Limits of Religious Tolerance

A couple of interesting stories this week which highlight the difference between the stated position of religious tolerance and what it actually means in reality. The most high profile is the case of Gillian Gibbons, a teacher in Sudan, who has been sentenced to 15 days in gaol for allowing her pupils to name a teddy bar Muhammad. The second has had far less coverage but concerns the release of the children's film Golden Compass. The main problem that the US based Catholic League has is that it believes that it has an atheist message (although its spokesman William Donohue did admit that he hadn't seen the film which is a common theme when people want a film, book, play etc. banned - nothing like an informed position I say!) and so should be boycotted as should the books.

So what do these two stories have in common? Both show that even a small minority in a religious group can get their voice heard if that shout loudly enough and also the real meaning of religious tolerance in societies. This is we don't say you have to believe but under no circumstances can you question our faith, although obviously we are allowed to tell how wrong you are, and if we have any chance we'll enforce this through law. It may look a bit harsh comparing the Catholic Church to an authoritarian regime but if the Catholic Church could in act laws to protect their views they would be more than happy to do so. It wasn't that long ago that the Catholic Church tried tried to be exempt from the law against discrimination against gays on the grounds it was a religious belief. Why a religious belief should somehow make any difference is beyond me. Take an example of an organisation taking the same stance with a non-religious belief - let's say allowing members of the BNP to discriminate against non-whites as that is their belief. Would the government, or the public for that matter, have taken this seriously at all ? No of course it wouldn't, and rightly so, but it seems that religious belief in someway trumps other belief systems.

Well I'm now going to catch up with the Melanie Phillips column in the Daily Mail which only last week blamed Islam for the rise in anti-religious feelings and for good measure chucks in the normal rubbish about how life must have been created by an intelligent designer and drags out a couple of scientist names that are also Christians. Well I think that will have to wait to another post ...