The Trojan Horse 'Islamic radicalisation plot', in which several schools in Birmingham stand accused of enabling (or not preventing) the potential radicalisation of their overwhelmingly Muslim pupil bodies, has revealed what a threat to Christianity the faith is.
By faith, I don't mean Islam. I mean secular 'tolerance'.
Of course, it's serious if state-funded schools are having speakers in assemblies who promote extremist viewpoints; if pupils are not taught properly about faiths other than Islam; if girls are not given the same opportunities as boys.*
But what's most serious is lines like this, which came from MP Chris Bryant on the BBC's Question Time the other day:
“Of course it’s not wrong to be devout and conservative and to have conservative views, but it is wrong to separate girls and boys or to treat girls differently.”
Why should that worry you? Because Chris Bryant has done the classic mid-sentence switch that tolerant relativists all end up doing.
The Intolerantist faith
Notice the first part of his sentence is classic tolerance. It’s fine for you to believe whatever you believe. Who is anyone to tell you what to think, or to tell you that what you think is wrong? This is a tolerant country, where we welcome people of all faiths.
But the second part of his sentence completely undermines the first part. Because if your religious conservatism means you think your sons and daughters should sit separately in class (or that, if you’re a teenager, you should sit apart from the opposite gender in class), well that’s not fine anymore. That’s wrong. And you’re wrong.
In other words, you can be a religious conservative as long as your religious conservatism doesn’t lead you to do things that I don’t think are right.
That’s intolerant. It’s the intolerance of a ‘tolerant society’, which decides the boundaries of acceptability, and then polices them fiercely. It’s the intolerance of tolerance—we might call its advocates devout (in)tolerantists.
And it’s an issue for Christians. Because despite all the jumping up and down, Muslims form a very small proportion of the UK population. Radical Muslims are not going to be in charge of our laws and courts anytime in our lifetimes.
But radical (in)tolerantists already are. And how long is it before there’s a news item about a school, or group of schools, where some of the governors stand accused of:
How long before someone sits on the Question Time panel and says: “Of course it’s not wrong for evangelical Christians to be devout and conservative and to have conservative views, but it is wrong to think what you do about sexuality, act like you do in evangelism, promote what you do as a school governor.”
If you’re an evangelical, your beliefs sound just as radical, extreme and unpalatable to a secular (in)tolerantist as a conservative Muslim’s do. Don’t be fooled by the first half of the sentence: it’s the second that shows the danger.
*Although let's make two qualifications; it's serious if non-state-funded schools do these things too—would you be fussed about the educational background of a radicalised terrorist? And second, it's amazing how segregation of girls and boys seems anathema, when I attended a very 'English' and wholly segregated school. It was a boys' grammar school.
Carl is Editorial Director at The Good Book Company and is a member of Grace Church Worcester Park, London. He is the best-selling author of The Garden, the Curtain and the Cross and God's Big Promises Bible Storybook, and also serves as series editor of the God's Word for You series. Before joining TGBC, he worked as a journalist and then as a teacher, and pastored a congregation in Hull. Carl is married to Lizzie, and they have two children. He studied history at Oxford University.