Should the UK withhold aid from countries where Christians are persecuted?

Last week I read a typically thought-provoking piece by Gillan on his God and Politics blog about how much aid is given directly by the UK government to those countries ranked in the top 50 of those where the persecution of Christians is most severe (you can read the piece for yourself here).

Since reading Gillan's blog, time and time again I find myself considering the points raised and the same question keeps springing to mind: is it time that we start to withhold aid, in part or in full, from those countries that allow, sanction or even encourage the persecution of Christians?

In 2011/12, the UK's Department for International Development (DfID) gave £3.11 billion in bilateral aid to countries across the world. Of this, £1.74 billion was donated to countries ranked in the top 50 for the persecution of Christians; that's a staggering 56%.

Amongst the recipients was Somalia, which received £101million and is ranked 5th in the world for the persecution of Christians (behind only North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan and Iraq). Somalia is a Muslim country (with an estimated 99% being Muslims) with a tiny number of Christians, most of whom are converts from Islam. Although apostasy (converting from Islam to another faith) is officially prohibited in only Somaliland and Puntland, it is effectively considered a crime by most of the rest of society, as Sayid Ali Sheik Luqman Hussein found out when he was shot dead in July 2008. His 'crime'? He had converted from Islam to Christianity.

Another major recipient of aid from DfID was Pakistan, which received £212million and is ranked 14th for persecuting Christians.  Whilst Pakistani law provides a reasonable amount of protection for religious minorities, Christians face severe and increasing opposition from militants and face risks including abduction, torture and death.  An increasing number of Christians find themselves falsely accused of breaking the country's controversial blasphemy laws.  Indeed, it was his opposition to the country's blaspehmy laws that saw Shahbaz Bhatti, Pakistan's Minorities Minister and only Christian cabinet member, gunned down in broad daylight in 2011.

These are but two examples; I could have gone on and on and on (to coin a phrase).

Given how tight the UK's finances currently are, and will doubtless be for the foreseeable future, I can't help but wonder if it is right to donate such a large share of our scarce resources to countries where Christians (or any other religious minority for that matter) fear for their lives daily.

Freedom of religion and belief is a fundamental human right, as per Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Amnesty International, in its evidence to the Conservative Human Rights Commission commented: "the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion is a fundamental component of the universal and indivisible human rights framework that applies to all people everywhere, as laid out in international law".

Furthermore, the extent of religious freedom in a country is a useful yardstick in assessing the extent of other fundamental freedoms; where the former is absent or in decline, a host other freedoms are usually threatened too. (Check out the aforementioned list of the top 5 culprits for persecuting Christians again).

So should we then reduce or end aid payments to such countries?  Should we make future aid conditional on concerted and tangible efforts by those countries' governments to act to protect religious minorities? I genuinely don't know.

A part of me is of the mind that aid to such countries should end, and the sooner the better. With the majority of the planet living in extreme poverty, surely there are others that are more worthy, more deserving of the UK's assistance?

Another part of me disagrees entirely. How could such a policy, of effectively imposing economic sanctions against some of the world's poorest, be in keeping with the Bible's teachings to love one another unconditionally, to help the weak and needy whoever and wherever they may be?

As with any crisis of conscience, I turn to my Bible for inspiration and quickly stumble upon what I think is the answer I am looking for:

"But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him?" 1 John 3:17

But does this really help? In a country of finite resources, and in a world whose needs far outweigh our ability to help in any meaningful way, bilateral aid is already apportioned based on subjective appraisals of need, of worthiness.  Why should the persecution of religious minorities not be taken alongside the multitude of other considerations?

As I continue to grapple with the question that is the title of this piece, one thing is abundantly clear to me - more needs to be done, and urgently, by countries such as the UK to tackle religious persecution, and particularly of Christians, across the world. With "200 million Christians (10 percent of the global total) being socially disadvantaged, harrassed or actively oppressed for their beliefs", according to Rupert Short's Christianophobia: A Faith Under Attack - a figure which is rising year on year - the time to act is now.

As I will doubtless continue to grapple with this question over the days and weeks to come, I can but hope and pray there are wiser minds than my own working within DfID and the Foreign Office on this very issue.

If the Church of England is still ‘the Tory Party at prayer’ is Cameron done for?

There have been many examples of David Cameron ‘doing God’ in recent times, from his speech celebrating the 400^th anniversary of the King James Bible last December to him hosting a reception for Christian leaders at Downing  Street to celebrate Easter (not Holy Week in his words but Easter week, though let us not quibble).

Keen to burnish his Christian credentials, this self-professed ‘committed’ but ‘vaguely practicing’ Anglican stated during his Easter reception that “I think there is something of a Christian fight-back going on in Britain and I think that’s a thoroughly good thing”.  Unfortunately, Dave appears to have neglected to mention this to James Eadie QC, the barrister representing the Government in landmark cases currently being heard before the European Court of Human Rights.

Amongst the human rights challenges being considered, Shirley Chaplin and Nadia Eweida – a nurse and a British Airways worker respectively – argue that their employers’ refusal to allow them to openly wear crucifixes at work contravened Articles 9 and 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which prohibit discrimination on grounds of religion.

However, speaking for the Government, James Eadie QC countered that wearing a cross was not a “generally recognised” act of Christian worship as “a great many Christians do not insist on wearing crosses, still less visibly”.  More ridiculously, he claimed that neither Chaplin nor Eadie had been discriminated against by their employers as they were free to “resign and move to another job”.

So how closely do the Government’s words in Court marry to Cameron’s recent proclamations on faith? Well, not remotely so; not even close.

During his Easter reception, Cameron said, “I think we see this fight-back in this very strong stance that I’ve taken and others have taken in terms of the right to wear a crucifix. I think this is important.”

Such a strong stance in fact that his Government’s lawyers are currently arguing that as there is no ostensible obligation for Christians to wear a crucifix then their ‘rights’ could not have been impinged.

With poll after poll, decade after decade, supporting the 18^th century perception of the Church of England being the ‘Tory Party at prayer’, then Cameron has problems.

Without a party co-Chairman who he can any longer instruct to ‘do Allah’ on the Government’s behalf, Cameron’s ability to ‘do God’ is undoubtedly going to be of more importance come the next general election than it was a week ago.

Based on his, and his Government’s, record so far, he’s in trouble…

Cameron's amoral Christians

I had not intended to comment on David Cameron’s speech of two weeks ago (here) when he ‘did’ God, and this will almost certainly be one of the tardiest blogs on the subject. But for all that was encouraging in the speech, there was one particular phrase near the end of the speech that has niggled me ever since:

‘There are Christians who don’t live by a moral code.’

Now I don’t profess to be any kind of theologian; I lay claim to no deep knowledge of Anglicanism, nor the Bible. But I fail to see how anybody can lead an amoral life yet still claim to be a Christian.

The story in Exodus describing how God gave the Law to Moses means that the Law is sacrosanct. As such, the Law is not just a useful moral compass but to keep it is a religious obligation. It seems to me that this is a pretty basic plank of what it means to be a Christian (or to be a Jew or a Muslim for that matter).

Of course, it is possible to hold high a set of ideals such as the Law, but fall short of actually living in accordance with them – the Law books of the Bible contain 659 commandments, so it is likely most of us will break one or more of them from time to time! Perhaps it is this to which Cameron alluded in his speech?

But to fall short of living up to your own moral code is something completely different to living life without a moral code.

I am always wary of discussing faith, and particularly the Law, in fora such as this. Waiting for the inevitable wit of somebody singling out a line of the Law they object to, usually, and with a tiresome lack of imagination, taken from Leviticus. I would merely ask such critics one simple question.

In Jesus’ summary of the law, He cites the second commandment as being: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’.

Irrespective of individuals’ faith (or lack thereof), can there be a better starting point for any national debate of morality, of law and order, as those five short words?