Good morning. Remember, remember the fifth of November. Gunpowder, treason, and plot.
In the nineteenth century the English religious imagination was kept in balance by the celebration of two annual festivals. On 30 January, the feast of Charles I, king
and martyr, people rejoiced that England never became narrowly Protestant. Today, on 5 November, the day of Guy Fawkes’ foiled gunpowder plot, people gave thanks that England was never overrun by Roman Catholics. This was the Anglican balance: to emerge from 150 years of religious conflict with a compromise that avoided the extremes on both sides.
Today, the celebration of 30 January is rare; and the festivities around 5 November have blended with the trick-or-treat traditions of Hallowe’en. The truth is, the
British have largely succeeded in domesticating Catholicism and privatising Protestantism so they both appear equally harmless. Unfortunately that doesn’t mean
religious antagonism and bigotry have disappeared.
For too long, people of faith have found it hard to do two things simultaneously. They’ve struggled to hold religious convictions deeply, and yet, at the same time,
to recognise the right of others to believe differently. The 1605 gunpowder plot was all about holding religious convictions deeply, to the point of blowing up
Parliament and seizing political power. But it abides as an example of profound intolerance to those who believe differently – an intolerance that frequently led to
the ghastly spectacle of people going to war for the sake of religion. Such travesties gave religion a bad name from which it’s never fully recovered.
Today people of faith in this country are generally better than their forebears at recognising the right of others to believe differently. We applaud individual rights
and freedoms. The trouble is, we’ve rather lost the appetite for profound religious convictions. As a result our culture finds it easy to talk about instrumental
goods, about the right to work, to be left alone, to be treated decently, to be given a chance in life; but we find it hard to speak publicly about ultimate goods,
about our true nature and destiny, about truth, purpose and meaning. Religion’s role in the public square is to stimulate this conversation – but it can’t insist on
having the last word.
In one place in the gospels Jesus says, ‘If you’re not with me, you’re against me.’ In another place he says ‘If you’re not against me, you’re with me.’ It’s
a paradox that expresses the same balance. If people of faith want respect they have to allow others to believe differently or not at all, and learn from, not blow up,
the stranger. Looking to God and cherishing your neighbour shouldn’t be opposites. The challenge is to be equally proficient at both.