Faith Diary

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/uk/8069248.stm

Version 0 of 1.

By Robert Pigott Religious Affairs correspondent

Dr Rowan Williams and Dr John Sentamu have spoken against the BNP

Fifty years ago, a forthright call from the Archbishops of Canterbury and York to shun a particular political party would probably have caused even more of a stir than has their recent intervention against the BNP.

It might also have been likely to have more impact on the outcome of the vote.

Calculating the effect­­ of Rowan Williams' and John Sentamu's plea to voters to deny support to the BNP is all but impossible.

By raising the party's profile, some have speculated that they might actually have improved its performance.

Bishops - including Anglicans - have intervened directly in the electoral process before. A group of them held a rally in West Yorkshire in 2004 and said voting for the BNP would be "like spitting in the face of God".

Their current intervention prompts the question: can the Church - which might claim to act as a sort of public conscience - choose between political parties.

Core ideology

It would be almost unthinkable for the Church to tell people to vote for or against one of the main political parties, so how is the latest case different?

It has clearly decided that as far as the BNP is concerned, the political issues have strayed into the area of what is plain right and wrong.

Speaking for the Church's more than 100 bishops, the archbishops justified entering this risky territory by claiming that the BNP had a core ideology that was about sowing division in communities and hostility on the basis of race, creed and colour.

The definition of religious identity - in this case Jewish identity - has been a difficult and divisive issue in Israel more or less since it was founded

The Church's action seems all the more political given the production by some bishops of posters for clergy to put up in vicarages and church notice boards.

The archbishops' intervention was not criticised only by the BNP. The Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, said he didn't like the entanglement of church and state, and that telling people how to vote was not the way to beat the BNP.

The BNP's leader Nick Griffin said the Church had lost credibility by letting MPs with questionable expenses claims off the hook, and that it did not represent public opinion.

Christianity battle

One of the main reasons for the archbishops' statement was the BNP's recent positioning of itself as the chief protector of Christian interests in the UK.

It has used a poster bearing a quotation from the Bible and a picture of Jesus with the suggestion that he would vote for the party.

The Church has pointed out that the BNP has its own definition of Christianity - one that seems to centre heavily on preventing what the party calls "the Islamification of Britain".

When more than 70% of the population described themselves as Christian in the last census, a much smaller proportion is likely to have meant it as a sign of active churchgoing, or any other association with the Church.

A significant number probably meant the description in a rather more cultural sense, or as excluding any other religious group.

The Church fears that some of that group might be susceptible to the BNP's championing of Christianity especially at a time when they wish a plague on the houses of all the main parties.

Jewish marriages

The definition of religious identity - in this case Jewish identity - has been a difficult and divisive issue in Israel more or less since it was founded.

The controversy has developed into something of a power struggle between the dominant Orthodox branch of Judaism in Israel, and the Israel Reform Movement which allows for a less strict observance of Jewish law.

It has come to a head with the country's Supreme Court ordering the government to fund classes for Reform Jewish conversions.

There is great debate in Israel over the observance of Jewish law

At the moment the state gives precedence to Orthodox precepts, both in conversions and marriages.

Marriages performed by non-Orthodox rabbis are not recognized by the government, and there are no civil marriages, meaning that Reform Jews have to comply with Orthodox requirements or go abroad for their wedding.

Currently the state recognizes non-Orthodox conversions only if they begin with studies in accredited institutions outside Israel, and end with approval by the office of the country's two chief rabbis.

The Interior Ministry has in the past questioned whether a person's conversion is valid because it has been supervised by a Reform rabbi.

Annual conversions

Twenty-two years ago, the Interior Minister Yitzhak Peretz resigned over the issue, warning that Reform Jews were "leading the nation of Israel to destruction".

The man who currently holds the post, Eli Yishai, who belongs to the ultra-Orthodox Shas party, warned that were non-Orthodox conversion to be officially recognized, "there are hundreds of foreign workers and Palestinians who will take advantage of the Reform conversion in order to gain Israeli citizenship".

During the 1990s there was an influx of immigrants, who were granted citizenship because of their Jewish heritage, but it's estimated that many - perhaps hundreds of thousands - are not regarded as authentically Jewish by religious law.

The Reform Movement says that up to 180 Israelis undergo Reform conversions each year, but that more people would take advantage of the option of a less rigorous procedure if they knew about it.

It hailed the Supreme Court's decision as "a strong statement that there is more than one way to be Jewish and more than one path to Judaism".

Shlomo Amar - one of Israel's two chief rabbis - warned that the Supreme Court's next step would be to recognize Reform conversions.

Shas, and other religious politicians are now pressing for a new law to specify that conversion be solely under the control of the Chief Rabbinate.

Minister shortage

In Scotland the officially recognised religion - as far as there is one - is the Church of Scotland.

But being, technically at least, the "established" or state church in Scotland doesn't protect it from the harsh effects of changing times.

In this case "the Kirk" as it is called, is running short of ministers, especially in its many rural parishes.

The scattered communities of Scotland's islands, and rural counties such as Caithness, are particularly difficult to keep supplied with ministers.

The Church has also discovered that although church-goers will drive 20 miles to find a church with a minister, congregations deprived of their own pastor will fairly soon begin to drift away.

The Church of Scotland is becoming short of ministers

But a solution to the problem has been suggested - using modern technology to allow ministers to be in several churches at the same time.

Three or four churches would be connected by video-link for Sunday services.

The minister could be in one church, passages from the Bible read in another and prayers offered in a third church, with all three congregations able to join in the responses.

The plan offered to the Church's General Assembly called for a pilot scheme to be set up in the Orkneys, at a cost of a £100,000.

It sounds expensive, but some in the Church feel action is necessary to prevent a further fall in churchgoing.

The Kirk has around half a million members, but the latest figures show a decline of 14,000 in the last year alone.

<hr/>

Send us your comments in reaction to Robert Pigott's faith diary using the link below:

<a class="bodl" href="http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?forumID=6110&edition=1">Send your comments</a>