Of kooks and religious Brits

"What rankles is the idea that even to have brought up faith would have been to have invited a "calamitous" reaction. That strikes me as odd, and unpleasant."

Aren't we lucky that it is odd an unpleasant.

Maybe the British reaction has to do with British history, which includes massive religious persecutions by those in political power. Citizens imprisoned, burned, beheaded, etc. Not just one time or by one side of the Catholic/Protestant argument.

Who instituted an ugly "war on Christmas" centuries ago? Puritan Oliver Cromwell, who wanted to rid the land of "pagan" (read: Catholic) influences and forbade public celebration of the holiday. He ordered shops to stay open Christmas Day and punishments for singing carols.

Europeans have longer historical memories - having longer national histories - than Americans. Let the Brits run their politics in accordance with the sensibilities of their culture and history. They came to some peace in the land by concluding that politics should be non-religious. We wouldn't want the US to run according to British norms. We shouldn't expect them to run according to ours.

I don't know whether the not 'doing God' policy comes more from British history (although religion and politics have a long and mostly dishonourable history in the UK) or from British reserve. We're loosening up, but there's a wide streak of reserve and privacy in the British character. Religion virtually defines private to the average Brit. We're aware that there are religious people and that's fine as long as it's between consenting adults and they don't do it out in public where everyone has to watch. I'm not being completely facetious here. Kate Fox, in her book, Watching the English says that we accept people being sincere, but not earnest. Get too close to personal matters in conversation and you'll have people backing away. I wouldn't expect my neighbour to start talking to me about his faith, so why would I want a politician to?

To give an example, on her first Conservative election victory Margaret Thatcher quoted the Francis of Assisi prayer 'where there is discord let us sow peace'. The entire country squirmed in embarassment. She took the hint and was never that overtly religious in public again.

And anyway, we all know that the realities of politics mean that faith principles are going to be compromised, so why make a big song and dance about them in the first place?

I feel torn about this whole area.

I would kind of like politicians to be more open about the religious or irreligious backings to their policies. I kind of like the whole idea of people having hinterlands. I hate that "Don't do God" thing about Blair.

One point is that in England (but not the rest of the UK), Anglicanism often was, and sometimes still is, associated with respectability and conventional morality, and not seen as overtly religious. Other forms of Christianity are seen as more or less dodgy. Homegrown Nonconformism is seen as bigoted, uncultured and lower-class. Continental Catholicism is seen as dodgy and fascist-leaning, whereas the Irish version is seen as like Nonconformism but worse. Modern US-type evangelicalism is seen as tacky, commercial and stupid. Therefore, Anglicans don't feel a need to play up their religion, and members of other churches are nervous about doing so.

However, I don't really think that any country gets the balance right. I don't like the look of the USA, where it's impossible for an atheist (or pagan or Buddhist, etc.) to get far in politics. Presumably this just means that there are a lot of clever atheist liars in Senate and Congress. France is nearly the opposite, where a religious politician has to actively conceal his/her faith in order to be acceptable. In some Catholic countries, the Church has a pretty creepy relationship with the state. The countries most like England in this respect are the Netherlands and Scandinavia, which, surprise, surprise, are the other places with semi-moribund Protestant state churches.