion of humanity. . . . No matter that the guilty person and the victim are one and the same . . . If violent destruction of a human life revolts us as a sacrilege, in itself and generally, we cannot tolerate it under any circumstances.’

Of course, many who favour legalised ASE support suicide prevention. But how do they differentiate the two? As Not Dead Yet, an organization of disabled people opposed to ASE, points out, it is assumed that those with fewer years left and those with disabilities lead less valuable lives and, thus, are directed towards ASE—while others are strenuously prevented from killing themselves. Legalising assisted dying would be a huge step in the wrong direction. It will lead to some people’s lives—on physical, or sometimes mental grounds—being deemed as not worth living. That would be a dire and dangerous situation. There is wisdom yet in the famous old Christian precept, Thou shalt not kill.

More on the assisted dying debate

National Secular Society podcast on the 2021 Assisted Dying Bill: Emma Park interviews A.C. Grayling and Molly Meacher, Baroness Meacher

Bishops in the Lords: Why are they still there? by Emma Park

Assisted dying: will the final freedom be legalised in France? by Jean-Luc Romero-Michel

The post Think again: the humanist case against assisted suicide and euthanasia appeared first on The Freethinker.

Know your place, woman!

In February, the National Secular Society (NSS) complained to the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator about a sermon given to the good folks of Rosyth Baptist Church, a registered charity, in which the ‘reverend’ Chris Demetriou clamped down on any uppity women who might be among his flock. As the NSS reported: ‘[In the sermon, Demetriou] explains a wife “should submit to her husband’s leadership” because “that’s the Lord’s pattern for us”. She submits to him “out of obedience to Christ”.’ (It should be noted that Demetriou has belatedly—and rather lamely—responded to the NSS’s complaints.)

So, there you have it. From now on, should any women disagree with anything I write in the Freethinker or elsewhere, I shall simply employ Demetriou’s Defence: know your place, woman! [Praise the Lord! – Ed.]

Know your place, infidel!

In a new report for the UK Commission for Countering Extremism, Alexander Meleagrou-Hitchens warns that ‘Anti-blasphemy activism in the UK is gaining momentum and showing signs of becoming increasingly radicalised.’ Meleagrou-Hitchens has provided a valuable summary and analysis of the threats posed by Islamists to free thought in the UK. It is eye-opening even for those of us who pay close attention to this sort of thing. And, as he astutely notes, it is not just non-Muslims like the Batley schoolteacher who face Islamist intimidation, but ‘heretical’ Muslims too—Ahmadi Muslims in particular, one of whom was murdered in Glasgow in 2016 for his beliefs. At a time when gay MPs have been scared by Islamists into giving up their seats, and when even the Speaker of the House of Commons is more or less openly expressing his fear of Islamist violence against MPs, Meleagrou-Hitchens’s analysis is essential, if also alarming, reading.

From Pakistan with terror

Meleagrou-Hitchens reports that much of this ‘anti-blasphemy activism’ is linked to ‘the emergence of a UK wing of the extremist Pakistani anti-blasphemy political party, Tehreek-e-Labbaik (TLP).’ This is unsurprising, given the long and ignoble tradition of Pakistani Islamists’ interference in other countries (the Pakistani government’s support for the Taliban in Afghanistan being the most disgraceful example)—not to mention the equally ignoble tradition of persecuting infidels within Pakistan itself.

Just this month, the BBC reported that a young man has been sentenced to death by a Pakistani court for the crime of sharing images and videos offensive to Muslims. Despite all this, Pakistan remains a ‘major non-NATO ally’, thus sullying the name of an organisation that, for all its past and present crimes and follies, is now one of the world’s great bulwarks of liberal democracy. So it goes.

A note on ‘extremism’

Michael Gove has produced a new official definition of ‘extremism’ that is both broad and vague, and therefore a threat to free speech. There are many problems with having the state define what constitutes ‘extremism’ in the first place—it is a contested word and concept, one liable to misuse by governments wishing to muzzle the opposition. What business is it of the state to define the limits of acceptable political discourse? What business is it of anyone to do so, unless they want to shut their critics up?

But the Gove definition is particularly dubious. As the NSS put it, it could include ‘those who seek to “undermine” the country’s institutions or values’, a group which would include opponents of the established Church of England and the monarchy (the NSS spoke before the definition was made public on 14 March, but its concerns still apply). On the one hand, then, the UK Commission for Countering Extremism (!) is rightly concerned about Islamic ‘anti-blasphemy activism’; on the other, the government seems to want to erode free speech in this country even further.

By the way, would blasphemy not be considered ‘extremist’ by the votaries of the various faiths? Indeed, it was not so long ago that we had an official blasphemy ban on the law books. The government’s attempts to counter the phenomenon nebulously described as ‘extremism’ is a little too close for my liking to a ban on blasphemy—even on free speech tout court.

The Scottish Hate Monster

Meanwhile, Scotland’s long-delayed and authoritarian Hate Crime Act will come into force on (appropriately) 1 April, with ‘non-crime hate incidents’ also being recorded. Thankfully, a Police Scotland video has resurfaced to put us all in our places. The narrator, in condescending faux chummy Scots, informs us that the ‘Hate Monster’ will grow within us every time we commit a hate crime. The criminal urge can just creep up on you, it seems: one moment you’re a bit peeved and ‘then, before ye know it, ye’ve committed a hate crime.’ A sound basis for prosecution…

Being Scottish, I have long had concerns about the Hate Crime Act. In 2022, I went so far as to say how shameful—and terrifying—it was. And this in one of the heartlands of the Enlightenment, no less! I can easily see how things I have written (including in this very Faith Watch), and things which have appeared in the Freethinker generally, might fall afoul of the Act or be seized upon by some offence-seeking enemy of free thought.

With Michael Gove and Humza Yousaf fighting for our freedoms, who needs tyrants? All I can say is that we at the Freethinker have no intention of being silenced.

Of rum and Ramadan

The month of Muslim fasting and prayer began on 10 March. There is no objection to people freely practising their religion, of course, but let us not forget the closeted apostates and liberal or non-practising Muslims around the world forced into doing so on pain of ostracisation—or worse. In Nigeria, for example, 11 Muslims have already been arrested for the crime of eating during the hours of fasting. That is why it is nice to see the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain (CEMB) planning to have a picnic in defiance of religious bullying this month.

Apparently, 23 March is Atheist Day, which I would normally find very silly except for the happy coincidence that it falls within Ramadan this year and is the date on which CEMB invites everyone to ‘take a shot of Rum for #atheists and #exMuslims across the globe’ using the hashtag #AtheistDayRUMadan. I for one will join in, though probably with whisky rather than rum. Happy Rumadan!

Ramadan and the Uyghurs

While Ramadan can inspire Islamic bullying and tyranny, it is also a good time to remember the Uyghur Muslims, who are facing genocide at the hands of the Chinese Communist Party. Their plight has faded from the media as other horrors have risen up to capture our attention, but they should not be forgotten.

For them, Ramadan is a dangerous time indeed. As the Campaign for Uyghurs put it:

‘The blessed month of Ramadan is also synonymous with the extreme torture and hardships perpetrated by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as it wages a brutal war on Islam amidst the ongoing Uyghur genocide. The CCP ludicrously deems any public expression of the Islamic faith as “religious extremism” [there’s that word again] and outlaws religious practices among the Uyghurs, including fasting, owning a Qur’an, and praying. During Ramadan, Uyghurs are forced to abandon their fasts, consume non-halal (prohibited) products, and engage in other activities that contradict their faith. If they refuse, they are subject to severe punishment.’

So even as I have no sympathy with religious belief and practice, I feel a little softer towards Ramadan these days than I normally would. Of course, the only thing is to be consistent in one’s advocation of liberty: just as nobody should be compelled to practice religion, nobody should be prevented from doing so if they freely choose it.

Alexander and Hephaestion redux

In happier news, one of the most famously gay places in all of history has legalised same-sex marriage. Despite the best efforts of the Greek Orthodox Church, the first-ever gay wedding in the Athens City Hall was conducted on 7 March. Nearly three thousand years after Achilles and Patroclus, and more than two thousand after Alexander and Hephaestion, it’s about time! Perhaps now is a good moment to revisit Mary Renault’s beautiful novel about the latter pair, Fire from Heaven (1969); it is a personal favourite of mine, and its sequels, The Persian Boy (1972) and Funeral Games (1981), are also well worth reading.

I can’t resist an apt quote from Fire from Heaven here. Alexander has just expressed his love for his closest friend: ‘Hephaistion had known for many ages that if a god should offer him one gift in all his lifetime, he would choose this. Joy hit him like a lightning bolt.’

The continued decay of subcontinental (and global) secularism

In last month’s Faith Watch, I wrote of Narendra Modi’s ‘assault on India’s rich secularist history’. Well, here we are again. Less than two months after Modi opened a new temple to Ram in Ayodhya, his government has announced that it is set to fulfil another Hindu nationalist dream by enacting the anti-Muslim Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), which was passed in 2019. Even the name of the act sounds slightly sinister.

As the writer and Modi critic Mukul Kesavan wrote in 2019, when the act was just a bill, ‘Couched in the language of refuge and seemingly directed at foreigners, the CAB’s main purpose is the de-legitimization of Muslim citizenship.’ He went on to describe it as one of ‘the greatest institutional threats to Indian democracy today.’

With Modi and his party up for re-election later this year, it is no wonder they are so flagrantly pandering to their Hindu nationalist base. Modi is likely to win a third term, so for how much longer will India be able to retain the title of the world’s largest secular democracy? Meanwhile, with Donald Trump, darling of the Christian nationalists, tying with and sometimes even surpassing Joe Biden in the polls, the world’s oldest secular democracy might also be preparing to self-immolate this year.

Perhaps nations like India and the US have forgotten the value of secularism. They should look to Iran, where a poll run by the state found a huge majority in favour of secular government. And, in a rebuke to all those who so vacuously celebrated World Hijab Day on 1 February, it also found that most Iranians are opposed to the mandatory hijab.

Should India and the US choose to abandon their hard-won secular democracies, they will miss them dearly—and they will have to fight for them all over again. At least the ideals of secular democracy will survive among those who most appreciate its worth.

Yet more papal piffle

The above words could be applied to almost everything every pope has ever said, including Pope Francis’s recent intervention wherein he might as well have told the Ukrainians to surrender to annihilation (having forgotten his church’s historical complicity with fascism, Francis has now reportedly joined Kim Jong Un and Xi Jinping in congratulating Putin on his recent election victory), but I have in mind a book released earlier this year: The Cambridge Companion to Joseph Ratzinger. I read (though ‘endured’ might be a better word) this book, intending to review it more fully, but it is so bad that it is not worth the effort. Instead, I shall limit myself to a few reflections.

First, why is a respected university press publishing a book almost entirely composed of theological waffle written mostly by committed theological wafflers? They may as well publish a Cambridge Companion to Scientology written by L. Ron Hubbard fans. If Catholics (or Scientologists) want to publish this stuff, they are free to do so – and they certainly have the resources with which to do it. And there is no reasonable objection to the publication of historical-analytical volumes on religion and theology.

But a serious academic press printing what amounts to mumbo-jumbo? I look forward to a future Cambridge Companion to John Frum Worship consisting entirely of pseudo-sophisticated analysis by Melanesian acolytes of the eponymous cargo cult. (Again, anthropological study is an entirely different thing.)

The Ratzinger book opens breathlessly, with the editors placing their subject alongside Aristotle and Shakespeare in the depth of his influence (in his case, on Catholic theology rather than philosophy and literature). He is also compared with Augustine and Aquinas (of course), but at least that pair had the excuse of living in periods of relative ignorance. The editors and contributors clearly think of Ratzinger as a great and humane scholar. A useful tonic to this hero worship is Daniel Gawthrop’s 2013 book The Trial of Pope Benedict, which (so far as I am concerned, anyway) exposes Ratzinger as the nasty, authoritarian, reactionary old bigot and bully that he was.

Here is an example of theo-waffle from Joseph Ratzinger, as quoted by a contributor to the Companion, so that the reader can judge for him- or herself this towering intellect:

‘The truth cannot unfold except in an otherness open to God, who wishes to reveal his own otherness in and through my human brothers and sisters. Hence it is not fitting to state in an exclusive way: “I possess the truth.” The truth is not possessed by anyone; it is always a gift which calls us to undertake a journey of ever closer assimilation to truth… truth is disclosed only in an encounter of love.’

As with so much theology, this babble is reminiscent of the worst stylings of the postmodernists. It is an irony that conservative theologians like Ratzinger, who abhor postmodernism and the like, sound so much like them—and carry about as much intellectual weight, assuming as they do all the things that they need, and have signally failed, to prove before they even begin and building an absurd and abstruse system on top of those assumptions. Change a few words here and there, and the most sophisticated Christian theology can be rendered into a postmodernist, or even a cargo cult, tract. (And it is beyond me how the above quote can be squared with another contributor’s statement that ‘the Catholic Church, for Ratzinger, is…the Spirit-filled infallible authority…’)

Here is another example, this time from one of the contributors, whose simultaneous pomposity and meaninglessness might make even Jacques Derrida scoff: ‘[F]or Ratzinger, communion is the fundamental figure of reality, created and uncreated, and historically mediated relationality is thus disclosive of the deepest meaning of being.’ Thus disclosive of the deepest meaning of being—magnificent.

According to Ratzinger and his Cambridge companions, Christianity is a pre-eminently and uniquely rational religion. Curious, then, that even its most ‘sophisticated’ defenders fall back on such fatuous language (all the better to befuddle, I suppose). There is also the awkward fact that Ratzinger himself, as discussed in the book, admitted that silly doctrines such as the Trinity can only be accepted on the basis of revelation—after all, they do not do very well under rational scrutiny. And what of the plain superstition that is literal transubstantiation? Or intercessory prayer?

Worst of all, the Companion barely deals with the thousands of child rapes that Ratzinger was arguably morally culpable for. When it does, it is to excuse him and to warp the record to portray him as a saviour rather than an enabler. On moral as well as intellectual grounds, then, this book is almost as rancid as its subject.

I cannot think of an excuse for Cambridge University Press here. Would they take an obvious work of fiction, complete with its own metaphysics and theology and imagined history, and allow deluded people who believe that the fiction is real to write so sincerely about it?

There is a Cambridge Companion to Fantasy Literature, but, so far as I can tell, none of its contributors believes in Aslan or Gandalf or treats fantasy as reality rather than literature—and it now strikes me that the papal piffle that fills the pages of the Ratzinger companion would be much more at home in the back-end of some anthology of third-rate fantasy.

Further reading:

Secularism, women’s rights, and religious charities

Secularism is a feminist issue, by Megan Manson

Blasphemy and free speech in the UK

Blasphemy and bishops: how secularists are navigating the culture wars, by Emma Park

Free speech in Britain: a losing battle?

Blasphemy Month at the Freethinker

Secularism and the struggle for free speech, by Stephen Evans

Britain’s blasphemy heritage, by David Nash

On trial for blasphemy: the Freethinker’s first editor and offensive cartoons, by Bob Forder

Freethought in Pakistan

Coerced faith: the battle against forced conversions in Pakistan’s Dalit community, by Shaukat Korai

Breaking the silence: Pakistani ex-Muslims find a voice on social media, by Tehreem Azeem

From religious orthodoxy to free thought, by Tehreem Azeem

Indian secularism and Hindu nationalism

Religion and the decline of freethought in South Asia, by Kunwar Khuldune Shahid

‘We need to move from identity politics to a politics of solidarity’ – interview with Pragna Patel

Campaign ‘to unite India and save its secular soul’, by Puja Bhattacharjee

The post Faith Watch, March 2024 appeared first on The Freethinker.

In 1877, a woman was put on trial for publishing what the prosecutor called a ‘dirty, filthy book’.

The book was a manual on rudimentary contraception, called Fruits of Philosophy. And the woman was Annie Besant – feminist, freethinker and vice-president of the National Secular Society. She and Charles Bradlaugh, the founder and president of the NSS, were both prosecuted for obscenity over this ‘dirty, filthy book’.

Besant’s story is extraordinary. In a highly patriarchal, highly Christian society, she fought fearlessly for the right of couples in Victorian England’s desperately poor and overcrowded slums to access information which would allow them to control their family planning. Alongside that, she fought for the right to free speech, and the right of women to control their bodies. 

Incredibly, Besant’s ‘dirty, filthy book’ is still upsetting religious fundamentalists even today, nearly 150 years later.

Last November, the NSS held a history talk in London all about Victorian birth control, including the fight to publish Fruits of Philosophy. To our astonishment, our talk was picketed by an anti-abortion Christian group. This was particularly bizarre; the manual argued one of the main aims of contraception was to reduce abortion. But when questioned, the protestors revealed that their group is not just against abortion – they are against all forms of birth control.

While it was somewhat amusing that an anti-abortion group would embarrass itself by protesting against this small and rather tame history talk, it was also disturbing. The incident revealed the extent to which the religiously-motivated desire to control women’s bodies, women’s choices and women’s participation in society is still alive in Britain.

Secularism is a feminist issue. This was true at the time of Besant’s trial, and it is true today, worldwide.

The 2023 United Nations Gender Social Norms index found that there has been no improvement in worldwide biases against women in the last decade. It also found that gender hierarchies in religious practices can strongly influence behaviours and attitudes.

It is therefore perhaps unsurprising that in recent years we have seen some dramatic and devastating leaps backward – driven, in part, by fundamentalist religion.

In 2021, the Taliban re-took Afghanistan and immediately set about imposing its fundamentalist Islamic ideology on women and girls. Women there are now banned from most public places. To visit the few places where they are permitted outside their homes, they must now be clad in a burqa. Girls cannot attend school from over the age of 11.

Male doctors have been banned from treating female patients, a policy with deadly implications. Naturally, the Taliban ordered pharmacies to clear their stocks of contraception. Is it any wonder that since the Taliban takeover, Afghanistan has seen a surge in women attempting suicide?

Then there is Iran. Following the Islamic Revolution in 1979, the theocratic Iranian state has required all women and girls over the age of nine to wear hijab in public. Women who break this law are often subject to brutal punishment, as horrifically demonstrated in 2022 when Mahsa Amini died at the hands of Iran’s notorious ‘morality police’. She had been arrested for failing to wear hijab correctly. Witnesses saw her being brutally tortured in the back of a police van. She died days later. She was 22 years old.

Mahsa Amini’s death sparked huge waves of protest in Iran, which were described as the biggest challenge to the government since the Islamic Revolution. The regime’s response was to double down on its laws, rather than make any meaningful change.

But perhaps it is a matter of time. Consistent surveys find that most Iranians oppose mandatory hijab and, on top of this, support a secular state. Protests may have died down, but the mood of resistance has not been extinguished. As one banner displayed during international protests against Iran said: ‘To the world leaders. Iranian women do not need you to save them. They only need you to stop saving their murderers.’

So how are leaders in the UK responding to the brutal oppression and killing of women in Iran, Afghanistan and other countries where religion prescribes patriarchy and misogyny?

Well, the suffering of women forced to wear hijab did not stop UK schools, universities, and even the Home Office this year observing ‘World Hijab Day’ – an event which explicitly celebrates the veiling of women.

And it did not stop Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council last year approving a 16-foot steel statue of a veiled woman for a park in Smethwick, Birmingham. The statue, called ‘The Strength of the Hijab’, was revealed to the public just days before the first anniversary of Mahsa Amini’s death. It is as if it was timed as an act of triumph against Iran’s courageous women who dare to show their hair; a tribute to the morality police.

Much of British authorities’ enthusiasm for the hijab comes from a concern to appear ‘respectful’ of minority groups. But an unwillingness to think critically about religious practices which are at odds with democratic values spells disaster for women’s rights. It also does Muslims a disservice by erasing debate and dissent from within that community.

This attitude is coupled with a fear of challenging religion – a fear which is, sadly, quite rational. There are now too many examples of people being accused of bigotry, losing their jobs, being threatened and even being physically attacked for questioning, criticising or poking fun at religion.

And it is something that schools with concerns about hijab have had to face. In 2017, St Stephen’s Primary School in east London told parents that girls under eight should not be sent to school in hijab, because of concerns about integration and the promotion of ideologies which are incompatible with British values. This sparked a furious backlash from Islamist fundamentalists, who bombarded school leaders with emails, many of which were threatening. As a result, the school backed down on its policy.

Decision-makers in the UK still operate under the belief that religion is a wholly positive force that should be respected, accommodated and showcased, not something to be questioned. This is particularly evident in the charity sector.

Incredibly, there are registered charities promoting the idea that husbands can dominate and even beat their wives, and that women who dress ‘sexily’ (for example, by wearing trousers) are to blame for rape. We have even seen charities signposting material which says the torturous and illegal practice of female genital mutilation has benefits, including reducing ‘excessive sensitivity of the clitoris’ which is ‘very annoying to the husband, especially at the time of intercourse’.

These charities do this in the name of religion. ‘The advancement of religion’ is a recognised charitable purpose in law. [On the problems with the ‘advancement of religion’ provision, see further in the Freethinker and New Humanist – Ed.]

As long as a charity is registered under this purpose, it seems to have carte blanche to say just about anything. Charities are meant to provide a public benefit in return for the generous tax breaks and Gift Aid they get. But it is difficult to see how promoting misogyny benefits the public – at least the female half of the public.

The fact that the state is willing to forgive misogyny when it is cloaked in religion reveals just how normalised it is. And what else could we expect, when the UK’s own state religion, the established Church of England, is itself drenched in sexism.

It is quite incredible that in the 21st century, 500 Anglican churches ban female priests. The Church has said this is because it is ‘committed to enabling’ those who are ‘unable to receive the ministry of women bishops or priests’ to ‘flourish’.

The established Church’s commitment to helping chauvinists within their ranks ‘flourish’ tacitly implies that there is something so subversive about women with authority that it is reasonable for men to reject them.

Let us not forget that as the established church, the C of E is part of our state. The lines between theology and politics are blurred when it comes to a state church. This is institutionalised, structural sexism at the highest level.

Religiously sanctioned notions that women exist to serve men translate into decision making which limits women’s opportunities, and feed into relationships which are coercive, controlling and abusive.

While women’s rights in the UK have inarguably progressed, women are still under-represented in positions of power and overrepresented as victims of domestic violence. A meagre seven per cent of FTSE 100 companies had female CEOs in 2023. Only 35 per cent of members of the House of Commons and 29 per cent of the Lords are female. According to Refuge, one in four women in England and Wales will experience domestic abuse in her lifetime, two women a week are killed by a current or former partner, and domestic abuse drives three women a week to suicide. Ninety-three per cent of defendants in domestic abuse cases are male while 84 per cent of victims are female.

If Annie Besant were alive today, what would she think? 

While she would no doubt welcome the many successes achieved by feminists and secularists in improving equality for women, I think she would also be dismayed and bewildered at the numerous and complex threats posed to women by fundamentalist religion today.

Progress on women’s rights can only go so far if we only treat the symptoms of misogyny, and not the causes. And one of the most important causes is patriarchal religion, which is not only tolerated by the British state, but nurtured, protected and endorsed.

That is why, to protect the rights of women and girls worldwide, we must not allow religion to pull the veil over our eyes when it comes to injustice, discrimination and oppression.

We must be free to look religion in the eye, to challenge it, and to criticise it in the strongest terms, without fear of punishment by society or the state.

We must stop letting religious extremists exploit our good intentions to promote pluralism and inclusivity by portraying symbols of misogynistic oppression as symbols of social justice.

And we must separate church and state to ensure women’s rights are never subordinated to religious agendas.

The National Secular Society is holding a free online talk on April 10^th with Michael Meyer, the author of a new biography on Annie Besant. More information and booking here.

The post Secularism is a feminist issue appeared first on The Freethinker.

Introduction

On the afternoon of Wednesday 6th December 2023, Paul Scriven, a Liberal Democrat peer, introduced his private member’s bill, the Disestablishment of the Church of England Bill, in the House of Lords, after it had been selected by ballot.

In the UK Parliament, the first reading of a bill is usually a mere formality, with the meat of the debate being reserved for the second reading – which may happen a few months later, if there is time and circumstances do not intervene.

When Lord Scriven, however, ‘beg[ged] to introduce a bill to disestablish the Church of England, to make provision for the protection of freedom of religion or belief, and for connected purposes,’ there were noises of dissent halfway through – apparently from the Conservative government’s side.

And when the Lord Speaker, Lord McFall of Alcluith, asked the House whether they were ‘content’ to let the bill be read a first time, there was vociferous opposition, to the point where he initially responded that the ‘not contents’ had it, before changing his mind. The full drama can be seen (and heard) in the video clip linked in Lord Scriven’s tweet below.

A brief history of (dis)establishment

The origin of the establishment of the Church of England was Henry VIII’s Act of Supremacy in 1534. This made him the ‘Supreme Head of the Church of England’ and required that his subjects swear an oath of loyalty recognising his marriage to his second wife, Anne Boleyn, after he had unilaterally decided to cancel his marriage to his first wife, Catherine of Aragon.

The Act of Supremacy was repealed under Henry VIII’s Catholic daughter when she became Mary I, but then re-enacted in 1558 under Elizabeth I. Section VIII, entitled ‘All Spiritual Jurisdiction united to the Crown,’ is still in force today.

The last time a bill was introduced into Parliament that would have disestablished the Church was in 1991, in Tony Benn’s Commonwealth of Britain Bill, which would also have abolished the House of Lords altogether and removed the constitutional role of the monarchy. However, the bill’s second reading was repeatedly deferred and there was never a full debate.

In January 2020, another Liberal Democrat peer, Dick Taverne, introduced a private member’s bill on one aspect of disestablishment: the House of Lords (Removal of Bishops) Bill. This passed its first reading, but fell by the wayside during the pandemic.

Other points in recent history at which disestablishment or the removal of the bishops from the Lords was considered are recorded in a paper on ‘The relationship between church and state in the United Kingdom’, published by the House of Commons Library in September.

The 2018 debate

Disestablishment was briefly debated in the House of Lords on 28 November 2018, under Elizabeth II. A Labour peer, Lord Berkeley, asked the Conservative government ‘what assessment they have made of the case for the disestablishment of the Church of England.’ The laconic answer, from Lord Young of Cookham, was, ‘My Lords, none.’

Lord Berkeley pointed out that attendance at the Church of England was falling rapidly, and that ‘half of British people have no religion’. He therefore proposed that it would be time for Charles, when he became king, ‘to embrace this secular state’ and swear an appropriately non-religious oath. This led to a discussion about the status of the Church of England and constitutional reform.

For anyone who thinks that the bishops in the Lords are a mere relic, their entrenched place in the establishment can be illustrated by a few quotations from this debate. Lord Young argued that the bishops in the Lords ‘add a spiritual dimension to our discussions. They speak with a moral authority that escapes most of us…The bishops seek to heal religious conflict and promote religious tolerance and inclusiveness.’ In a word, the government’s policy was ‘antidisestablishmentarianism’. Without a trace of self-interest, the Lord Bishop of Worcester proposed that ‘the established Church is a significant force for good.’

Lord Scriven’s Bill

About 24 hours before the Disestablishment Bill was introduced, I interviewed Paul Scriven over a cup of tea in the House of Lords. An edited version of the interview is below. We discuss his motivations for bringing the bill, even though it is almost certainly doomed to fail, and why he is bringing it now, of all times. We also look at the relationship of the Church to the monarchy and of disestablishment to wider constitutional reform; and whether the bishops or other religious leaders really have any claim to moral authority.

~ Emma Park, Editor

Interview

Freethinker: How did you come to introduce this bill?

Paul Scriven: A little bit by accident. I entered the Lords reluctantly, as I do not agree with an unelected second house. In 2014, Nick Clegg wanted to put a number of peers in, like me, who believed that when the time came, we would vote for a reformed elected chamber. I am quite a nonconformist by background. I grew up on a council estate in Huddersfield and have always rallied against authority. When I have seen unfairness, I have fought it. Then Nick finally beat me down and got me into this place. Now that I am here, I realise it is a place where you can champion causes which are important to improve either individual lives or the state of the nation or internationally.

I was an agnostic when I came in. I have sat and watched the Bishops’ Bench for the last nearly ten years, and their views on social matters have made me a confirmed atheist. It is quite clear they are way behind the curve on where the vast majority of Britons are, whether on same-sex marriage or women or a number of issues. If that is Christianity in action from the Church of England perspective, then I do not want anything to do with it. They do not represent modern Britain – that was clear from the 2021 census.

Has being gay influenced your perspective on this issue?

I find some churches’ views on being gay baffling. Others are clearly more progressive. It is hurtful at times having to hear that you are not equal, even though they say that God loves you – and then it is quite clear that they do not like my kind of love. That is wretched. It has not driven me to my position. I just think that, on a wider number of issues, listening to the bishops has made me not want to be associated with what I see as predominantly white old men arguing about how to keep an institution together and very conservative in their views.

I also find it absolutely bewildering that in the UK Parliament, there is only one institution that is guaranteed places, and that is the 26 Anglican bishops who sit in the House of Lords. In 2023, how on earth does a Church which has 0.9% of the population [in England] in regular attendance at a Sunday service have an automatic right to be in Parliament, determine laws and have influence and power beyond its relevance to most people?

More broadly, why is it that the Church of England has so much influence, power and a special status in our society, when those who want to practise any faith or belief should have equality? The time now is ripe for disestablishment – especially when you consider what a diverse country we are, in terms not just of our faith, but of our cultures and beliefs. It seems ridiculous that one religious denomination should have a special status that goes back to a king wanting a divorce in the 1500s.

In terms of tactics, the next general election has to take place no later than January 2025. Did you ever consider leaving the bill until the next government?

Very few private member’s bills actually become law. In all honesty, I think it is more likely that snow will fall in hell than that my bill will get through this time. It is important, though, to raise the issue, because of the diversity of beliefs and faiths revealed by the 2021 census. I could stay quiet and hope for the next government to have a different view, which I think highly unlikely. It will have a large legislative programme and probably the disestablishment of the Church of England will not be among its priorities.

If the bill falls, I can file it again at the start of the next Parliament. I am looking at this in the longer term. During the debate in the second reading, I will be able to listen to people’s objections and amend the bill, which will hopefully strengthen it next time round.

Is the bill officially supported by the Liberal Democrats?

No, as a private member’s bill it is not. It is not an issue which I discussed with my party first. I am sure that as the debate happens and as the bill progresses, there will be cross-party support from all over the House. My guess is that there will also be opposition from people of different parties too.

How did the drafting process work?

I had been in touch with the National Secular Society (NSS) over a number of issues, and I just said to them, I think now is the time to introduce the private member’s bill for disestablishment. We had a discussion and they told me what was important to them. I also had discussions with Humanists UK (HUK). There were a number of issues which both organisations wanted in the bill. To actually draft the bill in appropriate parliamentary language, I worked with the House of Lords Private Bill Office.

Apart from the NSS and HUK, did you work with any other organisations on the bill?

Those were the two organisations that reached out and spoke to me. I have had quite a lot of emails from people in the Church of England supporting disestablishment. They have told me that, for them, there is a real feeling that disestablishment could be liberating. They would no longer be seen as an organ of the state, and would be able to start doing things based on their true mission, which were not either weakened or diluted by their Church’s established status.

Have you asked the bishops for their point of view?

I talked to the Bishop of Sheffield briefly about it. They will probably disagree. And when we get to the second reading, they will have arguments as to why they want to keep their privileged status and their seats in Parliament. However, they do not come from a position of neutrality. It will be interesting to see if they all have the same view.

Is your argument for disestablishment premised on the state of the Church of England now, or is it a matter of principle, or both?

It is a matter of principle. No faith or belief should have a special status. People should be able to pursue their belief or religion equally.

One possibility sometimes mooted by supporters of religion is that, instead of simply having 26 bishops, the major religions and Christian denominations in the UK could all have allocated seats. What would you say to this?

Religions do not have a monopoly on morals, they do not have a monopoly on insight. You only have to look at some of the child abuse scandals in the Church of England and how they were covered up to realise that. If an individual within a church or a belief system has such significant impact that they can help influence the House of Lords in its present form, then they should by all means be individually nominated. But it should not be the very fact that they are an office-holder or attached to a particular religion.

One common view about the bishops in the Lords is that, well, they are quite nice, and are probably overall a good rather than a bad influence on legislation. How would you respond to that?

They are an influence. It is not for me to determine whether they are good or bad. They have a vested interest to ensure that they can use this place to ingrain their privileged position. On a number of occasions, I have been on the same side of the argument as the bishops, such as in the Illegal Migration Bill. But the fact that they are bishops does not mean that they should automatically be here and able to make those points.

Is there an analogy between bishops and hereditary peers, in terms of their lack of democratic legitimacy?

Being a hereditary peer depends on which womb you came out of. But even the hereditary peers in the Lords are now elected before they get here, unlike the bishops, who are plonked in because of the church they are in.

The peers are chosen by the world’s smallest electorate…

Yes. But the bishops come because they decided to study a certain theological doctrine and then they have climbed the greasy pole within a particular church. It is very odd to me.

What about the technicalities of disestablishment? I have heard some Anglicans saying that they support disestablishment in theory, but in practice it would simply be too difficult to disentangle all the knots that bind Church and State.

Isn’t that interesting? What they are really doing is arguing that they have got their fingers and their claws in so many parts of our constitution that it would be too difficult to touch it. On that argument, quite a lot of legislation would never get done.

My bill is not specific about the technicalities. It asks that, within six months of its being passed, a committee is set up for a year to look at the legal implications of what needs to happen to disestablish the Church of England. The committee would be made up of relevant legal practitioners and people who are specialists in the constitution and in law to do with the Church of England. A report then goes to the Secretary of State, and within six months of receiving that report, the Secretary of State has to produce a detailed legal bill on disestablishment. I am not saying this is going to be easy. There are going to be some very difficult conundrums in there, for example over the Act of Union.

Difficulty should not be a reason for not legislating, but for doing it carefully, with good legal minds and an appropriate timescale.

In terms of the implications of disestablishment, the Church of England owns a lot of property. What do you say should happen to it?

I do not want to get into a big argument about this. My bill says that property will go to the Church’s General Synod. And the sovereign will no longer have the title ‘Defender of the Faith’.

Talking of the monarchy, is getting rid of it a logical next step after disestablishment?

No, that does not automatically follow. There are many functioning constitutional monarchies in Europe where the monarch is not head of the church. So one does not follow from the other. Personally, I am not a republican. I believe in a European-style constitutional monarchy.

What sort of a coronation would you envisage post-disestablishment?

A non-religious one, which would crown the monarch as the constitutional monarch of the country, not as the head of a particular faith. It could be quite interesting to develop a new coronation.

Presumably the monarch would no longer be obliged to be Anglican?

Yes. This is not rocket science. Religion would come out of the coronation, and the monarch would no longer be the ultimate boss of the Church of England.

What about other religions with a presence in Parliament? As things stand, do they have much influence behind the scenes?

Not as much as the established church. There are people of faith – Christian, Muslim, Sikh – or of no faith, like the Humanists, who try to exert influence on legislation. But the difference is that it is equal and they have to win the argument. They have not got an ingrained position. I would not want to stop that. One of the purposes of my bill is to defend people’s right to have faith and non-belief, and to be able to pursue that equally.

One of the arguments that will get thrown about is that I am anti-religious. What I actually want to do is level the playing field between the influence of all faiths and beliefs.

Taking a step back, how far are we from full-scale House of Lords reform?

It is going to be a long journey. At the age of 48, I came here naïvely thinking I would be a turkey voting for Christmas. I am now 57, and I have worked out since being here that the evolution of the British system is not always as fast as you want it to be. To reform the House of Lords would take a lot of effort and heartache. I do not think Labour will do it in their first term, but if they get in for a second term, then there may be some significant reform. My guess is that it will be in steps rather than a big leap, which is the way that the British have tended to go for their revolutions for many centuries now. The removal of the hereditary peers and the bishops might be one of the first possible reforms in terms of moving to a democratically elected chamber eventually. Other reforms might include lowering the size of the House, fixing a retirement age for peers, and changing the way that peers are selected.

As you say, disestablishment may not be high on a Labour government’s list of reforms. Indeed, why should it be high on anyone’s agenda, when we have so many other problems in the UK to deal with?

Things that affect people’s lives every day, such as the health service, the economy, housing, safety, are always going to be there. I am not suggesting for one moment that the disestablishment of the Church of England should take priority over the health service, for instance. What my bill intends to do is to raise awareness so that when the time is right and government space becomes available, there will be public understanding and the pressure to deliver disestablishment. Eventually, the public will say, ‘Now is the time for change.’

And when will ‘eventually’ be?

I cannot give you an answer. We are getting the ball rolling; maybe it will happen in my lifetime, maybe it won’t. But we shall keep pushing for it. And hopefully it will become such a public discussion that, one day, the government will make time for it.

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