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There is a letter left out of the link to the prog - Will
Please delete this after the repair!

Wouldn't it be great if more N. Ireland journalists and politicians had the courage of their undoubted atheist beliefs?
But maybe I'm being too hard on them?
You'd have to be at a certain level in your profession, as Polly is, before you can take the risk of the probable sanctions.

I don't agree with her politics but I have always found Polly Toynbee a fascinating person to listen to. I'll do my best to listen on Sunday.

I doubt if Polly has ever concealed her antipathy to religion. But asking people in Northern Ireland to have the courage of their political or religious/anti-religious beliefs! Now you are really asking too much, Alan. Our great wee province is about 20 or 30 years behind the rest of Europe. It has a great history of people showing physical courage (fighting in wars, or killing for Ireland/Ulster, for example). But it has a poor history of people showing moral courage in public platforms and standing up for what they really think. And, usually, if they do, they are hounded out of the place, like Rev David Armstrong in Limavady or Gerry Fitt. Armstrong merely showed humanity towards his fellow Christians by attending a Mass, while Fitt came to the realisation that Catholic nationalism was inherently sectarian.
As Polly herself says, "Mankind itself has all the innate moral strength it needs, without inventing divine reward and wrath". But the weight of powerful religious interests in NI is so great that this innate moral strength is continually being stifled. For example, during the Darwin book pledge campaign, we were informed by two of the recipients that there were atheists in their party, but obviously they're hiding in the closet and haven't come out yet.
In my humble view, if you believe in free speech, then you should speak freely, if you love the truth, then you should tell it and if you believe in the open sociewty, then you should act in the open.

If ever I need a laugh, Polly provides. Loved by the Guardianista's, by the devout secularists, her award says it all in this era of leftism resurgent.

David knows a lot about laughs!
He and his other blog 'writers' laugh at anything left of the BNP!

The woman is a menace.

I'd love to hear a debate between such an articulate, inelligent English atheist as Polly Toynbee is and such an articulate intelligent English Christian as Elaine Storkey, or Amy Ewing-Orr. Why do all the high-profile debates have to be between men. It's about time women got in on the act, and there are many on either side of the theism / atheism divide who would do a very good job. Why don't you try to set it up Will?

Q. Are Protestants members of a true church?
A. It depends on what we mean by 鈥楶rotestants鈥�, 鈥榯rue鈥� and 鈥榗hurch鈥�.
Q. Are Catholics members of a true church?
A. It depends on what we mean by 鈥楥atholics鈥�, 鈥榯rue鈥� and 鈥榗hurch鈥�.
Q. What is a church?
A. A body or group of Christians.
Q. What is a Christian?
A. A person who follows the teachings of Jesus.
Q. Which group follows the teachings of Jesus?
A. None - the last Christian died on the cross 2,000 years ago.
Q. Which group belong to a 鈥榯rue鈥� church?
A. None since it clearly doesn鈥檛 exist.

Therefore, a plague on all your churches.

From today's interview with Polly:

POLLY: Humanists are the majority.

WILLIAM: How many members do you have in the British Humanist Association?

POLLY: Um, I don't know, I should know, shouldn't I?

Yes, Polly, you really should!

Yes deepjet, she should have known. Not quite one of Bush' calibre yet, but an embarresing one nonetheless.

The 'clear and present danger' to society in Britain is it's catastrophic drift away from Biblical Christianity. Britain was 'Great' when she honoured God and His Word: her moral decay has increased as she has turned her back on godly standards.

'The nation that puts the Bible in the bin will not be far behind.'

To answer Philip,
You are attempting to rewrite much of human history. You overlook the boasted cruelties of pious kings and rulers such as Nebuchadnezzar, Ivan the Terrible and the Borgias, the Crusades, the Inquisition, the burning of witches and heretics, the Middle Age pogroms against Jews, the 17th century religious wars and all the other horrors committed in the name of a God or Gods when religion was more powerful within the state than it is in many countries today. In those where it is still a strong influence, such as Pakistan, a government minister can actually call for the killing of novelist Salman Rushdie simply because he received a novel and received a knighthood.

Do you mean the Britain that exploited Ireland and allowed a million to die of famine in the 19th century? Or the Britain that did the same throughout her Empire? Or the Britain that hanged homosexuals in the 19th century? Or the Britain that refused to introduce old-age pensions in the late 19th century, decades after other countries in Europe? Or the Britain that refused to introduce a law against cruelty to animals in the late 19th century?

You are also ignoring the religious dimension of our local problem. Indeed you seem blind to the effects of religious conflicts between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland, Christians and Muslims in the Lebanon, Orthodox Serbs, Catholic Croats and Muslims in the former Yugoslavia, Jews and Muslims in Palestine, and Christians and Muslims and Sunni and Shiite Muslims in Iraq, to name but a few,(see Hitchens鈥檚 second chapter in God is not Great: 鈥楻eligion Kills鈥�).

And, Philip, don鈥檛 talk to me about the evil 鈥榯otalitarian secular states of the 20th century鈥�. For it was not their secularism that made them brutal: it was their fanatical political ideologies. As Hitchens says, those who invoke the 鈥榮ecular鈥� tyranny of Hitler and Mussolini ignore the connection between the Christian churches and fascism, and the capitulation of the churches to national socialism. Hitler, in any case, was not an atheist, as Alan Bullock makes absolutely clear in his famous biography. He was brought up a Catholic, stated that he applied what he learned from the Jesuits to his own party and also thought he had a mission to fulfil God鈥檚 plan: 鈥淚n attacking the Jews, I am doing the Lord鈥檚 work鈥� (Mein Kampf). Stalin, of course, trained to be a priest and also applied his knowledge of the Russian Orthodox faith to his own secular religion.

To answer Deepjet:
The BHA has several thousand members, but of course there are numerous other humanist groups throughout the UK, including the Humanist Association of Northern Ireland, whose membership is in the hundreds. These numbers may be relatively small but, as Polly implied, humanists are freethinkers and therefore strong individualists who tend to be averse to joining groups where there may be pressure to conform to a 鈥榞roup鈥� opinion. In opinion polls about 30% of the people of GB say that they do not believe in a god, and according to the 2001 NI census, 14% in the province declared that they had no religion. As humanist groups know only too well, the demand for non-religious funerals is rising all the time, and the vast majority of ceremonies are for people who were not members of the local groups.

Yet unless we humanists organise and join together, churches and religious groups will continue to have an undue influence on society. They will continue largely to determine laws on dying, on abortion, on homosexuality, RE school syllabuses, and even in some cases whether or not we go to war. On the last point, there is no doubt that the Iraq War was a kind of holy crusade, led in the west by two 鈥榚vangelical鈥� Christians who appealed to a 鈥榟igher power鈥� than the electorate 聽鈥� a very dangerous development in a democracy, especially if the hawks are now encircling Iran. 鈥楬oly Wars鈥� by Islamists are another side of this 鈥榥ew fanaticism.
So the 鈥榗lear and present danger鈥� of which Polly speaks is only too real.

Cheers,
Brian

Philip:

The clear and present danger is from creationists and other fundamentalists who want to hijack our schools and destroy science.

Hi all, I posted this item 12 hours ago. The Devil must have consigned it to the flames. Let's hope Auld Nick is busy with the Christians

To answer Philip,
You are attempting to rewrite much of human history. You overlook the boasted cruelties of pious kings and rulers such as Nebuchadnezzar, Ivan the Terrible and the Borgias, the Crusades, the Inquisition, the burning of witches and heretics, the Middle Age pogroms against Jews, the 17th century religious wars and all the other horrors committed in the name of a God or Gods when religion was more powerful within the state than it is in many countries today. In those where it is still a strong influence, such as Pakistan, a government minister can actually call for the killing of novelist Salman Rushdie simply because he received a novel and received a knighthood.

You are also ignoring the religious dimension of our local problem. Indeed you seem blind to the effects of religious conflicts between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland, Christians and Muslims in the Lebanon, Orthodox Serbs, Catholic Croats and Muslims in the former Yugoslavia, Jews and Muslims in Palestine, and Christians and Muslims and Sunni and Shiite Muslims in Iraq, to name but a few,(see Hitchens鈥檚 second chapter in God is not Great: 鈥楻eligion Kills鈥�).

And, Philip, don鈥檛 talk to me about the evil 鈥榯otalitarian secular states of the 20th century鈥�. For it was not their secularism that made them brutal: it was their fanatical political ideologies. As Hitchens says, those who invoke the 鈥榮ecular鈥� tyranny of Hitler and Mussolini ignore the connection between the Christian churches and fascism, and the capitulation of the churches to national socialism. Hitler, in any case, was not an atheist, as Alan Bullock makes absolutely clear in his famous biography. He was brought up a Catholic, stated that he applied what he learned from the Jesuits to his own party and also thought he had a mission to fulfil God鈥檚 plan: 鈥淚n attacking the Jews, I am doing the Lord鈥檚 work鈥� (Mein Kampf). Stalin, of course, trained to be a priest and also applied his knowledge of the Russian Orthodox faith to his own secular religion.

To answer Deepjet:
The BHA has several thousand members, but of course there are numerous other humanist groups throughout the UK, including the Humanist Association of Northern Ireland, whose membership is in the hundreds. These numbers may be relatively small but, as Polly implied, humanists are freethinkers and therefore strong individualists who tend to be averse to joining groups where there may be pressure to conform to a 鈥榞roup鈥� opinion. In opinion polls about 30% of the people of GB say that they do not believe in a god, and according to the 2001 NI census, 14% in the province declared that they had no religion. As humanist groups know only too well, the demand for non-religious funerals is rising all the time, and the vast majority of ceremonies are for people who were not members of the local groups.

Yet unless we humanists organise and join together, churches and religious groups will continue to have an undue influence on society. They will continue largely to determine laws on dying, on abortion, on homosexuality, RE school syllabuses, and even in some cases whether or not we go to war. On the last point, there is no doubt that the Iraq War was a kind of holy crusade, led in the west by two 鈥榚vangelical鈥� Christians who appealed to a 鈥榟igher power鈥� than the electorate 聽鈥� a very dangerous development in a democracy, especially if the hawks are now encircling Iran. 鈥楬oly Wars鈥� by Islamists are another side of this 鈥榥ew fanaticism.
So the 鈥榗lear and present danger鈥� of which Polly speaks is only too real.

Philip says that Britain was great when she honoured god and his word. When was this? Was it the time when, as Jomo Kenyatta put it, the British came and asked his people to kneel down and pray, but when they opened their eyes, all their land was gone? Was British exploitation of Africa a 'godly' standard?

Or was it during the Famine years of the mid-19th century when 1 million Irish people were allowed to starve because of the prevailing British philosophy of laissez-faire? Was exploitation of Ireland a 'godly' standard?

Or was it during the closing years of the 19th century when the government refused to introduce a basic pension, even though Germany and other states had had it for decades? Was exploitation of her own old and poor a 'godly' standard

Come on, Philip, be a bit more specific. when was this golden 'biblical' period when Britain was great?

Polly is in top form in today鈥檚 Guardian, lambasting Boris Johnson as a 鈥榯off, self-absorbed sociopath and serial liar, who has never run anything except his own image鈥�. In unsparing language, she fully exposes the British obsession with personalities rather than issues. The extracts from Alastair Campbell鈥檚 Diaries were a further example, with Today last week devoting nearly half an hour to the personalised whimpering of another self-obsessed politico. The real issues, such as the emasculation of Parliamentary democracy by Blair, Campbell and Tony鈥檚 other cronies, were almost totally ignored. Do real politics, apart from what celebrities and royalty do and say, count for anything in the UK?

Having read Polly鈥檚 full article, and not just the headline that you quoted Brian, I would have to totally agree with her assessment of Boris Johnston鈥檚 candidature for the mayoralty of London. If the Tories want to be taken seriously as an alternative government then they need to bury embarrassments like Boris Johnston. But then again it shows the nadir that politics has reached in the eyes of most people in the UK when Boris would be considered one of the best known politicians in the country. Remember, it wasn鈥檛 that long ago that the Tories used to pour scorn on 鈥楥hatshow Charlie鈥� Kennedy!

Boris Johnston is no more of an embarrassment to the Conservative Party than what Ken Livingston is to the Labour party. He is in good company.At least he cycles around London.

Dear me, Brian and Gerard - I do seem to have touched a raw nerve!

I was not suggesting any such 'golden age' (Brian seems to have responded to many things I haven't said....the words 'straw man' come to mind!)- but even the worst kind of historical revisionism (ie lying about history) cannot deny that Britain was strong as a nation when her Christian principles were also strong. (Many social reformers were also committed Christians...Barnardo, Wilberforce, Shaftesbury, Elizabeth Fry etc) Can we honestly suggest that Britain is in a better moral state today?

Seems to me a little honesty is required. Is that too much to ask?

Hi Philip,
Why do you introduce personal remarks into the argument. I didn't. I tried to stick to the issues.
So I'm dishonest, am I? How? It was YOU who referred to a period when Britain was great because 'she honoured god and his word'. It seems quite reasonable to ask when this period was. Pointing to individuals like Wilberforce, Fry, etc, proves absolutely nothing except that there are reformers in any period who want to make the world a better place. Do you mean the 19th century, then, since the examples you cite are from that period? Well, despite their efforts, black people were still treated badly, children slaved at work for a pittance, prisons were overcrowded (and still are). In fact, for most people in the 19th century in Britain. life was pretty miserable.

Grow up, man. The western world is a better place today for many, and the improvemenrts often came in spite of and not because of 'adherence to god's word'. Obstacles to further improvement often come from those who 'honour god's word'. Homophobia and bigotry are good examples.