Reply #9: Protestants, Catholics and to a lesser extent Jews [View All]

[fedsron2us]

already have schools that are funded within the state system. Muslims, perhaps not unreasonably, want the same treatment. This situation is in part historical accident resulting from the fact that many of the institutions incorporated into the state educational system since the 19th century were originally church schools, founded and paid for by religious dominations. I suppose the key question is whether religious education should have a central role in education and therefore be funded out of the state coffers or whether it should be regarded as a matter of private conscience to be paid for by individual parents. My personal view is that church and state should be completely separated as they are in some parts of Europe. It is ludicrous that atheists and agnostics should have to hand over their taxes to pay for the indoctrination of children in religious beliefs that they do not share. Of course, such a decision would require the disestablishment of the Church of England as a state cult with the Queen as its head. It would also mean that the monarch would no longer be crowned according to Christian rites. Although this would seem like a break with ancient tradition, in practice English kings and queens have always dated their reign from the death of their predecessors not their coronations. The church has always tried to claim its authority was necessary to legitimize the power of the state. This situation was never formally accepted by Britain's rulers even before the Reformation. Unfortunately, the complete separation of church and state is never going to happen whilst we have a prime minister who is hopelessly confused in his thinking on the subject. His blathering about the London bombers being the enemies of 'true religion' (ie they are not proper Muslims) shows he has not got a clue. The sad fact is that an individual can be Catholic, Protestant, Jew, Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist, atheist or agnostic but they can not subscribe to all these faiths at the same time. Similarly it is crazy for a government to pretend that it can promote the advance of all religions simultaneously. I loath the violent rantings of the radical Islamicists but I have to confess that there thought processes show more logical consistency than the febrile meanderings of the current British administration on the subject.