The Reform party’s candidate in the Makerfield by-election is misleading voters to whip up anti-Muslim feelings. He is misleading voters while claiming to defend Christianity.

Robert Kenyon, who is hoping to beat Labour’s Andy Burnham on 18^th June, posted a picture of himself on social media on Thursday (29^th May) outside a building in the constituency. Alongside the image, he wrote:

“St Mary’s Church in Ince once served the people of Makerfield. Now it’s a mosque.

“Our Christian heritage is being erased. Reform UK will ban the conversion of churches and protect Britain’s traditions.”

At best, Kenyon has failed to check basic facts about an important issue before commenting on it publicly. At worst, he has wilfully misled voters.

Some fairly basic research reveals that the building in question stopped being used by St Mary’s Church some years ago.

It is not and never has been a mosque. It is a building for the community that hosts a food bank and includes a prayer room used by Muslims. The food bank is open to local people of all faiths and none.

The Reform party – and other far-right groups – have recently been whipping up fears of churches being turned into mosques. The number of occasions on which this has happened in reality are tiny.

Yet by pushing the “churches-into-mosques” narrative, the far-right are fuelling the narrative that Islam is threatening and replacing Christianity. This of course is a thinly veiled way of suggesting that people of colour are a threat to white people.

Perhaps the nastiest part of Kenyon’s tweet is the framing of the first sentence:

“St Mary’s Church in Ince once served the people of Makerfield. Now it’s a mosque.”

St Mary’s Church used to serve the people of Makerfield says Kenyon. He then says, “Now it’s a mosque”.

Thus being a mosque is presented not simply as the opposite of being a church but as the opposite of serving the community.

This is nonsense. Many mosques, like many churches, serve their local communities, including people of other faiths and no faith. Of course, there are other mosques and churches that do less for their communities. But it is utter nonsense to claim that a church will serve the community but a mosque won’t.

As a Christian, I am disgusted by Reform UK’s misuse of Christianity. I know that many other Christians do too, although church leaders are often far too slow to speak out against the way that Reform UK – and others – are speaking about such things.

Reform UK and much of the rest of the far-right seem to think that Christianity is a synonym for Britishness, or at least white Britishness, and a very narrow form of white Britishness at that.

It is not. Following Jesus is at odds with Reform UK’s vicious hostility to refugees, their candidates’ refusal to repent of the harm they have caused, the demonisation of minorities and Kenyon’s vicious misogyny.

Being a Christian is not about standing in front of a community building that includes a Muslim prayer room and telling lies about it.