Should the church have a place in politics?

A friend of mine says that Christians shouldn’t be involved in economics and policy because we believe that 3 are the same as 1.  A bit of Trinity-based humour from him which ignores some rather complex theology. Despite the good humour meant, it’s a view expressed now and then by people who think the Church has no place interfering in politics. Usually these voices get louder when the Church isn’t speaking in support of their particular world-view.

And yet, here we are, in 21^st century Britain and the Church is giving voice as it has done over the centuries. History has a long list of Church leaders speaking out on the nation’s politics and economics from Thomas Becket on religious liberty, Wilberforce on slavery, John Howard and Elizabeth Fry on prison reform, Thomas Barnardo on destitution and poverty, William Temple on education, through 1985’s ‘Faith in the city’ report to last month’s letter decrying the current government’s lack of intervention to end hunger and poverty in Britain today. Christians are unafraid of being turbulent though, as a rule, we prefer to avoid the outcome of Becket.

The letter from the Bishops gave voice to many who are suffering up and down the country, highlighting the plight of those who are experiencing hunger. It draws attention to half a million people who’ve visited foodbanks over the last 12 months and calls specifically for the government to investigate food markets, make sure work pays, and ensure the welfare system provides ‘a robust last line of defence against hunger’.

It is this last request that Christians on the Left are going to be exploring at this year’s Tawney Dialogue on Wednesday 19^th March. Shadow secretary of state for welfare Rachel Reeves will be joined by Anna Rowlands, Lecturer in theology at Kings College London, to work out whether Welfare is a moral responsibility or a sinful waste.

The church places a strong emphasis on the moral duties of the state but is also concerned with the growth of a plural welfare society. There is recognition that the common good cannot be achieved by the state alone and requires participation at all levels of society.

The justice of the welfare society should be distributive, contributive and commutative. Firstly, welfare should be concerned with the fair distribution of means to ensure basic needs are met. Secondly, there’s a duty to contribute actively to the system of which we are a part; and that to make a contribution we must have freedom to shape the laws to which we will be subject. We need both freedom and duty to contribute to – and a willingness to work actively for – the good of our society. Finally, but vitally, commutative welfare is justice as a form of person-to-person conduct working relationally as people to ensure justice and charity meet.

The balance between these three areas is ground for debate. Do we have too much distribution? Should we look closer at elements of the contributory principle in schemes such as Workfare? How does a Labour government generate social, political and economic structures that promote and provide welfare which has as its goal both basic material subsistence and helps structure self-interest towards active social, political and economic participation?

These things plus the creeping practice of welfare privation as a form of social control are just some of the many areas we’ll be covering in our annual RH Tawney Dialogue which takes place this Wednesday, 19 March at 6:30pm. It’s held at Methodist Central Hall, Storey’s Gate, Westminster.

Rob Carr is the communications manager for Christians on the Left , the new name for the Christian Socialist Movement