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| Sharia Hysteria in the UK
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If you believe the hype and don't bother to read what was actually said, it sounds like the Archbishop of Canterbury is suggesting that the UK adopts sharia law. We've had utterly hysterical statements, because sharia provoles strong reactions in the UK in general terms: we see beheadings in the middle East, we hear extremist groups say that they are working to bring about an Islamic state in the UK, we think it's all about Islamic penal codes and there is understandable fear.
Politicians have been quick to distance themselves from his comments, as have many senior clergy and some muslim leaders. He's been accused of undermining race relations in the UK and risking worsening inter-Community relations. At the same time he's been accused of special pleading for faith groups by the British Humanist Association and National Secular Society.
But is there anything to fear in what the archbishop actually said?
Firstly, what he was suggesting was recognition of courts (currently known as councils) which already exist in the UK but currently have no legal status. Jewish courts, Beth Din, already have some legal status in the UK so there is a precedent. However other bishops have been on TV tonight saying that this is a different kettle of fish from the Beth Din because they sit more naturally within the judeo-christian tradition that have shaped UK legislative structures and sharia doesn't fit within the same traditions.
Secondly, he was not talking about all-encompassing sharia law, but some limited capacity for these courts to take decisions in areas where they would not undermine English law nor human rights norms.
The less contraversial areas could be things like designation of halal status for meats: the Bethin can already do this for kosher products. Of course food hygiene and animal cruelty legislation (EU and national) would still need to be complied with but there's no reason to think they wouldn't be.
Other suggested areas seem to be financial issues and family matters. I'm hard pressed to think of a reason why Islamic banking laws should be a problem, but I can see there might be more worries over family matters, (including on inheritance) particularly when the spokespeople that have appeared as talking heads on TV on this have said that family matters are often a matter of interpretation of the various Quoranic texts and Hadiths.
Ottowa recently looked at introducing something along the lines of limited recognition of Sharia and I understand this didn't happen in the end because of opposition from muslim women. They feared that they might be subjected to judgements less favourable to them under sharia courts than by going direct to standard courts, and that they would face pressure from family to use the sharia courts. These fears are being aired in the debate in the UK today.
A particular fear was over custody of children following divorce where some sharia courts would look to place weaned children in a father rather than a mother's custody. In a UK context, that would be very different from the general supposition of family law which usually favours children being placed with the mother.
It seems to me that the real issue that the Archbishop was raising was whether national law is always the only law commanding the loyalty of citizens. And it's a question that affects people of all faiths.
For Christians there's a clear position in the new testament: if there's a conflict between the law on earth and God's law we have a right and duty to speak out where we believe God's law is being broken, whether on, say, the Iraq war or making human/ animal chimeras for gene research. There are limits: on taxation, for example, Caesar's picture was on the coins so the coins should be given to Caesar.
I met Rowan Williams a couple of years ago when he visited my church in Brussels. I was conditioned by the preaching I'd heard from my first church in London to expect a wooly thinker determined to drag the church from its purpose of bringing the opportunity of a relationship with Jesus for all who want it, to turn it into an equivocal body willing to compromise its message for the sake of being publicly acceptable. That was not at all the man I saw. I saw a deeply spiritual, thoughtful man willing and able to justify positions he took bibilcally and not determinedly attached to the privileges of being the State Church.
So why did he say it?
I'm pretty sure that he really did have no idea how contraversial it would be. Current reports are that he is horrified at the fallout.
The chances are that he really was thinking about what he said in theological terms. He's an intellectual who takes an academic approach, but in my experience academics are not always the best at taking real world consideration into account.
However, to get to be Archbishop of Canterbury, in addition to intellect and religious leadership you also need to be a manager and a politician. The last of these elements is not always top consideration in identifying religious leaders (think for a moment about the world-wide nightmare that flowed from the Pope's ill-judged comment about a medaevil scholar) but to be a church leader is to be a public figure so perhaps there is a need for some more media-savvy thought before speaking these days.
What's the likely outcome?
Well I think we can assume there will be a few more days of niggling on this one, but there's no reason for it to remain in the headlines as a 10-day rather than a 3-day story.
I expect more comments from secular organisations to the effect that this is exactly why faith leaders should not have a role in public life, and further attacks on the positions of the Lords Spiritual's position in the UK legislature (in the House of Lords as representatives of the state church).
I wonder whether Rowan Williams has seriously damaged himself in terms of how the members of his church see him - it did feel a bit odd to have the Archbishop describe integration of sharia as "unavoidable" when things he says speaking out for Christianity never receive this level of coverage and that has been noted (particularly on the BBC website I notice).
So best case scenario is the Archbishop learns a valuable lesson on media-handling and policy considerations of speeches.
Worse case scenario is we lose an ABC and have to seriously consider disestablishment of the Church of England (which may happen tacitly when Prince Charles becomes king given his wish to be "defender of faith" rather than "defender of the faith" i.e. head of the Church of England... but that's another story for another time).
It seems pretty clear for now that the UK is quite some way away from even being able to think about an idea like this without reacting hysterically. So I suspect that in the medium term at least it will be quietly left as a large elephant-in-the-room faux pas that should not be mentioned again in polite company, and the real issue about when national law and God's law are not compatible will remain a point of conscience for believers. |
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Posted by rose22 on 2008-02-08 17:41:10 | Rating: | Views: 89
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Rose thank you for a most informative read
Much food for thought; it’s high time that Christians wake from the dead and return to life, which comes with the origin of a/The Word
God Bless
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Posted by greensky
on 2008-02-08 22:25:01
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