Conservative critics have claimed the blessing which had many of the trappings of a traditional wedding service broke church guidelines, which state that gay priests can enter civil partnerships as long as they remain celibate and gay couples who ask a blessing must be treated “pastorally and sensitively”.

An investigation, ordered by the Bishop of London, is now under way.

I must confess to almost rolling around with glee when I read stories like this. The church’s continued prejudice against homosexuality is a wonderful advert for Atheism and Secularism. Once again it seems like homophobia will dominate the Church of England’s General Synod which is to take place in July.

Rowan Williams will no doubt continue to try and avoid the issue and try to prevent it dominating the agenda. He fears that a full and frank discussion of the church’s position on homosexuality will cause a schism and the Anglican Communion will split in two. However, what he fails to realise is that until liberal and conservative Anglican’s split, the church will be viewed as dogmatic and bigoted by virtue of homophobic hatred being spouted from the conservative wings. The church will continue to lose membership, congregations will continue to dwindle and we shall see the demise of the Anglican Church.

Oh well… I’m not complaining.

Religion is a set of beliefs and practices, often centred upon specific supernatural and moral claims about reality, (at least that’s the best definition I could find on Google.) Its not based on hard fact or even sound reasoning, its based on faith. Now this is a shaky platform upon which to base anything, but add to this the belief of religious adherents that their particular articles of faith are inerrant, and their view becomes unquestionable.

Logic, reasoning, well argued points, none cannot penetrate this wall of denial. This is a dangerous mix for a politician. OK no politician likes to admit they got it wrong, ‘U-turns’ are savaged by the press, but the secular politician is open to new information. The Fundamentalist Religious politician, goes back to his good book or scripture to look for answers which offers no solutions to new problems and new circumstances because it hasn’t been updated for the better part of two millennia.

“When the facts change, I change my opinion” Or so goes the quote and that’s a generous as we can be to secular politicians who backtrack on a bad policy decision. This doesn’t seem to apply to religious politicians who still believe in creationism or that teaching abstinence prevents teenage pregnancy, in spite of the evidence to the contrary.

So we’ve established that people with fundamentalist beliefs are not exactly brilliant at reacting to new information and we need governments that are adaptive to the changing needs of society and the modern world. But what about the marginalisation of Christianity?

I started the article by saying how tired I was of hearing people like Alan Craig blaming the ‘secular liberal elite’ for the marginalisation of Christianity. The argument espoused by fundamentalist Christians seems to be that secularism some how oppresses religion. It doesn’t. Secularism is apathetic towards religion, it does it no favours but neither does it interfere with religious practice or worship in society.

Christianity’s main beef is that it no-longer has the strangle hold on society it once had, politically it has been marginalised because when it had power, it used that power to impose its will and beliefs on others and marginalised other denominations. This is true of all religions, just look at Islam in Iran or Judaism in Israel, those belonging to the majority faith are protected yet those belonging to minorities are marginalised and oppressed.

Secularism however treats all faiths with equal disinterest. This gives all religions an equal footing, they can all build their churches, mosques & temples, they can preach, they can worship, they can go out onto the streets and hand out leaflets. They just don’t get any help from the government to do it.

An an atheist this suits me fine as I don’t want to see the state promote any religion and I certainly don’t want my taxes spent indoctrinating others. Equally I suspect Jews wouldn’t want to see their money spent promoting Islam, or vice versa.

Religious people complain of having secular values imposed upon them, most notably I guess this is their objection to legalisation of abortion. Or the push for the legalisation of voluntary euthanasia to be made available to the terminally ill. But as I keep pointing out to people of faith. Just because abortion is legal doesn’t mean you have to go and get one!

The option is there for people who don’t share your belief in the soul and who, backed by the opinion of medical science, believe that sentience is not something achieved until well into the foetal stages of the pregnancy. If your religion tells you this is something you shouldn’t do, then secularism doesn’t force you to go against your faith.

Conversely if we had religious values promoted in politics, then this option would be lost to everyone.

Another example is where religious values from different faiths conflict. For example, I’ve always wondered how you could hold a Christian Mass in an Islamic country. Wine is central to the Eucharist, yet most Islamic states are dry. Some puritanically so. To me it makes more sense, for a government to adopt a secular approach and make no prohibition on alcohol and should Muslims choose to abstain, then good on them. At least the vicar can still get tipsy on the communion wine.

Secularism allows religion space to express itself, it just doesn’t help religions promote their cause. And this is real complaint that political-religious groups have. They worry that their flock is not strong enough to resist temptation so they want to overly sanitise society, removing the temptations, criminalising ‘sin’ and ultimately attaining cultural dominance over other faiths.

But that isn’t the government’s problem, if you are not a strong enough individual to abide by the moral teachings of your faith then you have failed yourself, society hasn’t failed you.

Secularism recognises that religious values are limited to the individuals of that faith, outside of it people have different moral codes. And people must be free to move between religions or out of them at their own will, to reject the values of a particular faith in favour of a new morality.

Ultimately though secularism is religion’s best friend. The secular USA is one of the most religiously adherent countries in the western world. And secularism also prevents the oppression of religious minorities or those which have fallen out of favour. Remember history class and Tudor England? There was huge political upheaval as Britain swung back and forth from being a Catholic to Protestant country. One oppressed the other. The oppressed denomination systematically changing with each new monarch. In the end Protestantism won out and its taken hundreds of years to gain Catholic emancipation. Yet anti-Catholic bias (or fear of it) hasn’t totally been removed from Britain. We had a wonderful example of this recently with Tony Blair’s conversion to Rome just days after leaving office. Aparently he felt unable to convert to Catholicism whilst still in office. Religion represses Religion.

And here in lies the beauty of secularism, its the perfect referee, it gives each faith equal footing and promotes none, but what really grinds at religion is that without state sponsorship, its reach is diminished. Its ability to indoctrinate school children from their earliest age is lost. And its ability to control the actions and behaviour of everyone else in society is removed.

So the next time you hear someone complaining about secularism marginalising religious groups, remember that they are just pissed that they can’t tell you what to do or think any more.

The objections raised are understood to relate to Mayoral Candidate Alan Craig’s opposition to plans by Muslim Missionary Group Tablighi Jamaat to build Europe’s largest Mosque next to the Olympic site in Newham. Mr Craig claims in the unedited version of the PEB that so called Mega-Mosque would be ‘divisive’.

Having watched the unedited version on YouTube, its difficult to see what the fuss is about, in fact I find Mr Craig’s claims that Christianity offers “concrete advice” on how to live your life far more objectionable than his objections to the Mosque. However, TV broadcasters are bound by tricky red-tape from regulators and censors which, those of us more accustomed to getting our message across either on the print or the web are unfamiliar with, as we thankfully don’t have to work within those restrictions.

For what its worth, this row has generated more campaign publicity for Christian Choice than they could ever have hoped for and has certainly raised their profile far beyond anyone’s expectations. But its important that this row isn’t allowed to develop into something that its not, and in particular what Christian Choice want it to be. Namely, another example of the repression of Christianity in an increasingly secular society.

What this is really is an example of a very minor political party failing to understand the limitations of TV broadcasting regulations. They’ve actually produced a very professional looking Party Election Broadcast, which I think the big three ought to take note of, not for his content, but its production quality and emphasis on how to actually vote. But lets not lose site of the fact both ITV and the BBC have offered to help make the PEB suitable for broadcast and comply with the regulatory requirements. So the TV companies aren’t the censors here if anyone’s to blame is the Broadcasting Standards Authorities.

There are always times when we’d like less stringent broadcasting regulations and its a still a media heavily sanitised by the regulators. But Alan Craig should be careful what he wishes for, with less strict regulatory requirements we’d be destined to see, more sex, nudity, bad language and violence on our screens. Things I’m sure he opposes.

Wake Up Alan. Freedom of expression on Television does not exist, it never has. I say “fuck” far too much to ever be allowed on live TV, but as far as I’m concerned I exercise the right to swear vociferously as part of my freedom of expression. Naturalists wonder around in the buff as part of their freedom of expression, yet they are not allowed on TV unless their genitals are obscured with some form of digital pixeling or blurring.

TV regulation is to blame for this controversy not secularism.

http://www.liveandloaded.com/audio/jimmy711.mp3

Its not exactly subtle, but its funny because its so blunt: “How you gonna be a virgin with a baby?”

Lets get straight to the bones of the matter and take a look at the passage from Leviticus which set-up this ugly episode in the first place:

“If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination”

Leviticus 20:13

This is the biblical passage which effectively says homosexuality is a sin and is immoral. Many Christians still believe this, yet few would accept the last part of this verse which is often left out for the purpose of sanitising this homophobic rant into something more socially acceptable. I include it now for your viewing displeasure.

 “If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death. Their blood shall be upon them.”

Leviticus 20:13 (full version)

So we establish that according to the Christian Bible, (still circulated in Churches, bookshops and hotel rooms) that the penalty for a homosexual act is death. (NB: I’ve used the King James Version here, but check any of the major alternative editions they all say the same.)

Question to Christians who believe homosexuality to be immoral: Why is the last line – the putting to death part – conveniently ignored?  On what authority to do you accept the first part of this verse but not the second?

Don’t come back to me with the “judge not yet be judged” caveate – that’s doublethink – Leviticus 20:13 is perfectly clear about what should be done with Gays. Why aren’t you out slaughtering homosexuals? Your revealed scripture is telling you to do nothing less why are you being so disobedient to your god?

STOP!! Let me just be perfectly clear – I am not trying to incite an act of violence against homosexuals, no – what I am trying to do is wake you up to the fact that you know the murderous directive of Leviticus 20:13 be morally wrong – so why accept the the first portion of the verse but not the second?

I cannot see how a rational person who accepts the biblical proscription of homosexuality as per Leviticus 20:13 can ignore the punishment that according the bible ought to be doled out. Either you accept the entire verse, or you reject it entirely.  Any middle ground is irrational.

On this basis, if you believe homosexuality is a sin you are either irrational, or a potential homophobic murderer. At best the world should ignore you, at worst we should lock you up. What’s it gonna be?

Surely the only sensible alternative is an end to homophobic Christianity don’t you think?

The cartoons originally published in Danish Newspaper Jyllands Posten in September 2005 depicted the Prophet Muhammad as a terrorist, with a bomb in his turban. The reprint has sparked fresh protests from Muslims who believe any image of the prophet as blasphemous and naturally don’t take kindly to the father of their faith been depicted as a terrorist.

However the response from protesters on both occasions has been little short of terrorism in itself. Embassies were burnt along with Danish flags, death threats issued and protesters in Denmark have most recently called free speech ‘a plague’.

If Muslims cannot tolerate insults to their faith and wish to see such acts outlawed then they are by definition a threat to freedom of expression. I suspect however that many Muslims in the West can tolerate such a slur and are simply saddened by the a) the perpetuation of the insult by the newspapers decision to reprint and b) the vulgar response of a radical minority of their own faith.

Still I have to be even handed… I will readily criticism a moderate Christian for signing themselves up to a religion which preaches hate, yet conveniently choosing to ignore the hateful parts of the scripture to reconcile their own morality with that of their faith and I should do no less with moderate Muslims.

But I reserve my strongest criticism for the Danish press. Who in my opinion have responded to this assassination plot in a wholly indiscriminate and disproportionate way. I certainly do not believe that the reprint of these cartoons was the right thing to do. It’s insulting to, and unnecessarily offends all Muslims when the target of the anger ought to be dumb ass radicals who were plotting to kill a cartoonist for drawing a picture. Ridicule these radicals, lambaste them, beat them. I don’t care, but target your anger at the place where it is warranted.

Freedom of speech includes freedom to offend, this is sacrosanct. But when it is threatened, direct your response appropriately.

The authorities consider Valentine’s Day to be a festival which encourages relations between men and women outside wedlock, an offence punishable by law in the conservative kingdom.

In these Islamophobic times this story must of course be tempered with the fact that this kind of conservatism is extreme even for Islam, however, it gives some idea of just what lengths puritanical philosophies will go to in order to impose their will on others.

You might expect me to join the band wagon in calling for his head on a plate, but whilst I disagree with the Archbishop, I fear his comments have been misrepresented by a largely Islamophobic media, and I hate to see arguments won for the wrong reasons.

As a secularist and an Atheist, I find it hard to argue against some limited aspects of Sharia been incorporated into the British legal system. For example, weddings… You can legally get married in a Christian church, a synagogue or a registry office, but for some reason, not a Mosque. This seems somewhat of a double standard, and frankly if the captain of a boat at sea has the authority to marry a couple, I see no problem with any upstanding member of the community been permitted to perform a ceremony in front of witnesses in whatever setting the betrothed coupled deem appropriate. (Cue invites to a satanic wedding.)

There are of course many more distasteful elements of Sharia: Amputation of the hand as possible punishment for theft and death for ‘crimes’ such as adultery and sodomy. Though in practice, one has to concede that in states which have recently re-imposed Sharia, these punishments are virtually unheard of. Iran is the only country in the world I know of which actively hangs homosexuals.

But of course the Archbishop was not referring to this part of Sharia, nor was he referencing any aspects of the Islamic value system not shared on some level by Christianity. And lets face is as Islam is tentatively a schism of Christianity in the same way Christianity is a schism of Judaism, this is not a wholly unchristian thing to do. On this level, criticism directed at Dr Williams from within the Church is unwarranted, and its criticism on this level – the notion of preserving our British/Christian identity – which has been echoed in the Tabloid press, that is wholly unjustified.

The criticism from outside these narrow-minded, White-Christian-Nationalistic circles is of somewhat different nature and can be summed up as follows, which is rather neat as it also represents the main reason for my disagreement with the Archbishop.

“We’ve spent the past 300 years since the enlightenment, untangling the church from the state and the legislature, why the hell would we want to undo 300 years of progress? Especially given that 26 Bishops still sit in the House of Lords that this work is still incomplete?”

The law was last used successfully in 1977 with the private prosecution of the Gay Times for publishing a poem, ‘The Love That Dares To Speak Its Name’, which depicted a centurion’s love for Christ. But hasn’t been used by public prosecutors since 1922. This is in spite of unsuccessful recent attempts by the fundamentalist group Christian Voice to use the law to bring a prosecution against the BBC for screening Jerry Springer the Opera.

There is broad consensus for scrapping the law, and support for its abolition comes from secularists as well as faith groups. The reasons for this are many, but one of the most glaring cases for reform stem from the fact that the law as it stands only covers blasphemy against the Church of England, it does not include blasphemy againt other Christian denominations, Judaism, Islam or any other faiths.

Rather than see the law scrapped many Muslims would like to see blasphemy laws extended to cover all faiths, but that’s unworkable as one faith’s teaching is heresy to another faith. Jews for example cannot accept that Christ was the son of God, to deny Christ’s divinity is ‘blasphemous’ to Christians.

Of course the most persuasive argument for scrapping the blasphemous libel laws is that it is not the role of the state to defend religious beliefs. Religion should be strong enough to defend itself, lest we find ourselves protecting an idea of belief system which has no merit. Much in the way that Galileo’s views on heliocentrism were suppressed by the Church in favour of the flawed Geocentric view.

Of course there are also opponents to the abolition of blasphemy laws most notably from Christian Voice. It said: “If the committee decides not to keep the law against blasphemy it will be saying, “We do not want the United Kingdom to enjoy the blessing of God, if such exists. We are not God-fearing folk. We care nothing for God or his blessing.”

Frankly I couldn’t agree more, that’s precisely what we are saying, to worship out of fear is the ultimate moral capitulation. Whether or not you achieve your god’s blessing is a matter for you, not wider society. I care nothing for the approval of a god I don’t believe in. And if God truly exists and possesses omnipotence and omnipresence then he hardly needs a band of upstarts like Christian Voice running around ensuring everyone shows him due deference. He could just strike blasphemers dumb or paralyse their limbs.

In fact I absolutely relish the amount of anxiety my freedom to blaspheme causes the likes of Christian Voice and other religious conservatives. The fact that I am allowed to say something heretical and get away with it must drive them nuts. Furthermore, Christian Voice’s willingness to sue using blasphemous libel laws can only results in self-censorship in parts of the mainstream media. This in itself should be reason enough to repeal this archaic law and end the oppression of free speech that exists as a result.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/media/avdb/news/uk/audio/140000/bb/140615_au_bb.asx?ad=1&ct=50

Gervais argued, between giggles that religious instruction of children amounts to “brainwashing” and indoctrination. Likening it to allowing children to continue to belief in Santa beyond the point to which its helpful to them. The archbishop countered rather bizarrely that “belief in Santa doesn’t generate a morale code, doesn’t generate art doesn’t generate imagination.”

Granted its an odd debate to be having and you have to listen carefully to points being made in this rapid fire yet good humoured exchanged, but I can’t resist picking apart the archbishops comments.

OK – moral code first – belief in God and by association (in the context of the archbishop of Canterbury) the Christian Scripture  creates a moral code which says: Leviticus 20:13 Execute Homosexuals. Or perhaps you care to read about the bible’s view of slavery?

Then of course there is the fact that belief in Santa, whilst it lasts, is in itself a moral code: “Be good and Santa will bring you gifts and be naughty and you’ll get a bag of cinders.” This type of morality is exactly the same as the bribe offered by Christianity, be good an you’ll receive eternal bliss in heaven as a reward.

The Santa Myth actually teaches kids the fundamental moral lesson: “Be nice to other people and other people will be nice to you.” The rewards promised by the Santa Myth for being nice are real, kids do get gifts, the only deception in this process is who actually delivers the presents. This is much more tangible and easier for children to understand than the complexities of eternal salvation.

Point 2) Belief in Santa does not generate art? Has the archbishop received a Christmas card this year? Perhaps I’ll send him one of my Santa and Rudolf collection. Santa has created a plethora of art, in fact most kids would rather draw Santa and his reindeer than the nativity. Fact: the church has created so much art because until the 17th Century, outside of the monarchy and government, it was the only organisation with enough money to be able to afford to commission art.

And Santa doesn’t generate imagination. How many children reveal in the myth of Santa each year? Is that not fuelling their imagination? Perhaps not by the archbishops measure but equally does the church really fuel imagination? Lets be honest compared to Science, Christianity does not fuel the imagination, because it pretends to have all the answers to the universal questions of creation and morality. It tells us what to think, not to imagine or test answers for ourselves.

Gervais closes with an absolute masterpiece “I think God’s biggest mistake was giving me free will” – The Archbishop of Canterbury can only concede laughingly, that he thinks most theologians would agree. This is an article in itself, but one can’t help but think that it was decidedly inefficient for an omnipotent creator god who wanted to be worshipped and have his moral code followed, to grant humanity free will. Its like warning your children of the dangers of fire before leaving them to play with a box of matches.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7142920.stm

It would seem cruel to suggest this guy brought it upon himself, but one can’t help but think that if he hadn’t been such a deluded self-publicist, that these ignorant, greedy, deluded bastards wouldn’t have hacked off his leg.

Christians can probably easily scoff at such self-delusion until they remember Jesus professed to have healing powers… Imagine if Chirst had been kidnapped by a colony of lepers just so they could stand in his shadow! What if they carved him up so they each keep a piece for shade? Ugh… the crucifixion now seems tame.

I mention this not to outwardly offend, but instead to remind my Christian readers that their beliefs are not so far removed from the man who professed to have a holy leg. Its a matter of which man you choose to identify as holy. Many Christians like to mock such a deluded notion as a “holy leg” whilst conveniently forgetting that the only difference between their beliefs in Christ’s healing power and that of a modern day mystic is 2,000 years.

I’d encourage readers to read the debate for themselves, but it amazes me that someone would so badly miss the obvious, namely that box office receipts have more to do with how well known a story is, which big names are behind he production and how well the film is promoted.

Furthermore the writer is  seemingly obviously to how highly selective he is being about the facts he uses to support his argument. Citing high grossing “Christian films” yet wholly ignoring the box office takings of films like “Harry Potter” (which has a harmless edge of occultism to it) or even films which actively kick the Christian Church like “The Da Vinci Code” which was the second highest grossing film of 2006 after Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith.

The argument has no merit either way, neither for Christianity nor for Atheism, its goods stories which sell cinema tickets. I mention this as noteworthy, because the debate is symptomatic of the “double-think” employed by those of religious persuasion and highlights how they will cling to just about anything to support their beliefs.

So can an Atheist be a Cultural Christian or is it somewhat hypocritical?

I can only answer from my personal standpoint. I was raised as a Christian (Church of England Anglican to be exact.) I went to a church school and my mum took me to church and sunday school every week. I later attended a Catholic Boarding School, so my upbringing was pretty religious by most standards. Yet as an Atheist I do not feel comfortable singing carols, in fact I point blank refuse to participate in any act of religious worship.

This probably has something to do with attempts by my Catholic boarding school masters to force me to participate in religious worship. My expulsion from the school was actually discussed because I refused to take part in evening prayers. But this attempted repression of my true beliefs is not the only reason I feel uncomfortable. To me it would feel somewhat hypocritical to advocate atheism yet join in with the Christian fanfare when it suits.

At this time of year it begs the question, do I celebrate Christmas?

Well given my last statement it may surprise you to learn that I do celebrate Christmas, however I do so in a very secular way. But lets not pretend that Christmas is a Christian cultural tradition, there have been mid-winter festivals celebrated since pagan times, so the cultural significance of a feast on or around the 25th of December pre-date Christianity.

Furthermore, its widely accepted that Christ’s birthday was not the 25th of December. The early Church chose this date and concocted the Christmas celebration in order to entice pagan Romans to convert to Christianity without losing their own winter celebrations.

So if Christianity can monopolise another faith’s traditional celebration for its own purpose, I see no problem in doing the same.

After all, at least once a year I like to give friends and relatives a small gift to let them know how much I care about them. I choose Christmas to do this mostly because I find it easier to remember one day of the year than dozens of different birthdays.

I don’t believe this makes me a cultural Christian, no more than it makes Christians cultural pagans. However, I beg to differ with Professor Dawkins, but for me, joining a carol service steps over a line towards religious worship I’m not prepared to cross.

The use of the term “Christianophobia” entertains me somewhat, after all it means “scared of Christians”, the Christian Church lost its ability to scare people after the Inquisition ended and we stopped burning people at the stake! But it comes as no surprise. At this time of year, in the run into Christmas, there is almost always some complaint that our Christian Heritage is being undermined. Each year fewer schools put on Nativity plays and more councils either refuse to fund “Christmas” lights or stupidly rename them “winter lights” to avoid offending other faiths.

Whilst the right-wing press and the Conservative party like to seize on this as further examples of the marginalisation of Christianity and “PC gone mad”, very few people actually recognise the true issues at stake here.

The real issue is one of religious equality, under British law religious discrimination is against the law, this means all faiths must be treated equally. Now it fundamentally goes against the notion of religious equality if one faith is promoted or funded by the state ahead of another. So it follows that if you fund Christmas lights then you should fund Diwali lights for the Hindu festival, it then follows you should fund Islamic festivals, Jewish festivals, Sikh festivals even Pagan or Satanic festivals.

No council in Britain can afford to fund religious festivals for all possible faiths, therefore its impossible for them to be even handed. The only logical solution is for them to fund no religious festivals, absolute secularism and no state sponsorship of religion, just like in the US.

As for councils who rename “Christmas Lights”, “Winter lights” this isn’t “PC Gone Mad” its little more than thinly cloaked religious prejudice, diverting tax-payers money to celebrate a Christian festival just under another name.

All state sponsorship of religion must end in Britain, particularly in schools, where it amounts to little more than indoctrination of young impressionable minds. (Tell a five year old that God passes judgement who’s being naughty and nice when you die and they believe you, just like they believe in Santa. Except as millions of adults still perpetuate the God myth into adulthood, religion becomes a belief much harder to grow out of than Santa Claus.)

Christianity cannot expect continued privilege just because it lays claim to being the largest cultural group or has history and tradition on its side. Today in Britain 53% of people identify themselves as Christians (Tearfund 2007) down from 72% in the last census (2001). In spite of this narrow majority of the population identifying themselves as Christian, 66% have no contact with religion and never attend religious worship. So practising Christians are a cultural minority, not that this should even matter in an age of religious equality, majority or minority, each should have equal treatment.

Fundamentally anyone who claims that Christianity should have special privilege because its the largest faith or is the historical traditional faith, is someone who does not believe that other faiths should enjoy equal treatment.

Whilst I’m on this rant we should also remove the 26 Lords Spiritual (Senior Clergymen of the Church of England) form the House of Lords. Whether or not you agree that the church has no place in a modern secular democracy. It certainly isn’t fair that the Church of England is the only faith specifically represented in the UK parliament.

The only answer is US style constitutional secularism. Its always surprised me that Britain has a population naturally more inclined to secularism than the US, yet has a governmental system which due to historic accident favours Christianity.

There will be ill-thought out counters from religious groups which claim that secularism favours Atheists, but this is flawed thinking. Secularism favours no faith or belief system and it doesn’t mean that Christians can no-longer enjoy Christmas lights or Nativity plays, only that these must be sponsored (ie: paid for and organised) by the church. No great hardship when you consider the Church of England alone has an annual income approaching £900 million. If they have a bit of a whip around in Rome then I’m sure that could pay for a few billion fairy lights.

Desmond Tutu is clearly a moderate who rightly points out that the church shoud be focussing on the real evils of this world such as HIV / AIDS and global conflicts and not be so wrapped up in human sexuality. Whilst I agree with him that someone’s sexuality shouldn’t be a barrier to them pursuing their live goals. The archibishop’s stance puts him clearly at odds with the scripture.

Leviticus 20:13 clearly forbids homosexuality and proscribes the punishment of death:

“If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.”
- King James Version

“And if a man has sex relations with a man, the two of them have done a disgusting thing: let them be put to death; their blood will be on them.”
- Bible in Basic English

Few biblical scholars disagree with the direct interpretation of this passage, so are moderates within the Anglican Church going out on a limb here? Are the perhaps picking and choosing the parts of the bible they agree with and ignoring the ones they don’t?

If they are then they are clearly setting the bible aside and defining their own morality. I have no problem with this in fact I applaud it. And if archbishops can define their own morality in contradiction to the scriptures then it offers clear proof that religion is not required to ensure we lead moral lives. We can behave perfectly ethically without faith, so religion once again finds itself surplus to human requirements.

To be honest I think most readers would agree it would be wholly immoral to follow the teachings of the bible as far as Leviticus 20:13 is concerned. Murdering homosexuals is clearly not the path of righteousness, yet the bible actively encourages it.

Now granted, no-one in the Anglican Church is actually calling for people to go out and kill homosexuals, not even those who want to bar homosexuals from the clergy. However the Anglican Church will never be able to shed its homophobic attitude whilst the faith remains based on a book with such vile homophobic sentiments.

Seemingly clerics in Sudan have stirred what was little more than a cultural faux-pas into a major diplomatic incident. Under Islam it is considered blasphemous to create an icon of the prophet Mohammed or depict him in any way, even so much as to draw him.

Not that this is what Gillian Gibbons did, no far from it. She simply asked the children to vote on a name for the class teddy bear, a toy that the children would have been able to take home at weekends and use for show and tell. The children picked the name Mohammed. In fact one boy in the class said he’d voted for the name Mohammed because he too was called Mohammed! So what started as an honest attempt to involve children in a democratic process ended in an innocent woman’s incarceration and all for what?

A ridiculous religious sensibility over a name! Sure there is a cultural misunderstanding here, most Brits would never dream of naming their child Jesus, yet its a very common name in Spain (pronounced He-zus), but isn’t it even more surprising that there exists a law which prevents people offending religious sensibilities even unintentionally?

It strikes me as a sad testament to the insecurity of religious beliefs if the have to legislate against people causing religious offence. Blasphemy laws seemingly exist to protect believers from getting upset, or to give them a justification for getting upset. After all, let not pretend that ‘god’ really needs any kind of protection us mere mortals, if he exists then he’s gonna be thick skinned.

To illustrate just how ludricous this is, if during a heated confrontation someone insults my mother, that may be seen in my defence as sufficient provocation for me to throw the first punch. But few would agree this is a proportionate response, or one which should be held up as a shinning example of how to respond to an insult. Fewer still would agree that the offender should be locked up for a slur on my mum.

Yet transpose this to religion an people are bating for blood.

All this over a bear called Mohammed.

“Imagine there’s no heaven”, is the opening line of John Lennon’s most iconic song Imagine. It is a song about a wish for world peace an central to this song is Lennon’s clear understanding that religion ruins everything. A strong sentiment and one not instantly considered when you first hear the song, but read the lyrics.

The first verse makes the point that if people didn’t believe in heaven, then they’d live for today. There would no self-repression, people would be free to be themselves and not cajoled into being part of the conformist flock. We are taught to conform to religious teachings, to be pious and self-sacrificing in this life and earn ourselves eternal bliss in the next. It strikes me as a deep insult to human nature that religion thinks we need to be bribed with a promise of eternal bliss just to keep us doing the right thing. I’d say its a pretty shallow person who is only being nice to others because there’s something in it for him. Religion doesn’t promote selflessness it promotes self interest by the biggest bribe in history. Heaven.

In the second verse Lennon very quickly moves to associate religion with wars between nations and within them. This is unquestionably accurate, look around the world at the flashpoints since World War two. The Israeli Lebanon Conflict (60 years of religious strife), Northern Ireland (30 years of ‘troubles’), the insurgency in Iraq, the genocide in Bosnia and the later war in Kosovo, just five examples where religious beliefs have led to war in recent times. What’s more its always been this way, going back through history, the bible and the Qur’an even proudly document religious wars. Since man has had religion he has had war.

So imagine there’s no heaven and no religion too. Its not such a scary though, at least you would know that when someone is being nice to you, its because they are genuinely acting selflessly. And the next war you find your nation caught up in will hopefully be over something slightly more important than some religious schism.