Politics
Reform’s crusade for ‘Christian values’ offers false comfort
The announcement by Reform UK that they will “restore Britain’s Christian heritage” and that the nation must “uphold its Christian values” captures the contradictory essence of modern populist politics. Politicians of various faiths and none scrambling to weaponise a religious identity that the British public themselves have left behind and show no sign of wanting back.
In The Times, Zia Yusuf argues that reasserting Britain’s Christian heritage is about “respect and continuity”, framing it as a necessary anchor for social cohesion in an increasingly diverse society. He, alongside others in his party, suggests that young men in particular are experiencing a “meaning crisis” and are crying out for cultural confidence. A return to traditional Christian primacy is the only way to satisfy a growing national hunger for meaning.
This diagnosis is false and the proposed cure is a recipe for division rather than unity.
We must ground our political debate and national identity in reality: Britain is not a Christian country. This is not a radical ideological statement; it is a basic demographic fact. Successive social attitudes surveys and the most recent Census data have painted an undeniable picture. The majority of the population, and an overwhelming majority of young people, do not belong to the Christian religion. Our pews are empty, and the moral and social lives of most Britons are entirely detached from Christianity.
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To insist, in the face of this reality, that Britain must operate as a “Christian country” is to govern by nostalgia. Worse, it actively hinders our ability to work towards real national self-confidence. When the state privileges one specific religious identity, whether through the school curriculum, the presence of bishops in the House of Lords, or the rhetoric of our political leaders, it inevitably relegates everyone else to the status of second-class citizens. You cannot build genuine social cohesion by telling the non-religious majority, alongside millions of citizens of minority faiths, that they are merely guests in a house built by and for someone else.
If we want a cohesive society, we must build it on a foundation of shared values. We need a secular, pluralistic state that treats all citizens equally, regardless of their beliefs.
And what of the “hunger for meaning” that politicians like Yusuf claim to be addressing? It is true that in our complex, often fragmented modern world, people are searching for purpose, connection, and belonging. But it is a profound failure of imagination to assume that this profoundly human search must lead us backwards.
The search for meaning in the modern world is not the exclusive property of the religious. For humanists, and indeed for millions of people who live perfectly good lives without God, “meaning”, if we choose to use that word, is not about linking our fate to deities or submitting to inherited traditions. It is about a profound sense of connection, wonder, and meaning that enriches the human experience.
We can find awe in the natural world, in our staggering scientific achievements, in art, in music, and in the incredible, complex tapestry of human connection. We find our moral compass not in ancient texts, but in reason, empathy, and our shared pursuit of a better world. We are the inheritors of a rich secular vocabulary of education, virtue, friendship, and civic participation. These are the tools we need to build a meaningful life and a cohesive society, and they require no religious framework, though religious Britons may find resources in their own traditions to support this common endeavour.
Attempts to resurrect Christian Britain prey on the anxieties of a changing world by offering the false comfort of a mythical past.
We do not need to pretend to be a Christian country to be a good, moral, or united country. Only if we accept what Britain actually is today – a vibrant, diverse, and majority non-religious nation – can we face the future with confidence as a nation.
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