Westminster 2010: Declaration of Christian Conscience is launched

Thirty-five prominent individuals have signed a statement of values calling on politicians to ‘protect the right of Christians’ to hold their beliefs and ‘act according to Christian conscience,’ reports Christian Concern for our Nation.

The Sunday Telegraph reported that a bid to place Christian values at the heart of the general election campaign has been launched with a ‘declaration of conscience’ endorsed by senior figures from various Christian denominations.

Signatories include Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, leader of the Catholic Church in Scotland, and the Rt. Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, the former Bishop of Rochester.

The document, which was launched on Sunday, 4 March 2010, was inspired by the Manhattan Declaration, an affirmation drawn up by conservative Christians in the United States last November and since signed by 400,000 supporters.

The British version says Christians should be ‘subject to all governing authorities and obey them except when they require us to act unjustly’. It adds:

‘We will not be intimidated by any cultural or political power into silence or acquiescence and we will reject measures that seek to overrule our Christian consciences or to restrict our freedoms to express Christian beliefs, or to worship and obey God.’

Dr Peter Saunders, chief executive of the Christian Medical Fellowship and another signatory to the declaration, said:

‘There has been a feeling of growing hostility to the Christian faith and that Christians are being marginalised from the public square. It is important to know what candidates actually stand for, particularly when Christian beliefs can appear on both the left and right of the political spectrum.’

He said Britain's four million churchgoing Christians – on average, 6,000 per parliamentary constituency – were ‘a minority’.

‘If the election is close, either between parties overall or individual candidates, Christians, like any other minority, could prove decisive to the outcome,’ he added.

The document also calls on Christians to ‘support, protect, and be advocates for children born and unborn, and all those who are sick, disabled, addicted, elderly, poor, exploited, trafficked or exploited by unjust trade, aid or debt policies’.

The Declaration also pledges to support marriage – ‘the lifelong covenantal union of one man and one woman as husband and wife’ – as ‘the only context for sexual intercourse’ and ‘the most important unit for sustaining the health, education, and welfare of all’.

On Sunday, 4 March 2010, a BBC documentary Are Christians Being Persecuted? examined the current situation of Christians in the United Kingdom. Nicky Campbell, the presenter of the corporation’s flagship programme for Holy Week, argued that Labour’s anti-discrimination legislation has led to clashes between religious conscience and equality for homosexuals, and blamed local authorities for rebranding Christmas celebrations as winter festivals because of a misguided belief that they are standing up for minority faiths.

To read the full text of the Declaration of Christian Conscience, click here.

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[04/15/2010]

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