Category Archives: Active nonviolence

Justice and revolution at Greenbelt

Posted on by symonhill

I’m already enjoying the Greenbelt festival in Cheltenham, which began yesterday afternoon. If you’re not familiar with, it’s a Christian festival with an emphasis on social and political engagement as well as spirituallity, worship, music and arts. I go every year and, while I’m aware that Greenbelt is not without its faults, I still love it.

I’m honoured to say that I’ve been asked to speak this year. If you’re here and would like to know the details, they’re as follows:

Saturday, 3.30pm, Centaur: Joining a light-hearted Battle of the Visions debate with Jim Wallis and Sara Kewly Hyde. We’ll be discussing what our influence would be if we ran the country (an unlikely possibility but I live in I hope!). I’ll be arguing for “justice”, Jim for “faith” and Sara for “arts”.

Sunday, 3.30pm, Jenin: I’ll be talking about my new book, Digital Revolutions: Activism in the internet age, and answering questions

Sunday, 5.30pm, G-Books: Signing copies of my books and happily talking about them to anyone who would like to ask more.

See you there!

When silence is evil: praying and protesting against the arms fair

Posted on by symonhill

At the beginning of September, some of the world’s most oppressive regimes will be sending representatives to London. They will be there to meet arms dealers, ready to profit from war and oppression.

Their meetings will not be illegal. They will be actively encouraged by the Prime Minister, the Defence Secretary and the Mayor of London.

The London arms fair, which runs from 10th-13th September, marks a key date in the calendar of arms-dealing corporations such as BAE Systems and Lockheed Martin. It regularly welcomes oppressive and aggressive regimes such as Saudia Arabia, Colombia, Sri Lanka, Israel and Bahrain.

Christians from across the UK and beyond will join with people of many religions and none to take nonviolent action against the arms fair. An important date is 8th September, the Sunday before the fair, which will be Stop the Arms Trade Day of Prayer.

The London arms fair is one of the largest in the world. It is subsidised by taxpayers’ money and the regimes that turn up are invited by the UK government. But it is euphemistically entitled Defence & Security Equipment International (DSEi). This is misleading. The arms trade is not about defence and security.

David Cameron and his allies like to promote the arms industry by arguing that democratic countries have a right to defend themselves. But there are no arms companies that sell weapons only to democracies to use for self-defence.

Arms trade apologists also speak of the number of British jobs that arms exports supposedly provide. This argument was also central to supporters of the slave trade over 200 years ago. Not only are the figures generally exaggerated, but arms companies have themselves been rapidly moving jobs out of the UK in recent years. Engineering skills could be put to better use through government investment in socially useful projects such as renewable energy.

The sins of war and economic injustice are brought together in a trade that ensures that war is profitable for a few. Every UK minister who signs off on an arms deal to a dictator is weakening anything the government might say in defence of human rights. Every pound spent on bombs and bullets is a pound less for vaccines and school books. The arms trade kills before a gun has been fired or an aeroplane left the ground. And it thrives on the lie that violence is the answer to conflict.

As Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, “Silence in the face of evil is itself evil.” Let’s speak up, pray and protest in the week beginning on Sunday 8th September.

We will pray – at church, at home, in the street, outside the arms fair. We will protest – in our communities, in universities, at the headquarters of local arms firms and of course at the arms fair. We will speak out – to our friends, our neighbours, our colleagues, our politicians, the media and the arms dealers.

Prayer and action cannot be separated. Let’s pray that we will speak out sincerely, in love and not in hate, acknowledging our own collusion with injustice, celebrating what’s already been achieved and seeking transformation for ourselves, others and society. May God guide us to take effective and radical action so that we are – as Jesus put it – “wise as serpents and innocent as doves”.

The prayers and actions will continue throughout the week of DSEi and beyond.

There are many people resisting DSEi. Most of the groups involved, including the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT), have a firm commitment to active nonviolence.

Of course, we are all different. We can speak out in different ways. Not everyone can, or should, travel to the arms fair to pray and protest in person. Below are a few suggested actions. Your choice may depend on your time, personality or other considerations. Please feel free to suggest others.

* Ask your church if they will mark the Day of Prayer. They can include the arms fair and the protests in their prayers of intercession – or go further and have a special service or themed sermon. CAAT’s Christian Network have produced some suggested resources.

* Pray for all those involved in the arms fair and all those resisting it.

* Tell at least one friend or colleague about the arms fair and why you’re against it. You can find out more about DSEi here.

* Find out whether there will be any actions in your local area at the time of the arms fair. If not, how about organising one?

* Write to your local paper, national paper or Christian publication about the arms fair. You can find out more about DSEi here.

* Write to your MP, MEP, MSP or AM, challenging him/her to oppose the arms fair in public.

* Come along to DSEi. There will be a massive protest on Sunday 8th September, two days before the arms fair begins. A strong Christian presence, in solidarity with people of other religions and none, will be great.

* Join in the multifaith vigil at the arms fair on the evening of Monday 9th September.

* Read more at the Campaign Against Arms Trade, the Stop the Arms Fair coalition or Christianity Uncut.

The power of love, the power of justice, the power of the crucified God is a subtler, stranger but ultimately stronger power than the power of money, markets and military might. As the apostle Paul said, God’s power is made perfect in weakness.

Focused on that power, let’s pray and protest against the arms fair. The arms industry, like all sinful structures, will one day be defeated. This is an important step along the way.

———–

The above article formed my latest column on the website of the Ekklesia thinktank.

Unexpected item in bagging area

Posted on by symonhill

If anyone’s looking round for a symbol of modern capitalism, I can think of nothing better to suggest than self-service checkout machines. With their robotic pseudo-friendliness and meaningless recorded “thank you”, they sum up a society in which people exist simply as consumers for the benefit of faceless corporations. Allowing large companies to lay off staff, they require customers to do a job for which they are not paid with tools that do not work.

Both the absurdity and inhumanity of self-service checkouts are regularly on display at WH Smith’s in Euston station. Usually, a harassed-looking member of staff is spending much of the time helping customers to use the machines. But – presumably because of the machines’ existence – the staff member has to work there on his or her own. If Smith’s got rid of the machines, and employed more staff, the workers would be less stressed and the customers would be served more quickly.

The term “Luddite” has come to mean someone who is against technology, but this is unfair. When the Luddites were active two hundred years ago, they campaigned only against the use of technology for purposes that were socially and economically harmful. Let’s take our inspiration from them. Unlike them, we don’t all need to risk imprisonment and death. But we can refuse to use self-service checkout machines.

Not the G8 – digital activism in Leeds

Posted on by symonhill

I am on a train that’s just pulled out of Leeds, following a great day at ‘Not the G8’, a conference run by the World Development Movement (WDM).

I was there because WDM invited me to speak at a session on digital activism. But I’m really glad they did, because the whole event was very good and I learnt a lot.

The day included a really helpful talk about food sovereignty by the writer Raj Patel. I have realised recently that WDM are very good at drawing the links between different issues – poverty, the environment, banking. In particular, they make clear that environmentalism is not simply a lifestyle choice for the middle class in the West but is an urgent concern for anyone who wants to tackle poverty.

I was asked to give a talk based partly on my new book, Digital Revolutions: Activism in the internet age. As usual, I Iearnt at least as much from the participants as they did from me.

At these sort of events, I fear that the attenders will expect me to be some sort of technological whizzkid, with answers to all sorts of questions about computer use. Anyone who’s watched me struggle to get my DVD player working will know that I am not that person. My book is not a book about technology; it’s a book about activism. It looks at the ways in which the internet has been used for activism in recent years.

I am not a net utopian – technology won’t save the world. Nor am I someone who dismisses the usefulness of the internet. Digital activism is an important part of many campaigns. It can also draw people into other forms of resistance. But digital activism is almost never sufficient on its own. When talking today, I focussed on examples of campaigns that have effectively combined online and offline activism. Examples include:

  • Tax justice campaigners who petitioned Olympic sponsors online to give up their tax exemptions at the Olympic Park. Several companies quickly agreed, probably because they feared physical occupations – which had greeted many tax-dodging stores the previous year.
  • Boycott Workfare, who have persuaded dozens of companies and charities in the UK to withdraw from workfare schemes. Some withdrew after physical protests and economic pressure. Others withdrew when bombarded with tweets and faced with humiliation online.
  • Disabled activists in York, who found a provision that required the City Council to debate any petition with over 1,000 signatures from York residents. Their petition and the council debate meant that cuts to local disability services became the lead news item on BBC Radio York – making many more people aware of them.
  • Lovers of peace in Israel and Iran, who set up “Israel Loves Iran” and “Iran Loves Israel”, two Facebook pages that built understanding across the divide and allowed Israeli and Iranian citizens to tell both their governments that they were “not ready to die in your war”.
  • Minority language activists as far apart as Wales, east Africa, Australia and south Asia, who use web-based resources to promote linguistic diversity and the rights of their communities.
  • The paradox of the Occupy movement, which combined the modern image of web-based communication with the old-fashioned image of debates in public squares. Both of them, at their best, are far more inclusive than mainstream political processes.

I was delighted that so many people got stuck into discussion about these issues. As my book has not long been published, this was on the second time that I’ve given a talk based around it. I will be doing so again at the Greenbelt festival in August. However, I’m very open to speaking with other groups. If you’re interested you’re welcome to email me at symonhill@gmail.com. I would love to hear from you!

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My book, Digital Revolutions: Activism in the internet age, can be bought from the publisher, New Internationalist, by clicking here. It costs £9.99 (0r $16.95 in the US). 

We must condemn murder – in both Woolwich and Afghanistan

Posted on by symonhill

In a bitter coincidence of timing, Barack Obama announced the scaling down of drone operations by the US government just after the horrific murder of an unarmed man on the streets of Woolwich this week.

It remains to be seen how real or effective Obama’s new policy will be. His assertion that drones should not be used to kill civilians is absurd. Drones have killed civilians time and again. They cannot be used in a way that avoids civilian death. Time and again, claims about the targeting ability of new weapons prove to be untrue.

Nor does the British government plan to cut back on drones. Quite the reverse. They are now operating drones directly from the UK. Previously, UK drones were operated by RAF staff in the US.

Cameron, Clegg and their colleagues have rightly condemned the murder of Lee Rigby in Woolwich. Neither the fact that Rigby was a soldier, nor any policy of the UK government, can justify this vicious attack. Almost everyone, including all the major Muslim organisations in the UK, has condemned the killing.

Many have also condemned the predictable response of the EDL, BNP and other far-right thugs. There have been several attacks on mosques, as well as verbal and physical abuse of Muslims, since the Woolwich murder. Two years ago, when Anders Brevik claimed that Christianity had motivated his murder of 77 people in Norway, there were no attacks on churches. Today, the organisation Faith Matters reported that they had chronicled 150 incidents of anti-Muslim abuse or violence since Wednesday. 

This is just the sort of conflict that violent Islamic fundamentalists wish to promote. Islamic fundamentalists and the British far-right need each other. Attacks by one provoke attacks from the other, perpetuating senseless violence, usually against people who are neither fascist nor fundamentalist. Each group pretends that the other is representative of what they are fighting – be it Islam or western society. Hatred feeds off hatred.

In the midst of this horror, we are faced with the image of Ingrid Loyau-Kennett, the woman who calmly spoke with the killers, risking her own life but possibly preventing further bloodshed. I am sure that many people have this week been challenged by her inspiring example.

Unfortunately, some of those who praise don’t follow through on the example of active nonviolence that her behaviour represents. Although mainstream politicians condemn the anti-Muslim violence, few of them are doing so as loudly as they are speaking about Woolwich. Worse still, there are many murders that they do not condemn at all. The drones that rain down death on innocent Afghan civilians are no more justified than a murder with a meat cleaver in Woolwich.

There are those who say that this is not the time to talk about the UK government’s foreign policy. But how can there be a time when it is not right to talk about the killing of innocent people? We would all be disgusted if someone told Lee Rigby’s family not to talk about his death. Are we prepared to tell the mother of a child killed in Afghanistan that this is not the right time to be talking about it?

This is precisely the time to be talking about it. Indeed, if we are to be consistent and act with integrity, then we must talk about it. The Woolwich murderers appeared to believe that the killings in Afghanistan and elsewhere justified a killing in London. They do not. Nor does Rigby’s killing justify attacks on Muslims in Britain. And none of these events make it acceptable for people on any side to be killing innocent people on the other side of the world.

This week’s newspapers have been full of pictures of Michael Adebolajo, his hands covered in blood. The hands of David Cameron and Barack Obama may look a lot cleaner. This is only because they kill at a distance. When it comes to responsibility for death, Cameron and Obama are up to the waist in blood. If we are to have integrity as we condemn the vicious murder of Lee Rigby, we must be prepared to say so.

My eviction from an arms dealers’ AGM

Posted on by symonhill

I’ve just returned from the annual general meeting of BAE Systems, one of the world’s largest arms companies. I was forcibly carried out of the building after challenging the board on BAE’s arms sales to the brutal regimes of Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

On 364 days of every year, BAE’s bosses are able to live in a world in which they are rarely challenged on the reality of their deadly business. But as a shareholder company, they are legally obliged to hold an AGM. They give the strong impression that they hate it. On this one day each year, power is confronted with truth.

BAE are so keen to avoid scrutiny that this year they moved the AGM from central London to Farnborough in Hampshire. Predictably, there were fewer journalists in attendance than usual. But if BAE had been hoping that their critics would be deterred by the venue, they were disappointed. The Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) hired a coach to take people from London, and other CAAT supporters joined us on site. There were at least as many as usually turn up when the AGM’s in London.

Like many other opponents of the arms trade, I own a single share in BAE so that I am legally allowed to attend the AGM and question the board (I make no profit from this share; the eleven pence I made from it last year was donated to CAAT).

The meeting began with a presentation by Dick Olver, chair of BAE. He sought to give life to a fantasy world, in which BAE are “global leaders” when it comes to “ethical behaviour”. Such absurd claims from a man who sells weapons to tyrants were interspersed with meaningless corporate jargon about “total performance” and “going forwards”.

Olver was jeered as he claimed that BAE make the world “a better place and a safer place”. Try telling that to the peaceful pro-democracy campaigners in Bahrain, who have been attacked and killed by their own government with BAE’s weapons. Of course, Olver would rather we didn’t think about BAE’s victims.

We are all responsible for what goes on in the world. When Jesus was asked “Who is my neighbour?” (Luke 10,29), he told a story about a man who saved a stranger from a different ethnic and religious group. This is a story that is meaningful to people of many religions and none. If I see someone being killed in front of me, I have a responsibility to do something about it. The fact that the killing in question is in Bahrain does not lessen my responsibility – especially when the weapons involved are manufactured and promoted on my own doorstep.

Of course, I am complicit. Of course, I do not do enough. Of course, like most people, I avoid uncomfortable truths. I do not claim to be less sinful than Dick Olver. Recognising this does not lessen my commitment to speaking out when truth and justice are distorted. It increases it.

Many of us began to challenge Olver as he talked, confronting his absurd fantasy not only with jeers but with comments about the reality of his business. When somebody criticised the “troublemakers” for their noise, I called out that the real troublemakers are those who sell weapons to dictators.

Despite ten years as head of one of the world’s most deadly companies, Olver still looks surprised when he is challenged. He has the expression of a disapproving headteacher and you could almost expect him to say “It’s your own time you’re wasting”. If only only Olver were a headteacher, he would be contributing to society instead of harming it.

He responded to the heckles by saying that he would answer “any questions” when the reports had finished. This being my seventh time at a BAE AGM, I knew very well that he would dodge most of them. He has many ways of doing this: talking about something else, aggressively criticising the questioner, waving an issue aside by saying it’s a matter for the government. He has a particular line in patronising older and female questioners while ignoring what they say.

So, like many others, I was not prepared to confine my questioning to the hour when Olver chooses to allow it. One hour a year is not enough for such a powerful person to be held to account. I had not gone to the meeting with the intention of getting thrown out. I have never been removed from the BAE AGM before. But I was not going to sit there and be ordered into silence by the chair of BAE Systems. I shouted out that we would continue to challenge him, as he is not being held accountable and is refusing to recognise BAE’s complicity in oppression in Bahrain and elsewhere.

Several shareholders tutted. There are those who are happy to arm oppressive regimes but who disapprove of interrupting the structure of a meeting. For some, it seems, morality is about order, not justice.

Dick Olver pointed at me and said “Remove that gentleman!”. Four security guards did so. They were suprisingly gentle, but resisted my attempts to engage them in conversation about BAE’s ethics. One of them, when I asked his views on selling arms to dictators, said “I don’t think it’s anything to do with me”. The others didn’t answer.

The security guards were verbally polite as they removed me, and I was (I trust) polite in return. One of them even went back to fetch my jacket. Protesters in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia and other recipients of BAE weapons are not so fortunate.

Twelve other people were also removed, and I understand that many challenging questions were asked, particularly about Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and corruption. Several people staged a singing protest and others were thrown out while seeking to present Dick Olver with an award as “Whitewasher of the Year”.

As the meeting was finished, Olver was heard to say to a colleague, “That was a lot worse than usual”.

This was Olver’s last AGM as chair. His successor has yet to be announced. Having failed to avoid scrutiny by running away to Farnborough, perhaps the board will host the next AGM on the Isle of Skye at three o’clock in the morning. If they do, we’ll be there.

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For more information on the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT), please see http://www.caat.org.uk.

My new book, Digital Revolutions: Activism in the internet age, can be ordered from the publisher, New Internationalist, by clicking here.

Charles flies to Saudi Arabia and ignores human rights

Posted on by symonhill

At a camp for Syrian refugees in Jordan yesterday, a visitor expressed his shock at what he saw. It was, he said, an “unbelievable and heartbreaking situation”. The visitor was Charles Windsor, commonly called the Prince of Wales. His wife, Camilla Parker-Bowles, praised the “strength of spirit” of the women refugees at the camp.

Today, Charles and Camilla visited Saudi Arabia for friendly meetings with Saudi princes. Charles did not say it was “heartbreaking” to see the suppression of political and religious freedom in Saudi Arabia. Camilla did not praise the “strength of spirit” of the Saudi women who challenge state misogyny by driving cars or travelling without a male companion (both of which are illegal). Neither of them said it was “unbelievable” that seven people had just been shot in public by firing squad after an unfair trial for theft.

Indeed, prior to the visit, their spokesperson ruled out any idea of them even mentioning human rights, torture or political prisoners to their royal Saudi hosts.

Once again, I am sickened by the hypocrisy of the British establishment when it comes to Saudi Arabia. It is one of the most vicious tyrannies on Earth and yet Tory, Labour and LibDem ministers have all readily looked the other way for the sake of two industries that rely on UK-Saudi co-operation. They are the arms trade and the oil trade – two of the dirtiest, deadliest, most immoral businesses in the world.

British subservience to Saudi Arabia undermines every comment that any British minister or royal figure makes about human rights and democracy.

Tony Blair, seeking to justify the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, said he was worried by the treatment of women under the Taliban. The treatment of women in Saudi Arabia did not stop him intervening in a criminal investigation in 2006 to ensure that BAE’s Saudi arms deals would not be investigated for corruption.

In 2007, Gordon Brown welcomed Abdullah, the king of Saudi Arabia, on a state visit that saw them sharing a banquet at Buckingham Palace. Kim Howells, then a junior minister, spoke of the “shared values” between the two countries. Shortly beforehand, the Saudi regime had arrested a group of Catholics for peacefully worshipping in a family home.

In 2011, David Cameron condemned Assad’s brutal oppression in Syria. A few months earlier, the Bahraini regime had invited Saudi troops into their country to help them to suppress peaceful pro-democracy protests. They did so with armoured vehicles made by BAE in Newcastle.

And now Charles Windsor has joined in the hypocrisy. Attempts to plead that the royal family are “non-political” just won’t wash. Charles has made comments on all sorts of political issues, from education to the environment. His description of the situation in Syria as “unbelievable and heartbreaking” was political as well as accurate (it would certainly be seen as political if he said it about Saudi Arabia).

The very idea of being “non-political” is a moral and practical absurdity. Neutrality is literally impossible in a context of injustice. Those who respond to oppression by saying they are not taking sides are helping the oppression to continue and thus siding with the oppressor.

Such behaviour by British ministers and royals is nothing new. But Charles is also expected to be “supreme governor” of the Church of England some time fairly soon. This is another good reason for disestablishment. Leaders of churches should not be defending tyrants. 

Living activism (ten years after the Iraq march)

Posted on by symonhill

Ten years ago today, I joined millions of other people around the world in marching against the planned invasion of Iraq. This morning, I was effectively banned from my local branch of Costcutter. It’s been a strange decade.

My conflict with Costcutter began when the manager told me I should not pick up and look at the newspapers before choosing which one to buy. I nearly always buy one (and sometimes more than one) and always put the others back neatly. But I often look at them before making my decision.

The manager told me this is not allowed. I politely asked for the reason, and he was unable to give one. He resorted to repeating that it was not allowed without explaining why. I find legalism like this particularly frustrating. At one point, he suggested that all newspapers basically carry the same news – an alarmingly inaccurate statement.

The discussion went on for some time. He told me I was not welcome to buy newspapers there. I told him I would not be buying anything else there either.

Of course, resisting unreasonable rules in local shops is a very trivial issue compared to resisting the invasion of Iraq. The invasion led to at least 200,000 deaths (by conservative estimates). Ten years later, international NGOs rate Iraq towards the bottom of the world’s league tables when it comes to political freedom and other human rights. The worst fears of those of us who campaigned against the invasion have come to pass.

And yet, many people who marched against the war feel that they made no difference. For first-time activists, it was particularly disheartening. At the time, I had little doubt that Bush and Blair would push ahead with their vicious plans regardless of our action, although I believe that we may have made them more cautious about starting more wars immediately afterwards.

Unfortunately, after that march, the anti-war movement effectively tried to replicate it with more central London marches characterised by long dreary walks and endless repetitive speeches (OK, some were better than others). I made this point when interviewed by Ian Sinclair, author of a new book, The March That Shook Blair. I’m about to go to the book launch.

A few years later, activism took a different turn. Groups such as the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) combined direct action with media activism and court cases. The coalition’s cuts agenda was greeted by a rise in nonviolent direct action greater than I dared to hope for. Imaginative actions by UK Uncut and their allies saw tax-dodging shoot up the political agenda.

Marches are sometimes important, but they are rarely, if ever, enough in themselves. We need more diverse tactics, more effective tactics and a greater understanding of active nonviolence.  More importantly, we need to root activism in our daily lives.

I’m not suggesting that alternative lifestyles are a substitute for explicit political campaigning. Rather, I believe we should seek to resist injustice in everyday actions and choices. As Jesus of Nazareth put it, they who are faithful in small ways will be faithful in big ways.

Challenging Costcutter’s unfair rule about newspapers is of course a minor example, but I’m glad I did it. There are many (greater) injustices around me that I fail to challenge. And of course, we are all complicit in the unjust systems that we live under and sometimes benefit from.

But I believe we can aim to live out our values in such a way that our very existence is an act of rebellion. It is something to which I aspire. I have a long way to go.

Beware of prime ministers quoting the Bible

Posted on by symonhill

Beware of politicians quoting random Bible verses at Christmas. Earlier this week, on Christmas Eve, David Cameron said:

“The Gospel of John tells us that [Jesus] was life, and that his life was the light of all mankind, and that he came with grace, truth and love… Indeed, God’s word reminds us that Jesus was the Prince of Peace. With that in mind, I would like to pay particular tribute to our brave servicemen and women who are overseas helping bring safety and security to all of us at home.”

The Prime Minister’s words remind me less of the Bible and more of George Orwell’s 1984, in which the government declares that “war is peace”.

When the word “peace” appears in the Bible, it means much more than an absence of violence.

In English translations of the Bible, the word “peace” is usually a translation of “shalom” (Hebrew) or “eirene” (Greek). “Shalom” refers to far more than a lack of violence. It is about justice, healing, wholeness and the restoration of right relationships at personal, social and political levels. The meaning of “eirene” is contested, but when Jesus speaks of leaving “peace” with his followers, he is clearly talking about something more than the fact that they are not killing each other (a practice that didn’t develop amongst Jesus’ followers until a few centuries later).

There have been occasions on which UK troops have been used to contain or limit violence, although this in itself requires coercion and the threat of violence. Whether or not this is justified, it is certainly nothing to do with “peace” in the biblical sense.

However, recent use of troops by UK governments has gone way beyond this. The invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan have been acts of aggression that have done nothing to make the British people safer and have added to death and suffering in other parts of the world. The young men and women sent to their deaths by Cameron and Blair have been sacrificed in the name of values and powers that Jesus firmly rejected.

The notion that violence is the best, or ultimate, answer is contrary to Jesus’ active nonviolence. John’s Gospel, the book that Cameron quoted, records that Jesus’ last instruction to his disciples before his death was “put away your sword”. 

Equal marriage: We need campaigns, not court cases

Posted on by symonhill

I’m disappointed to see that a same-sex couple in Essex say that they plan to sue the government over the ban on same-sex weddings taking place within the Church of England.

My position may surprise some people, given my enthusiastic support for marriage equality. However, the government’s proposals for the legal recognition of same-sex marriage have not even passed the Commons yet, let alone the Lords. I suggest we should concentrate on trying to change the proposals before they reach the statute book. Suing the government at this stage implies that the bill has already become law.

I strongly believe that same-sex couples should have the same rights as mixed-sex couples. I also believe that no-one should be obliged to participate in or host an act of worship in which they do not believe. Therefore, I do not want to see any faith group forced to carry out same-sex marriages against their will.

The government’s proposals go further than this. They give the Church of England a special status and make it harder for pro-equality Anglicans to achieve change within their own denomination. Rather than have a system in which churches can “opt in”, I would rather they were able to “opt out”.

Certain anti-equality groups have been claiming for a long time that churches will be forced to host same-sex marriages against their will. For a long time, I have been asking them to name any group that believes this. They have been unable to do so. They have claimed that campaigners are planning legal actions – but not named any. It is significant that this action has been brought not by a campaign group but by an individual couple (who, incidentally, are wealthy enough to embark on legal action).

While I do not think the couple have chosen the right course, I can understand their anger. Also, I think it is vital to recognise that they are not demanding that a church should be forced to host a same-sex wedding against its will. They want to be married by a pro-equality priest in the church in which their children were baptised. They are practising Anglicans.

I want to see the Church of England treated the same in law as other religious groups. This is difficult when several Anglican leaders want the privileges of establishment (e.g. bishops in the Lords) without the obligations (e.g. conforming to equality laws). Disestablishment would make this whole issue a lot easier. However, even with establishment remaining, it should be possible for the law to allow each faith group, including the CofE, to make its own decision. I wish the CofE would allow individual congregations and clergy the freedom to follow their consciences. If they won’t, I recognise their right not to host marriages on an equal basis, however abhorrent I find this position.

The government’s proposals, by giving special status to the Church of England, are discriminatory. Their bill might be passed as it is; it might be improved by amendments; it might not pass at all. There are several good reasons to challenge the government’s proposals. But let’s do that on the streets, in the media and in Parliament. Let’s not imply we’ve lost already by going straight to the courts.