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Should Britain become an official secular state?

In a sense we already are secular. Secular weddings etc. I think the UK would solve many problems and I don't see why people would oppose secularism. There's nothing wrong with it and there is a lot of common misconceptions about it too which spring from religious 'reasoning'.

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Reply 1

The Angry Stoic

Aren't we already? Is there anyone still clinging to the idea we are an Aglican Christian State?

Reply 2

Skip_Snip

Laws shouldn't be based on the words of a 2000 year old imaginary friend. Secularism all he way

Reply 3

BaronessMiller

No! We should become 100% Puritan as opposed to CoE, Muslims, Catholics, Atheists etc.

Reply 4

Morgsie

Kick them out of the Lords, they do contribute to debates but they will disrupt the gay marriage Bill. They have already intervened on this Bill hence the government climbdown

(edited 11 years ago)

Reply 5

The Angry Stoic

Original post by G8D

Culturally we're fairly secular but our head of state is still the symbolic head of the church and the church still has influence in our democratic processes through its 25(?) peers in the House of Lords.

Then we are a religious state in the same way Trajan's Roman was a Republic!

(History Reference FTW)

Reply 6

Hopple

I think we're doing alright as is, in the same way that we're doing alright having an unelected monarch. That said, I wouldn't oppose clearing the spiritual lords out the House of Lords, include the hereditary peers too.

Reply 7

Will Lucky

Original post by Morgsie

Kick them out of the Lords, they do contribute to debates but they will disrupt the gay marriage Bill. They have already intervened on this Bill hence the government climbdown

Forget that, scrap the Lords. Replace it with another elected house.

And yes by all means Secular state.

Reply 8

rcummins1

Can we change the national anthem while we're at it? I don't believe in God or support the monarchy, so singing about both of them doesn't make me feel very patriotic.

(edited 11 years ago)

Reply 9

forfrosne

Yes, we're far behind the rest of the modern world on this. There is no place for state religion in a true democracy.

Reply 10

L i b

Original post by Jacob :)

Aren't we already? Is there anyone still clinging to the idea we are an Aglican Christian State?

The UK has two state churches: one Anglican, one Presbyterian.

And yes, we clearly are an officially Protestant Christian state. The head of state effectively has to be one, there are bishops in our legislature, there is a significant special position given to church law, the sovereign appoints the nation's chief cleric, there is compulsory religious observance in state schools, our major public buildings have chaplins and chaplaincies, there are laws about how business may be transacted on sacred days, virtually every official logo - whether a policeman's cap badge or the letterhead of an HMRC tax return - has Christian symbolism in the form of the cross.

I could go on for a hell of a while on this one. This country is about as far from being officially secular as you can get without being an overt theocracy.

Reply 11

JackS94

Even if religion has a minor sway over politics, that's too much. We should have had secularism centuries ago.

Reply 12

ChocoCoatedLemons

Yeah, ditch it. There's absolutely no reason to keep it.

Reply 13

luca-cunn

Definitely, religion is a bronze age creation, an attempt at explaining a world we knew nothing about with poor resources we now laugh at. One day we'll laugh at organized religion just like we laugh at the idea of our planet being flat.

As Hitchens wrote; "The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species."

Reply 14

Cannotbelieveit

Religion should play absolutely no part in politics, quite frankly having bishops in the House of Lords is backward.

However I don't think complete secularisation is necessary, the Queen is head of the COE after all.

(edited 11 years ago)

Reply 15

sevchenko

Original post by Cannotbelieveit

ask yourself what is the purpose of the HOL? Then ask yourself why multi faith figures are in there.

Reply 16

Rakas21

'Yes'.

Lib points out a few very good points that would need to be addressed however religion is collapsing in the UK and as a modern western democracy i believe that we should become an officially secular state.

Reply 17

sevchenko

Original post by Morgsie

Kick them out of the Lords, they do contribute to debates but they will disrupt the gay marriage Bill. They have already intervened on this Bill hence the government climbdown

Original post by forfrosne

Yes, we're far behind the rest of the modern world on this. There is no place for state religion in a true democracy.

The whole point of a democracy is fair and equal representation for everyone in our society. A Democracy where a group of people are denied an input into a legislative process is not a "true democracy".

Whether you like it or not according to the 2011 census there is a large, yet declining, Christian population within this country. There is also a significantly rising population of Muslims in this nation, the Hindu population has risen and so has the Sikh. All of these groups need some form of representation and consolation in legislative process or this could lead to Laws that do not respect their religion.

We've seen it already working fine in the past. Most Bishops were in favour of gay marriages as long as priests weren't forced to conduct them in Churches, that's why they forced a consolation and revision of the Law. The Bishops don't care what happens outside the Church.

According to the Road Traffic Act 1988 Sikh's, if wearing a turban, don't have to wear a helmet when riding a motorbike.

The use of special Sharia courts in the UK.

Reply 18

Elelia

Original post by JackS94

Even if religion has a minor sway over politics, that's too much. We should have had secularism centuries ago.

This.
It should have been done long ago, its ridiculous that they can sway politics

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Reply 19

username402722

Recent actions of parliament almost seem to be the behaviour of a secular state. I want to see religion respected, not an established church, and the monarch have a choice about their faith. Prince Charles's idea that the monarch should be a 'defender of faiths' seems a sensible one, embodying the idea that in the UK we allow religious worship and no longer persecute someone on the basis of their faith.