A Christian at work?

[chrishansenhome]

In the UK there has recently been a flurry of interest in the Rt Rev'd and Rt Hon. Lord Carey of Clifton, PC's new initiative to combat the "bullying" of Christians at work and in society. The poster-person for this is a person who was forbidden to wear a neckchain with a cross on it at work (she's a nurse). Another person who worked for British Airways was sacked for refusing to remove a neckchain with a cross when on duty. According to Carey (the former Archbishop of Canterbury), along with such usual suspects as the Rt Rev'd Michael Nazir-Ali, the former Bishop of Rochester and the Rt Rev'd Peter Forster, the Bishop of Chester, this amounts to bullying of Christians in the workplace. Some would go so far as to defend the registrar in Islington who was sacked for refusing to conduct civil partnerships and the marriage counselor for Relate who could not bring himself to counsel same-sex couples in need of relationship counseling. (I apologise for using links to the Daily Mail, in which I would normally not even wrap fish.)

Now the British examples are relatively benign, in that very British way where we are enormously polite to each other in public. The alleged bullying or persecution of Christians seems, to me, to be a last-ditch attempt by those who have traditionally run things in the United Kingdom to preserve their special status and keep the right to discriminate for themselves, while denying that right to everyone else. Imagine the outcry if a Wiccan registrar refused to register the wedding of a devout Christian couple because of their attitudes towards Wiccans.

In any case, were the Rt Rev'd Lord Carey to win out, I wonder if this news item would be the result, translated to England. Would HWMBO and I be the targets of radical and violent Evangelical proselytising at home after having solemnised our civil partnership at Southwark registry office?

Comments

Re: oh-poor-christian-me

[chrishansenhome.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't defend the C of E against bigotry charges or even anti-LGBT-discrimination charges, as they are demonstrably so (as you say). Luckily Carey is only one of a few voices crying about this, and our society yawns whenever religious subjects come up in the news.

If, as I expect, Nick Baines is the next ABC, then we'll see quite a turnaround in this situation, as he is a skilled communicator who seems to have truly Christian attitudes about LGBTs (and lots of other people and situations as well).