Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor: 'have the threads of democracy begun to unravel ?'

I have been criticizing the Daily Mail recently but nonetheless there are today, after wading through pages and pages of government and/or Israel-lobby drivel disguised as fake 'indignation about our Brits in Iran', a couple of quite important articles.

One is a tiny little story confirming what everyone knew anyway about the ruinous sociopath Gordon Brown's last budget, i.e if you are on a low income then you are going to be seriously worse off. And in particular it indirectly raises the issue, which was something I was going to bring up myself last week, what the hell is the Working Tax Credit anyway ?

In the Mail, the government confirmed that 75% of people entitled to it, don't claim it. That is hardly an accident and it's obviously something the regime are relying on heavily. But more seriously, the Working Tax credit and compounded by Gordon Brown's attack on the low income band in his last budget, is nothing more than trying to tie people to the state by taking and then 'giving them back their earnings' which are theirs anyway (if they ask that is and jump through the required demeaning hoops). This is abhorrent and wrong and it needs to end. If people are entitled to the money then it should not be coming out of their taxation to begin with. No ifs, no buts, the Working Tax credit needs to go. I'm sorry some Labour backbenchers think it is the only achievement of their time in government, but it is wrong, it is just another catastrophic failure of policy and it needs to come an end.

Anyway, the other article (and I'll just link to the Standard's version) is the coverage of this very important speech by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor denouncing these vile 'anti-discrimination' laws that would amongst other things force children into the hands of homosexuals and more widely form part of a framework for rewriting democracy itself:

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor says:

"...we are being asked to accept a different version of our democracy, one in which diversity and equality are held to be at odds with religion.

"We Catholics - and here I am sure I speak too for other Christians and all people of faith - do not demand special privileges, but we do demand our rights.

[...] My fear is that, under the guise of legislating for what is said to be tolerance, we are legislating for intolerance. Once this begins, it is hard to see where it ends.

My fear is that in an attempt to clear the public square of what are seen as unacceptable intrusions, we weaken the pillars on which that public square is erected, and we will discover that the pillars of pluralism may not survive.

"The question," the Cardinal added, "is whether the threads holding together pluralist democracy have begun to unravel. That is why I have sounded this note of alarm.

"I am conscious that when an essential core of our democratic freedom risks being undermined, subsequent generations will hold to account those who were able to raise their voices yet stayed silent."

He also fueled speculation that Catholics may order their adoption agencies to break away from links with the state - and forgo their £10 million a year of taxpayers' funds in favour of relying on donations.

The Cardinal said: "I wonder how far we can still claim as British the assumption that if a religious organisation serves the public interest according to its own rights, it has a legitimate claim on public resources.

"I begin to wonder whether Britain will continue to be a place which protects and welcomes the works of people shaped and inspired by the church." The Cardinal said he feared intolerance of Christianity "so when Christians stand by their beliefs, they are intolerant dogmatists. When they sin, they are hypocrites.

"When they take the side of the poor, they are soft-headed liberals. When they seek to defend the family, they are Rightwing reactionaries."

He added: "What looks like liberality is in reality a radical exclusion of religion from the public sphere."

The Mail/ES continues:

Catholic leaders have made a powerful point of their loyalty to the British state since full civil rights were granted to Roman Catholics by the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829.

The Cardinal described the Act as a historic turning point.

The speech is likely to make uncomfortable reading for Tony Blair - he is expected to convert to Roman Catholicism ('convert' from what ? Bolshevism ? Satanism ? -j) after he leaves Downing Street later this year - and for Communities Secretary Ruth Kelly, a staunch Catholic responsible for pushing through the Sexual Orientation Regulations."

Just a few comments on the Mail's worthless ones. Firstly, it is probably doubtful that Blair's 'Christianity' has ever been anything more than window dressing to get the vaguely conservative gullible faction to buy into a deeply anti-Christian Mr Blair.

Secondly, as I understand it Ruth Kelly, despite ostensibly being a pin-up girl for New Labour, was actually very much against the legislation anyway.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor New Labour