The Most Rev Vincent Nichols declared that faith groups must be free to “speak from their traditions”, and that their involvement in national debates “enriches democracy”.
He warned that if respect for a wide range of opinions is abandoned, society will deteriorate into a situation where we become “either dominators or dominated”, while the abandonment of Christian teachings puts us on “shifting sands”.
The Archbishop of Westminster likened being a member of a particular denomination to being in a choir, as he argued that religion helps people come together as a group without losing their individual identity.
He also said that groups of people who share experiences such as “hill-walking and bird-watching” come to experience a “surge of awe” that can lead to spiritual experiences.
His comments on society, in a lecture delivered on Wednesday evening at the Thomas More Institute in Hampstead, a think-tank set up by the Opus Dei group, echoed those made by the Pope during his historic visit to Britain last year when he urged the faithful not to be silenced by “aggressive secularism”.
But the Archbishop, the most senior Catholic in England and Wales, sounded a more optimistic note when he said that the reactions to Benedict XVI’s visit “suggest that new opportunities may be emerging”.
“Slowly a new place for religious belief in the public square is being marked out, not with a power or desire to impose religious beliefs or their consequences, but with the recognition that a mature and enlightened public square should reflect the beliefs of those who share its space, in dialogue with one another and with secular protagonists, to the enrichment of all,” he said.
“The secular public square should not be faith-blind but faith-sensitive, welcoming and testing reasoned argument. Religious voices should not expect special privilege because they are religious, but nor should they be excluded either. And whilst public authorities will rightly seek to justify their actions by reference to reasons which all can accept, in contributing to public debate religious and faith voices should be free to speak from their traditions as well as to adduce reasons in their support. Encouraging their willing and full participation enriches democracy and at the same time facilitates the necessary dialogue between the world of secular rationality and the world of faith.”
In a further reference to the risk of abandoning traditional religious teachings, he said: “The rejection of the wisdom and foundations of the past – as with the place of Christianity in Western culture – does not give us unrestricted freedom to do what we like now, but puts us in danger of building on shifting sands which have not been tested for their stability or their capacity to bear the weight of our culture.”
The Archbishop went on to say that one of the most urgent tasks in the world today is “exploring the reality of the diversity of human living”.
“Give up on respect for diversity, and we are impoverished and eventually become either dominators or dominated.”
He described the importance of faith as a basis for community, and a defence against loneliness, pointing out that the church is one of the few places where “people from all different classes” sit next to each other “and assume both an equality and a mutual identity”.
The Archbishop also said: “Once a group of people, sharing experiences of one sort or another – be it hill-walking, art, bird-watching or music – begin to ponder on the depth of their shared interest, then the invitation to wonder, the surge of awe, will come to the fore.
“Then they are entering into the preambles of religious faith, into its foothills, and careful accompaniment can indeed lead the search into the realms of the gifts of revelation.”
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