Banning Christians from public services will damage society

Evangelical Alliance response to a report by the British Humanist Association.

30 November 2007

The Evangelical Alliance has responded to a report by the British Humanist Society. The report claims that religious organisations do not offer any distinctive benefits to the provision of public services and might even damage social cohesion due to discrimination on religious grounds.

Rev Joel Edwards, General Director of the Evangelical Alliance, commented, “A wealth of public service bodies are hugely motivated by their Christian faith to provide an effective service. If they were stripped of the right to express this motivation there would be an enormous hole that would not assist the social cohesion the BHA are so keen to foster. To wipe out faith convictions from public service would be like an artist being interrogated with every stroke of his brush.”

“It is so important that charities with a religious basis such as the Salvation Army, the Shaftesbury Society and faithworks are able to deliver public services in a Christian way. This also applies across the faith spectrum. As regards any question of discrimination, the Evangelical Alliance has made its views known in its submission to the discrimination law review.”

Malcolm Duncan, leader of faithworks, a Christian charity that exists to empower and inspire individual Christians and every local church to develop their role at the hub of their community, comments. “The report demonstrates a deep intolerance of any place for faith in the public square and completely misunderstands faith as a motivation. They are calling for faith to be removed from public services in a round about way – that’s not just wrong, it is misguided, dangerous and will doom communities to poorer services."

Thousands of charities and voluntary groups with a religious basis continue to do their work, whether publicly funded or not, and arguably make the largest contribution to the voluntary sector in the UK.