Dr Michael Nazir-Ali: A Christian Britain in a Plural World?

The rapid fragmentation of society, the emergence of isolated communities with only tenuous links to their wider context and the impact of home-gown terrorism have all led even hard-bitten, pragmatist politicians to ask questions about ‘Britishness’: what is at the core of British identity; how can it be reclaimed, passed on and owned by more and more people?

The answer to these questions cannot be only in terms of the ‘thin’ values, such as respect, tolerance, good behaviour, etc, which are usually served up by those scratching around for something to say. In fact, the answer can only be given after rigorous investigation into the history of nationhood and of the institutions, laws, customs and values which have arisen to sustain and to enhance it. In this connection, as with the rest of Europe, it cannot be gainsaid, that the very idea of a unified people under God living in a ‘golden chain’ of social harmony has everything to do with the arrival and flourishing of Christianity in these parts. It is impossible to imagine how else a rabble of mutually hostile tribes, fiefdoms and kingdoms could have become a nation conscious of its identity and able to make an impact on the world. In England, particularly, this consciousness goes back a long way and is reflected, for example, in a national network of care for the poor which was yet locally based in the parishes and was already in place in the sixteenth century.

In some ways, I am the least qualified to write about such matters. There have been, and are today, many eminent people in public and academic life who have a far greater claim to reflect on these issues than I have. Perhaps my only justification, for even venturing into this field, is to be found in Kipling when he said, ‘What should they know of England who only England know?’ It may be then that to understand the precise relation of the Christian faith to the public life of this nation, a perspective is helpful which is both rooted in the life of this country and able to look at it from the outside. Read more
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