Anti-Christian Legislation Defeated by the House of Lords: Long Live the Aristocracy!

Last night the British House of Lords demonstrated why it deserves to exist as an institution separate from the House of Commons by defeating (by a vote of 216-178) the most outrageous provisions of the monstrous "Equality Bill," which would be more appropriately entitled "The Government Take Over of Churches and Secuarization Act." See the story in the Daily Telegraph here.

Gerald Warner on his blog at the Daily Telegraph site explains in a post entitled: "Equalities Bill: Church leaders defeat Government over gay staff"

"Last night’s defeat by the House of Lords of the aggressively anti-Christian provisions in Harriet Harman’s Equality Bill should not be allowed to gloss over the malevolent intent of the House of Commons in promoting this legislation. The impertinently intrusive provisions of the Bill demonstrated that the state has acquired pretensions far beyond its legitimate scope and urgently requires to be cut down to size.

The Bill attempted to force churches to employ people even if they do not lead lives consistent with the teachings of the Christian faith. On a narrow interpretation the Bill could even have compelled the Catholic Church to ordain women as priests. The Bill’s supporters want churches to employ homosexuals and transsexuals. The theology of the Catholic Church condemns homosexual practices as one of the Four Sins Crying to Heaven for Vengeance and, as with any other mortal sin, teaches that those who die unrepentant face damnation.

By what conceivable logic could that same Church be expected knowingly to employ people committed to such conduct? As Baroness O’Cathain asked in the Lords debate: “How would a rape crisis centre operate if it was forced to employ male counsellors? This is the state trying to tell people who they can and can’t employ.” That is the nub of the matter and it goes far beyond religious issues: the increasingly totalitarian tide of intrusive state control must be rolled back.

The early draft of the Harman Bill illustrated the infatuated self-conceit of its sponsors, by attempting to impose female ordination upon the Catholic Church. In Catholic theology the priest, during the Mass, acts in persona Christi at the moment of consecration; that is to say, he takes on the personality of Christ who, in his human nature, is male. The Church, as infallibly confirmed by John Paul II, does not possess the power to ordain women. Nor can that power be conferred on it by the House of Commons.

There is something comically pathetic about the pygmy Parliament on the Thames, now a wholly-owned subsidiary of Brussels, attempting to interfere in such spiritual matters. And look at who these people are who attempt to reconfigure the morality of Christian churches: MPs are seen as a bunch of thieves who have robbed the country blind. Many of them are leaving Parliament to avoid paying back illicit expenses or because they cannot live under a more regulated regime that imposes on them the financial morality commonplace in other institutions.

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It is not just Christians who are harassed by the control freakery of Parliament. It is a serious threat to democracy as we have known it. To paraphrase a famous parliamentary resolution of 1780, “the power of the Commons has increased, is increasing, and ought to be diminished”. Whether that diminution is implemented by a new Bill of Rights or some other device, our traditional liberties require that this encroaching tyranny be curtailed."

Warner is right and he does not overstate the case one iota by portraying it as an attack on Christianity by the Labor government. The sooner the election is held the sooner Britain can breath free again. More cheerful news today came from a Social Attitudes Study showing that the people of the UK (as opposed to their political masters) are shifting to the right. Janet Daley summarizes:

"The study shows that a majority of people now believe that the poor should take more responsibility for looking after themselves, and that taxation should not be increased – significantly, not even in order to raise spending on services such as health and education. Only one in five now think that unemployment benefits are too low (compared with nearly 54 per cent in 1994). Suppport for wealth redistribution even among Labour voters has dropped from two thirds to less than half. In other words, twelve years of Labour government have tested to destruction the idea that all social problems can be solved by government seizing a higher and higher proportion of people’s earnings either to fund state-run services or to provide income for those who are not working."

There is no doubt that the Leftist agenda has been given a good try over the past 13 years in the UK and it is clear now that NuLabor is an awful lot like old labor only with less morality and more hostility to Christianity. Now if Dave Cameron would only catch up to the people and start acting like a principled conservative, rather than a mere politician.

Hopefully, better days are ahead for the mother of Parliaments and the longsuffering British people. We need to pray for a revival of faith in Britain, which is the only hope for a country tormented by atheists and a paternalistic, bureaucratic, managerial state.