Before long we Britons face a General Election and, as a Christian, I have no idea who or what to vote for! How bleak the short term future looks! I probably speak for many in feeling utter disillusionment when faced with the current political system. An emotion only exacerbated by the deplorable expense scandal which reveals how corrupt, dishonest and self serving politicians have become. Amusingly/frighteningly most of them don’t ‘get it’, assuming they somehow deserve special graces or vastly improved salaries due to a tremendous sense of self importance. Do they not understand I prefer my taxes to fund social initiatives for the vulnerable, a group they are hopelessly out of touch with, as opposed to lavishing puffed up egotists with lush lifestyles?
Whatever happened to upstanding citizens standing for office later in life through noble desire to perform public duty? Instead we have a new breed of ‘career politician’ who, in all honesty, could belong to any given party. Partly because they are so malleable to popular opinion that pinning down their views is akin to nailing jelly to a tree and partly because the parties themselves have lost all sense of ideology and drive. A desire for power and control shines through but a principled vision to complement policy does not.
Not that political confusion is new to me as a Christian! It has long seemed the hard left driven are by jealousy and the far right driven by greed, both of which are sins! Thus I favour the left in matters of social justice and the right in matters of morality and hope for a hung parliament to deliver middle ground.
But now its worse than normal. Whichever party I opt I only perceive a future with one outcome: an increasingly secular society in which Christianity is driven to the margins within a backdrop of horrendous tax hikes due to the baleful mismanagement of our banks and the disastrous handling of the economy by the present occupants. And whoever is elected will, in any case, simply be a puppet for a sinister secular force of non-elected power known simply as the EU.
If ever UKIP seemed attractive it is now- if simply to raise at least a modicum of protest before that faceless bureaucracy governs our lives. And yet voting on single issues is folly and so we return to square one. Thank the Lord the BNP are run by transparently moronic nutters- because I see so many similarities to Germany in the wake of WW1 and we all know what happened then. If ever Britain was screaming out for principled leadership it is now… but everywhere I look is only corruption, weakness and despair. All ideology, character, integrity and principle is being swept aside by an insipid secular individualism in which all must think alike.
Fertile soil, you might think, for the Church to rise up, gather the people, inspire and provide. With the power of the Gospel and the wisdom of the ages at hand, who could be better equipped to spark spiritual revolution and return our nation to its Christian heritage? A heritage which served it so well in the past.
But here my gloom slides into depression. The church has allowed itself to become an anodyne arm of this hapless State. And so the silent, weak and unimpressive bench of bishops only mirror the monkeys in parliament. Far from driving reform and renewal they barely seem able to keep their own church together and the show on the road!
So you tell me- who in our nation and church can we look to for inspiration and leadership? Answers on a postcard or, alternatively, in the comments box!
My own response is that we must not look to the princes of this world but to the King of the ages. If we wish to survive in this oft battered life then only a life of simplicity, rooted in the Gospel and sacraments of the church, will sustain and protect us. So in this season of Advent, look to Jesus, strive harder to live out the Christian life and pray for his coming once more. Only He can bring about the revival of faith that we so desperately need.
Well, for what it’s worth you are not alone in feeling like this.
Yes UKIP does look attractive right now, but I don’t share your confidence in folks viewing the BNP as moronic nutters and sadly I am also referring to the Christian world. We are going to see the rise of the far right in the UK and I blame nuLabour.
As you rightly point out, because of our new EU masters, voting for any of the 3 main parties is a practical waste of time.
And we certainly can’t look to the church, let’s be honest, as the leaders are too busy gardening, in their eco allotments.
My conclusion, I am personally becoming more and more libertarianism and simply want the government to STOP legislating and start reversing the process and stay the hell out of our lives.
You’ve also summed it up for me!
Although the idea of the left holding social justice high and the right claiming the moral high ground is almost a thing of the past. I don’t really see much difference between all of the political parties now.
What a fabulous photograph!
Oh, and I propose HM to run the country – if it ran with the same polish, timing, attention to detail and sense of duty as the monarchy, we would have few problems.
Fr, what happened to the self-denying ordinance on political comment?
For what its worth I believe we now have the politics we deserve. Massive over-selling of what any government could ever achieve at an election followed by a massive let down once the “winning” party demonstrates that it doesn’t stand an earthly of delivering its promises.
And a media that loves nothing more than a build-’em-up story (remember Obama?) followed by the knock-’em-down story that can be run once the political honeymoon is over.
Idiots that we are, we lap it all up: yes I really believe Party X has the answers and will change my life for the better; oh, dear what a let down, to think I trusted them, they’ll never get my vote again. And who really thinks that a party that ran on a platform of “well we cannot offer much, things are pretty much out of our control and lets face it the UK doesn’t really rule half the world any more so keep your expectations low” would be returned on a landslide.
Rant over.
my self denial passed when I was rendered dormant with little daily news save news of my back!
Stuart writes:
“I am personally becoming more and more libertarian … and simply want the government to STOP legislating and start reversing the process and stay the hell out of our lives”
In that case, the party for you and for many others is the UK Libertarian Party
http://www.lpuk.org/
which is committed to getting this country out of the EU and Big Brother government out of all our lives.
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