Faith has a place in politics
Many political arguments are about values and religion lies at the heart of many moral arguments – whether we realise it or not, says Bartek Staniszewski
“May they never lead the nation wrongly through love of power,” prays the Speaker’s Chaplain – with questionable efficacy – as the House of Commons begins to sit each day. In the Houses of Parliament, Christianity is not just for Christmas – it permeates parliamentary customs and symbolism, while politicians continue to reference their religion in debates even as religiosity amongst Brits supposedly declines. Between the 2011 and the 2021 censuses, the proportion of Brits declaring themselves non-religious increased by almost half.
The privileged role that faith plays in politics is therefore often under attack. Only last month, Lord Falconer objected to religious arguments being used to oppose the assisted dying bill and, according to a YouGov survey from last year, over a fifth of Brits think religious people should not even be permitted to hold political office, let alone make religious arguments.
But faith-based arguments are unavoidable, whether you like it or not. Politicians disagree about values all the time – whether it is about the permissibility of financing violence in the context of the War in Ukraine or the morality of keeping possession of sculptures made in other countries, as is the case with the Elgin Marbles. And if politicians are to have reasons for why they hold to a certain value – as they should, given that the alternative is their values being arbitrary – it is difficult for them to give one except by appealing to a reason that is ultimately religious.
Indeed, people scarcely realise just how many arguments we take for granted in everyday debate are religious in origin. Take property rights – if you believe in them, you owe the rationale for that belief to John Locke, but Locke’s argument for property rights is explicitly religious and based on his view that, since we are made in God’s image, we can have rights over the fruits of our labour analogously to how God has rights over all of creation. If you reject that argument, your belief in property rights might be unfounded.
No such thing as neutral
Many great twentieth-century philosophers were aware of this problem and tried to resolve it, including John Rawls, Ronald Dworkin and Thomas Nagel – names familiar to any student of political philosophy. They aspired to create a ‘neutral’ worldview, one independent of any person’s religious beliefs. Rawls tried to do this by coming up with a list of things that reasonable persons can all agree are important and saying that the government should only work on those things. The new problem then was that nobody could agree on who counts as a reasonable person and what should go on the list.
Ultimately, the project of finding a ‘neutral’ worldview is folly. We must always refer to some deeper truths to justify our political beliefs.
Okay, you might concede – but those deeper truths do not have to be religious. Contemporary humanists, for instance, attempt to provide a framework for life that does not appeal to religious reasons. But, by doing that, they are offering merely a different kind of religion. Humanists UK’s website states that they believe in placing “human welfare and happiness at the centre of their [decisions]”. This is lovely, but it is no different from a religious person saying that their decisions are led by the belief that all life is sacred. Both are just as contestable. Both are also either founded upon some further belief – which itself begs for justification – or are accepted without some further justification – in other words, on blind faith.
Whether you like it or not, this Christmas, your politics ultimately rests on some blind faith – whether religious or not.
Bartek Staniszewski is senior researcher at Bright Blue