In Depth:  Fred Catherwood

Imagine yourself as a Christian student. You have worked hard for three years; you have just passed your final exams. But, before he recommends you for a degree, your professor demands a bribe. Do you say this is the custom of your country and pay up, or do you remember that the apostle Paul spent two years in prison rather than pay a bribe to the Roman governor for his release?

I met a girl at the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students (IFES) European conference in Hungary last year, who had to make the choice of re-taking her course or paying the bribe. She had had excellent marks, but was in tears because she knew she had to try again. 'They don't dare to demand a bribe the second time.' She was not the only one facing the problem of bribery. The room of students who wanted to discuss the problem of bribery was packed.

Down the years, every country has some kind of moral order, Islamic, Confucian, Shinto or Christian, as the basis of its law and custom.

In Europe, since the Dark Ages, the Christian moral order, though never obeyed to the letter, was accepted as the basis of British law and custom. When we lost that in the permissive 1960s, we lost the whole plot. Today, government and Parliament look to the think-tanks and their moral order is secular humanism. But the ideas of the intellectual elite do not persuade the ordinary voter. Its 'reforms' consist mainly in demolishing the previous moral order, but inspire no new self-discipline in its place.

The apostle's vision of heaven, with saints 'from every nation, tribe, people and language' is brought vividly to life by the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students (IFES).

This summer its' World Assembly drew delegates from 115 national student movements, and from most of the other 35 countries where work has started. As the names of one country after another came up on the screen in the opening meeting, it was hard to keep back the tears. The last countries to appear were those who would formally join the Fellowship that week: Russia, Rwanda, Indonesia, Belize, Lesotho and St. Lucia. They rolled up the screen to spontaneous applause.

Some Christians do have a view, including the view of Europe expressed by Tony Bennett, a member of the small UK Independence Party, in the last issue of EN.

He worries about a number of things.

The Catholic influence

This is waning rapidly. Catholics from Spain, Ireland and Italy say that the young no longer go to mass and congregations are dwindling fast. The party with the closest links to the Catholic church, the Italian Christian democrats, has folded completely. But, politically, Catholics can be allies, too. In European debates on moral issues, all professing Christians unite against the secular humanists who dominate today's public agenda.

The votes have been counted, the seats filled, and the pundits have finished poring over the statistics.

So what lies ahead for our country? EN asked veteran politician Sir Fred Catherwood to comment.

Sir Fred Catherwood recently represented Evangelicals at a forum in Kazakhstan to discuss religious liberty (see news item on p. 7). Here is the text of Sir Fred's speech, which passionately argues for tolerance.

I want to talk about the contribution which the Kazakhstan Protestant churches can make to this country.

In the early 1970s a colleague of mine found himself Permanent Secretary of the new Northern Ireland Office. I took him out to lunch to find out how he had got on.

I said: 'I hope you realise it is a political conflict, not a religious one'. He said: 'I learned that straightaway'.

The British constitution is like a vintage Rolls Royce, splendid in its day, giving smooth delivery of power to the privileged few, but with brakes not designed for emergencies in today's traffic.

The Scott Report shows how hard it is to stop the juggernaut of government. Parliament had no way of finding out that government policy had changed. Three businessmen who were assured, in great secrecy, that it really had changed, found themselves facing criminal charges. Senior ministers signed a document to prevent the release of papers which proved their innocence, but, by fortunate chance, the judge in the case insisted on seeing the documents for himself, and the three were acquitted.