Blair thinking of converting, says Catholic priest

[Khephra]

Blair thinking of converting, says Catholic priest

Sam Jones
Friday October 15, 2004
The Guardian

Speculation over Tony Blair's choice of faith strengthened last night after a priest who often says mass for the Blair family said the prime minister was seriously contemplating converting to Catholicism.

Fr Timothy Russ, of the Immaculate Heart of Mary church in Great Missenden, near Chequers, said he had discussed the matter of conversion with Mr Blair. But he stressed the decision was "a personal one, not a political one".

"I'd say normally speaking, if you have someone committed like him, then yes, he will become a Catholic," he said yesterday, but added that he could not see the prime minister joining the Catholic church in the near future.

"He didn't say to me, 'Can I become a Catholic?' What he said to me was, 'Can the prime minister be a Catholic?'"

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/labour/story/0,9061,1328161,00.html

[Mandate My Ass]

1. I guess he wants absolution

Good luck with that, Tony.

[teryang]

2. Right, he wants to confess

All those dead for the Queens equity accounts are weighing heavily.

[rooboy]

3. The Catholics might get his body, but satan already has his soul. n/t

[T_i_B]

4. If Blair wants to be Catholic

Then I say :thumbsup:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;sessionid=20P2BHRPDC00ZQFIQMFCM54AVCBQYJVC?xml=/news/2004/10/15/ncath15.xml&sSheet=/portal/2004/10/15/ixportal.html&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=74030

A priest who regularly conducts Mass for Tony Blair and his family refuelled speculation yesterday that the Prime Minister intends becoming a Roman Catholic.

Fr Timothy Russ, whose parish includes Chequers, disclosed that Mr Blair, an Anglican, had raised the question of conversion with him and said: "If you ask me do you think he wants to become a Catholic, I would say yes."

Fr Russ indicated, however, that he did not believe that Mr Blair would take such a step while Prime Minister and suggested that he had "some way to go" on important moral issues.

Mr Blair, a High Church Anglican, regularly attends Mass at Chequers with his wife Cherie and three children, who are Catholics, and he took part in a private service in the Vatican during a recent visit to Rome.

[KoKo]

5. What's with Bush and Blair! They both use "religion" when they get in

trouble. Yes....Blair would need alot of confessing and mending of his ways. One is his "sin of pride." To leak this to deflect that he refuses to apologize to Parliament.

Bush/Blair...same games.

[AP]

9. Blair's spirituality has been the subject of discussion since 1997.

And he was never 'born again' by the way. That was a lie that was spread based on things he was trying to say about his struggle between the C of E and Catholicism.

[AP]

18. ...and, btw, the Tories tried to use his family's Catholicism against...

...Blair.

But, thank god, the Tories' religious bigotry was one of many legacies of Thatcherism that people were willing to throw away when they elected Labour to a majority in 1997.

Incidentally, under the Race Discrimation Act in the UK, religious discrimination was not against the law. It wasn't because they didn't think they had a problem. I strongly suspect that it was because they knew how disruptive it would be to make religious discrimination illegal after the Tories had founded so much of what they stood for during the Thatcher years (and before) upon anti-Catholicism.

I believe the EU anti-discrimination laws now incorporate religion as a protected category, but I'm not sure if that's the case.

[muriel_volestrangler]

24. You're imagining things that weren't there

"the Tories had founded so much of what they stood for during the Thatcher years (and before) upon anti-Catholicism."

Simply not true. There are plenty of Catholic Conservative politicians - take this article, talking about Blair and Catholicism:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/htmlContent.jhtml?html=/archive/1998/03/05/ncath05.html

It is thought that Mr Blair went to the Sunday evening Mass at Westminster which is often attended by the Duchess of Kent, the Tory MP Ann Widdecombe, Kevin MacNamara, the Labour backbencher, and John Battle, the energy minister.

Other politicians who worship at the cathedral are John Gummer, Chris Patten and Michael Portillo.
...
Lord St John of Fawsley, a constitutional expert and a Roman Catholic, said: "I am delighted to hear this very good news. It shows that Mr Blair is spiritually both a committed and an open person."

Widdecombe, Gummer, Patten, Portillo and St John are Conservatives; MacNamara and Battle are Labour. Iain Duncan Smith, the last Tory leader, is also Catholic. Ironically, the original Tory politicians had distinct Jacobite (and thus Catholic) tendencies - the word comes from a name for Catholic Irish outlaws.

If Thatcher had been 'anti-Catholic', she would hardly have been given the highest honour awarded by the Catholic Church.

[AP]

26. Tories used fear of the IRA the way Bush uses fear of Muslims. The result

was a tollerance of a LOT of religious bigotry.

Your argument above is the equivlaent of saying that because Condi and Collin are black, blacks are conservative and that Bush represents the interests of black Americans.

The FACT is that things like anti-catholicism in the school yard and office and in your neighborhoods when the marchers came through fed into a bigger political sentiment which helped Thatcher cast britain as a dangerous place in need of an iron fist and not so much in need of some wealth redistribution down to the people. So long as they're keeping you alive, who cares about economic opportunity, eh? And the Tories loved religious bigotry.

[muriel_volestrangler]

29. Your argument is complete bollocks

I have shown, time and again, that there are plenty of Catholic Tories, and that the Catholic church is quite happy with Mrs. Thatcher. Yet, having read the article that showed that, you still call her anti-catholic! All you do is state your opinions without any foundation for them at all.

It's time you found out about Britain before pontificating on it (pun intended). You cannot extend the attitudes in Northern Ireland to Britain.

Fear of the IRA was based on the fact that they bombed people (including, of course, Mrs. Thatcher). You cannot take the IRA as representative of Catholics.

"Your argument above is the equivlaent of saying that because Condi and Collin are black, blacks are conservative and that Bush represents the interests of black Americans".
No. That would be the equivalent of me saying that Catholics are Conservative. I have not said that. I do claim that Roman Catholic stances on many social matters are less liberal than those of the C of E. You have not actually bothered to address that yet - you just keep claiming that Tories are anti-Catholic, with no evidence, and that therefore Blair is making some political statement by thinking about converting. That is rubbish.

Your equating race and religion is bizarre too.

[AP]

30. And there are black Republicans. So?

- Do you have NO Catholic friends who live in the UK?

- Do you think that it's bizarre that the Race Relations Act in NI treats religious discrimination and race discrimination exactly the same? That act equates race and religion.

Don't you think it's interesting that they left on religion from the Race Relations Act in E&W and Scotland?

(The RRA was the anti-discrimination statute for all forms of discrimination except sex discrimination, which had it's own specific act that, I believe, preceded the RRA by about 5 years. Between the two, they covered all actionable discrimination -- race, gender, national origin, and one or two other things...feel free to google).

- My point is not so much that Tories are anti-catholic. It's that the Tories have gotten a lot of mileage out of anti-catholicism, the same way that Republicans get mileage out of racism and bigotry in the US. It's also that catholicism is historically the religion of the oppressed minority in the UK, while the state religions are the religions of the oppressor. This all stems from anti-papism and the NI situation. For a PM to switch to catholicism so soon after...

Oh fuck it. I've made my point. Deny it all you want. You know it's true.

[AP]

27. By the way, from your article, I like Blair's quote:

Mr Blair said the aim of fostering dialogue between Christians, Jews and Muslims was “an integral part to strengthening cohesion between our communities“.

“I am proud that Britain is a country of many faiths and many cultures and that this diversity is seen by the overwhelming majority of decent people as one of our country’s strengths,” he said.

You know why he said this? Because this hasn't always been true in the UK. The divisiveness of religious bigotry, and especially anti-catholicism, had been pervasive throughout the Thatcher years, and is only now on the wane.

[MetaTrope]

6. Let's send Blair a hairshirt and some broken bottles to kneel on

}(

[Khephra]

7. He could join the Naked Crusade

(Re. the Sting SNL sketch)

[AP]

8. I think it would be tough being liberal and Anglican in Britian.

It's a dying religion -- the number of people going to church dwindles year over year. It's the state sponsored religion, which any thinking person has got to resist on an intellectual level, as well as a spiritual level. And it seems mostly to exist as a fuck you to Catholics.

For something so few people believe in it sure is the source of a lot of trouble. If a person in the UK had a great deal of faith and also had liberal tendencies, I can see how that would cause a crisis of consciousness for you if you were an Anglican. I'd respect Blair for converting to Catholicism.
 

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. Easier to be liberal, and C of E, than Catholic

They are happy with contraception; not so dogmatic on abortion, or divorce and remarriage; accept women priests (and married ones); and many are happy with homosexual priests. This is all far more liberal that the Roman Catholic church.

[AP]

11. Some of the biggest & best liberals I know are Catholic.

And in the UK a great deal of the Catholic vs Anglican debate lines up on the issue of whether it's right for the UK to colonize Ireland, and I'd rather be on the side of the Catholics in that debate.

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. I think you are 100 years out of date

The main debate of Anglican vs. Catholic in the past 20 years has been over women priests. That was why, for instance, the Tory Ann Widdecombe converted to Catholicism - she couldn't accept women priests. Ireland is not an issue at all.

[AP]

13. I think you need to spend a Saturday afternoon in Glasgow when Celtic...

...is playing the Rangers, or you need to step out the front door of your tenemant flat in your catholic neighborhood when the marchers are going by.

And Widdecombe is so far out on the lunatic fringe I don't see how anything she does can be evidence of what Catholicism stands for.

[muriel_volestrangler]

14. I think you need to learn the difference between England and Scotland

because there are precious few Church of England members in a Rangers crowd. The clue is in the name.

Everything I said in my post about the differences between Catholicism and Anglicanism on social matters was accurate. It's not impossible for a liberal to be Catholic - they just have to not follow Catholic dogma blindly. But no-one switches to Roman Catholicism because they find it more liberal than the Church of England. It's typically because they like more central control of the church beliefs, or object to a an Anglican viewpoint that they find too liberal or modern.

If you think that the Catholic church is attracting the lunatic fringe, I think that's a cause for concern for them.

If you want to find out about the differences between the two churches, I suggest you start here: The gaps between the Roman Catholic & Anglican churches

[AP]

16. Protestants vs Catholics. In NI the protestants where Rangers jerseys and

it's not for any reason other than the fact they don't like Catholics. They certainly aren't Church of Sctoland in NI.

EVERY religion has a lunatic fringe. I'm not going to hold opus dei against the catholic nuns who get murdered in central america because they're trying to help the poor. I'm not going to hold the 700 club against protestants.

[muriel_volestrangler]

20. You surely don't think that all Protestants are the same

I don't know if you are Christian, but you must know of the differences between, say, the Southern Baptists and Episcopalians in the USA - take their views on homosexuality, or women ministers.

You can't really take Rangers fans as the typical member of any church (any more than you can take Celtic fans as representatives of the RCs). The weird animosity between the 2 clubs does have connections to Northern Ireland; but note that Northern Ireland has more Presbyterians than Anglicans (348,742 vs. 257,788), so a typical Northern Irish Protestant is indeed closer to the Church of Scotland than the Church of England.

Really, the major reasons for converting from C of E to RC recently have been women priests, or a general sense of more 'tradition' in the RCs. If not, then it's some personal doctrinal reason. Take this as an example:

A spokesman for the duchess stressed that her conversion had nothing to do with current issues facing the Anglican church.

He said: "This is a long-pondered personal decision by the duchess and it has no connection with issues such as the ordination of women priests."

But some priests believe interest among the aristocracy has been spurred by recent Anglican departures from tradition.

Father Charles-Roux of St Ethelreda's in Holborn, central London, said many were not happy with the direction the Anglican church was taking.

"There's been a major change in their tradition and the people who belong to that tradition go back to what they are familiar with. They look for support in Rome," said Father Charles-Roux.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/14/newsid_2530000/2530695.stm

[Bridget Burke]

22. Wasn't there a time when the non-conformists were persecuted?

In Ireland, they were useful for keeping the Papists down. But they didn't have the same rights as members of the Church of Ireland.

[muriel_volestrangler]

32. non-conformists had some restrictions in England, certainly

such as not holding public office, until the 19th century, but they were allowed to worship freely in the 18th century in England, unlike Catholics. The same may well have been true in Ireland - I'm not sure.

[AP]

23. I think a politican CHOSING to be Catholic in the UK isn't

very different from, say, a white american president in about 1979 chosing to be black.

It's a choice to side with the historically oppressed rather than the oppressor hot on the heels of a historical period when bigotry against that group wasn't so rare.

Religious bigotry is on the wane in the UK, but you don't have to look far to find its manifestations today, and one place you can look is in NI where Rangers and Celtic jerseys mean a little more than, for example, a sentimental attachment to the team your da took you to see play when you were a wee lad.

You don't need to look much farther than protestant marchers refusing to alter their routes to avoid catholic neighborhoods (which they do all over the UK, and not just in Portadown). You don't have to look much farther than offices and school yards.

When Tony Blair switches to Catholicism, it says a little something about his courage on the one hand and about a changing Britian on the other hand.

And I do distinctly remember Tories trying to make a fuss about Tony's family being Catholic in 1997 in the hopes that people that protestants would get all anti-papist. That was pretty sick.

[muriel_volestrangler]

28. You have an incredibly distorted view of religion

especially in Britain. The idea that it's about siding with the oppressed is absurd. It's about doctrine, or tradition. Please, please, just find out about the Anglican church. Do you know any Anglicans at all? I'm an atheist now, but I did grow up as an Anglican, so I can answer most of your questions, I should think. Or just look on the web.

Yes, there is bigotry in Northern Ireland; as I said, the largest Protestant denomination there is Presbyterian.

If the Tories were anti-Catholic in 1997, then it was a damn quick conversion for them to elect one as their leader in 2001. They'd survived with plenty on their front bench before that.

[AP]

31. You have an incredibly large blind spot for a very recent history of...

...religious bigotry.

You want to talk about the marchers?

The Tories almost selected a GAY MAN as their leader in 2001. And that was pretty quick on the heals of a government that thrived on the notion of Little England and persistently looked backwards.

Desperate times require desperate measures.

[muriel_volestrangler]

33. If you mean the marchers in Ulster

then they aren't Conservatives. How many times do I have to tell you - you cannot take what happens in Northern Ireland as applying to Britain too? I'd have thought that was obvious to anyone, especially when politics are concerned - they elect completely different parties.

You still haven't refered to a single case of religious bigotry in England, or tied one to the Conservatives. You really don't seem to understand the position in Britain. The Church of England does not repress Catholics. The laws discriminating against Catholics were repealed in the 1830s. This is not "recent history".

Would you like to address the comparative liberality of Catholic social positions with those of the Church of England, since that was my originial point?

[AP]

35. Marching itself -- and they do it in England and Wales and in Scotland...

... is the annual signal to Catholic minority that the non-Catholic majority is still pretty hostile to your right to privately enjoy your life and your religion.

Religion is a pretty conservative institution, so we're not going to get anywhere talking about whether Blair is joining a more or less liberal religion by joining the catholic church. His wife is pretty liberal in my opinion, and she has been a life long catholic. So that's gotta be worth something.

But, again, I'm just going to repeat that there is a conflict that forms over religion in the UK, and no matter how much you want to pretend that it's about whether women can be priests, it's actually about colonization, and for a PM to switch to the religion that is historically the one of the oppressed and not the oppressor is an interesting thing, especially since in 1997 Conservatives had a little fucking anit-catholic religiously bigotted whisper campaign about his families religion and acted like the guy might take direction from the pope.

With the absense of racial differences, right wingers have historically (prior to the influx of racial minorities after the 1950s) used religion as the wedge issue. It didn't stop just because black people came along. Just look at the annual marches.

And, just a reminder, the law allowing anti-catholic discrimination might have been repealed, but under the Race Relation Act in E&W and S (unlike in NI) there is no cause of action for an act of religious discrimination and it is so surely because conservatives at the time the law was drafted knew that it would cover so many actions that were tolerated in the UK throughout the 80s and 90s that it create a huge mess.

[muriel_volestrangler]

36. I have never heard of any marches in England, Wales or Scotland

that have any anti-Catholic connotations at all. Where have you got this from?

I think we could get somewhere by comparing the attitudes of the Church of England and Roman Catholic church. You thought it was hard to a liberal and a member of the C of E. When I gave some examples of the differences between the 2 (and gave a link to a non-partisan site that discusses them), you've just ignored that, despite its relevance to your original supposition.

I've also given a link to a discussion of someone else converting from C of E to RC, which said that women priests were often a reason, and the greater reverence for tradityion in the RC church. You also ignore this; instead, with nothing to back you up, you are claiming that the difference is about colonization. Need I point out that Roman Catholic countries like Portugal, Spain and France were just as enthusiastic colonisers as Britain was? And that was 100 years ago or more.

The Race Relations Act came in in 1976 - under a Labour government.

What religious discrimination actions are you talking about? So far, you've just claimed they exist, without naming a single one.

Have you ever lived in Britain?

[AP]

37. Well that certainly explains a great deal.

Has there ever been a catholic PM, by the way? I honestly don't know. You know the US has had one catholic president. His religion was a campaign issue.

Of course the RRA was passed by a labour government. But it was the result of compromise with tories.

Religious discrimination: not getting a promotion because of your religion. Not getting hired because of your religion. Getting knifed because you're wearing a Celtic jersey.

Feel free to do a search of the religious discrimination case law relying on the RRA (NI) and tell me with a straight face that all the actions described NEVER happen in E&W and Scotland and magically only happen in NI.

Why do you think NI included religion as a protected category but they forgot to include in E&W and S? Do you really think it's because there's no religious discrimination anywhere other than NI?

[muriel_volestrangler]

41. So give me some proof there was compromise

on religious discrimination in the Act, especially to do with Catholics, with the Conservatives.

Give me examples of this discrimination happening. Show me it had anything to do with the Church of England.

With a straight face: religious discrimination has been nowhere near as big a problem in Britain as in Northern Ireland. When it does happen, the victims are far more likely to be Muslim or Jewish, than any Christian denomination. Yes, they passed laws banning religious discrimination in Northern Ireland because it was a serious problem there (it was what started 'The Troubles'); it was not in Britain. Glasgow does have this 'discrimination by proxy' of taking protestant and catholic sides with Rangers and Celtic; that is not Anglican. Neither is it part of 'the establishment'.

No, there hasn't been a Catholic PM. But don't just assume that because it was a campaign issue in the US over 40 years ago, it would be in the UK.

[AP]

45. Why do you think there's no cause of action for religious discrimination

in E&W&S, but there is in the equivalent act in NI?

Why in the world would you leave it out?

The catholic vs protestant conflict in the UK is 100 times worse in the US than it is in the US, and I'd say that if it was a big deal in the US 40 years ago in the US, it's probably still a bigish deal in the UK (especially without having the benefit of having a catholic PM to break the ice) -- just like a woman or a black US president would still be a big deal watershed moment even though we think the US isn't sexist and is 40 years past its worst moments with racism.

THAT'S what is significant about this story today. It says something about religion and diversity.

Some people who don't like labour will say it's about women priests and turning more conservative or opus dei. That's all total bullshit and only someone in a serious state of denial would say that, I believe.

[muriel_volestrangler]

62. Because, for the umpteenth time, it wasn't a serious problem in Britain

just in Northern Ireland. In 1976, NI got the Fair Employment Act, outlawing religious discrimination, and introducing affimrative action, but didn't get the Race Relations Act; Britain got the Race Relations Act. They (ie the Labour government - I see you still have no basis for your claim that conservatives did all this) passed the legislation to fix the problems they saw.

THIS STORY IS NOT SIGNIFICANT.

I only replied to your assinine first post because I still have some respect for the C of E (some of my family members still being in it, and it still produces some very good clerics, like Rowan Williams or Desmond Tutu), and your ignorant insults needed correcting. I now find your knowledge of Britain is laughably inaccurate, and needs more correction.

[AP]

39. By the way, I'm not debating the relative conservativeness of religions.

I'm not interested in debating ANY idea that comes from Anne Widecombe's head.

I'm debating the historical significance of a liberal PM leaving the CoE and becoming Catholic.

You don't want to talk about that honestly. I don't care to debate the relatvie merits of religions. What more do we have to say to each other?

[muriel_volestrangler]

42. But you did make a claim about the relative liberalness

You:

I think it would be tough being liberal and Anglican in Britain: It's a dying religion -- the number of people going to church dwindles year over year. It's the state sponsored religion, which any thinking person has got to resist on an intellectual level, as well as a spiritual level. And it seems mostly to exist as a fuck you to Catholics.

For something so few people believe in it sure is the source of a lot of trouble. If a person in the UK had a great deal of faith and also had liberal tendencies, I can see how that would cause a crisis of consciousness for you if you were an Anglican. I'd respect Blair for converting to Catholicism.

But after this curt dismissal ("a fuck you to Catholics"? Could you say a more ignorant thing?) when the examples of liberalness are shown, you try to change the subject. You really show no knowledge of the C of E at all in the 20th century, let alone the 21st.

The historical significance? Not much, really - we've had a Methodist PM recently. Anyway, Blair has denied it:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3746398.stm

But asked by reporters in Budapest, where Mr Blair is attending a Progressive Government conference, whether he was planning to convert, he said: "I am saying no.

"Don't they run this once a year? I think they do."

The Roman Catholic church is not a church of the oppressed in Britain. When people convert to it, the significant difference is that they are acknowledging the authority of the Pope. This changes some of the ideas you are meant to have (like transubstantiation), and the way you live your life (like no contraception). The structure of the church is similar, except for the Pope in charge of the international church. Colonization doesn't enter into it at all. Can you find a single example of someone for whom it did?

[AP]

43. That's the historical context.

- And I know many good liberals who are catholics and who feel the same way about which direction that wealth and power should flow in a society that works well that Cherie feels.

- NI is colonized by the English (and so is Scotland). Religion plays big part in the conflict in NI.

- Such a little thing -- transubstantion, king vs pope -- but I guess the difference it made was grand.

[DemBones DemBones]

46. Muriel, I am really puzzled by your opening sentence:

"I have never heard of any marches in England, Wales or Scotland that have any anti-Catholic connotations at all."

I think when the Orangemen go marching in Ulster, it's pretty clear who they dislike.

Why else do they make it a point to march through Catholic neighborhoods and remind them of an ancient Protestant victory over Catholics?

My family is from England. I grew up enjoying a great friendship with my English granny, attended Episcopal services with her. As an adult, I became a Catholic. When I visited family in England, I knew from some comments about "RCs" that it was best not to share that part of my life.

I have no idea whether there is more anti-Catholicism in the US or the UK, but there is too much in both countries.

[AP]

53. The UK is a nation where sports teams and neighborhoods are organized

by religion. That's what the marching is all about (and the do do it in places outside NI). They march through the catholic neighborhoods. They have a state religion. That's a problem regardless of the sort of theology the religion reflects. There are obvious problems with religion in the UK. That's what makes it even an issue that Blair is caught up in this religion question. If Bush wanted to change his religion it wouldn't get a fifth the spin that this story is getting. Why? Because people still have an issue with religion in the UK. And if people think this is some sign of Blair creeping towards conservativism, they're fools. It's creeping away from the conservativism of state sponsored religion and from religious bigotry.

[muriel_volestrangler]

60. No, that applies to NI and Glasgow

it does not apply to the UK as a whole (as far as Christian sects go, anyway; there are Muslim and Hindu neighbourhoods, and a very few Jewish areas).

I really don't think you realise how small a story this is in the UK. I haven't heard anything about it on TV or radio. It's turned up because a priest gave an interview to The Times, and some reporters have followed it up. Blair himself has dismissed it.

After a lot of searching, I have found there are some marches in the Glasgow area. For the rest of the country, it's something those crazy Northern Irish do. We couldn't even find a catholic neighbourhood in the rest of the country.

Given that US presidential candidates are asked about their religion in the debates, while UK politicians go through their lives without most people knowing what their religious views are at all (I had no idea that Iain Duncan Smith was RC - it was never mentioned as relevant when the Tories elected him, and I only found out when looking up links for this argument; some cabinet ministers are agnostic/atheist - they took an affirmation rather than an oath of allegiance, but I'm buggered if I can find out which, because no-one thinks it's worth recording), I would say that religion is a much smaller issue in the UK than the US - except Northern Ireland.

Really, I'm sure Blair's reasons are to do with his personal faith - he obviously likes worshipping in Catholic churches, but doesn't seem to think the formal change is necessary. The big issue in the past 15 years has been women priests - I've shown you the links. I suspect a few people who are anti-homosexual may leave the CofE for the RCs if the CofE gets any more liberal on the subject, but more will probably try to set up something on their own.

[muriel_volestrangler]

61. Yet again, I must stress you shouldn't use NI as typical of the UK

Yes, there are significant amounts of nutty Protestants and Catholics in NI. That's why I specified 'England, Wales or Scotland' - so why is it puzzling?

After searching on the web, I have found some marches around Glasgow. Maybe they are ashamed on them, and cover them up; maybe they are in fact harmless. Either way, they are unknown to the vast majority of this country. Only the jerks in NI get on the news.

I'm sorry to hear there are 'comments' from your English relatives about Roman Catholics. Most people don't give a toss - most people don't go to church anyway.

[T_i_B]

57. If I remember rightly

the laws discriminating against Catholics were repealed in 1828 to be precise by a VERY unwilling Duke of Wellington due to the prospect of civil war in Ireland after a Catholic had been elected to parliament.

These days on mainland Britain (not Ulster) sectarianism is VERY much on the slide, which is part of the reason why Labour made such inroads in 1997. I think that AP is totally underestimating how very secular Britain actually is these days.

[patcox2]

25. removed

[T_i_B]

56. Ever heard of Rowan Williams?

Our Archbishop of Canterbury is actually very much a liberal politically. Furthermore, the Anglican Church is VERY active in many liberal areas such as campaigning for debt relief, against climate change, against BNP racism etc. They have even managed to annoy David Blunkett before now by speaking out against his illiberal immigration policies, with Blunkett branding Rowan Williams a "hairy leftie". May I suggest you come over here and attend an Anglican service before pronouncing on the Anglican Church?

[KittyWampus]

15. Opus Dei

[IHateFundies]

19. Prince Charles is about to revert to Orthodoxy

and Charles has been promoting the cause of the anti-Papist Orthodox Monks on Mount Athos. Perhaps there is a fight brewing for control of the Church of England?

If Charles became king he could exercise his privilege as an Orthodox Christian Monarch to reorganize the establishment Anglican Church.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1214522,00.html

[RainDog]

44. surprised he doesn't convert to Hinduism so that

...you all know the punchline, right?

he can be reincarnated as a tampon.

[goforit]

48. Yikes!!!......That's a scarry group!!!

[meow2u3]

49. You took the words right off my keyboard

BTA, great minds think alike!

[daleo]

17. I thought the pope was against the Iraq invasion

Maybe Blair wants some political cover to pull U.K. troops out, or at least soften his image about this issue. On the cynical side he may be calculating that people will think he went into Iraq unwillingly if he is thinking of becoming a catholic, since the pope is against the war.

[muriel_volestrangler]

21. He was, but so was the Archbishop of Canterbury

so this wouldn't make any difference.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0713-04.htm

[daleo]

38. Good to know

I guess the pope just got a lot more coverage around the world for his stand.

[DemBones DemBones]

47. Yes, but the Archbishop of Canterbury's opposition was in the news.

Perhaps Pope John Paul II made more anti-war comments. Perhaps he got more publicity because there are so many more Catholics than Anglicans.

The head of the United Methodist Church -- to which Bush* belongs -- also spoke out against invading Iraq.

[daleo]

51. I would guess it is the fact there are so many Catholics

Also, the historical sweep of the Roman Catholic church gives it a certain gravitas in these matters, even though it has a far from spotless record in matters of war and peace.

[Forkboy]

34. First things first...he has to convert to feeling human being

[VegasWolf]

40. The war in Iraq - 10 Hail Mary's, siding with * -- eternal damnation!

New Information Shows Bush Indecisive, Paranoid, Delusional

[tuvor]

50. Expecting to be Kerry's poodle, eh? n/t

[Chicago Democrat]

52. WOW.... Well it will be a first and 400 years ago people died over that

issue.

Religion is the cause of more evil than Satan and all his minions.

-me, just now

[Chicago Democrat]

54. There is nothing wrong with converting.... Especially for a Prime Minister

England has alot to answer for its excesses and atrocities during the English Civil War and subsequent persecution of Catholics.


It pervades their culture, even their modern TV shows. Every Brit I have ever met is basically in denial of the many atrocities against Catholics and mostly extremely shallow in their faith. It is after all, something controlled by the queen, not exactly the ideal moral leader.

[leesa]

55. Can the PM be a Catholic? Or is this a convenient way for the slime

to ooze out of office?

[JohnKleeb]

59. If I read correct, a British monarch can't be Catholic

now if Blair does convert, he'll be the first Catholic PM I believe.

[chenGOD]

58. Wait..let me check the year....

Still 2004. Have we reverted to the dark ages again? Will Spain and Portugal fight England and the Netherlands on the open seas? Will the catholics convert the heathen heretics? And which order will prevail, the Franciscans or the Jesuits?

Find out next week in the "Crusades of the Blair Bush Holy Coalition"!!