Apr 07 2007
Christians and society
Yesterday I attended the Churches of Wokingham together act of public witness for Good Friday.
We started with a short service in the Methodist Church, walked to the Market Place with the cross, spent an hour hearing the four gospels and singing hymns, and then walked to one of the Anglican Churches for a short concluding service.
About 250 people came out of a town population of some 30,000. The Bishop of Reading joined us, and carried the cross on the second leg of its journey.
??The Church organisers decided that we should walk on the road rather than on the pavements. Several had been designated to hold up and direct traffic. In the modern health and safety idiom they wore fluorescent jackets and carried mobile phones to talk to each other.
I suggested that we use the pavements to make things easier. The organisers wished to use the road, and most walked on the road under their guidance. The procession delayed people in cars for just a few minutes.
??Several car drivers became angry, sounded their horns and then performed high speed manoeuvres to get past the walking party by overtaking on the other side of the road and cutting back just before bollards got in their way.
??The tension was evident. No harm was done. Forty or fifty people were a few minutes later for whatever their next activity would be on a Bank Holiday. Some Christian walkers were upset by the visible annoyance of some fellow citizens.
??Was the Christian community right to use the road on their special day? Or were the motorists right, that England is no longer sufficiently Christian for the majority to tolerate unusual use of the road?
I would be interested in your thoughts. It is a small example of the new tensions arising in our instant gratification?? consumer society where some of the old give and take and some of the old assumptions have gone.
John Redwood has been the Member of Parliament for Wokingham since 1987. First attending Kent College, Canterbury, he graduated from Magdalen College...
John, I suspect this will open up a veritable can of worms. I’m an agnostic (and have been called a “cowardly atheist”). I see religion as an inconvenience for society, causing more trouble than it is worth. I don’t care who walks on the roads, as long as it is notified, and alternate routes posted. Did your group do this spontaneously? If so, I entirely understand people getting angry. If you told the police of your intentions, and the public were notified, e.g., press and local radio, then you were in the right. But, please don’t think that just because you were a religious group, that gave you an automatic right to inconvenience people.
By the way, thank you for your blog, it’s excellent!
Thanks - I’m glad you liked the blog.
For my part I thought it would have been better if everyone had kept to the pavements to avoid the obvious conflict.
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His Grace is of the view that offence was unnecessarily caused by this decision.
It is one thing to witness for one’s faith, but quite another when that witness causes irritation or frustration with matters that are quite irrelevant to that witness. The decision to walk on the road is perceived as arogance, rather than a sign of humility, and car drivers were justifiable in their expressions.
For what His Grace’s opinion is worth, the march should have been along the pavement, and Christians should have got out of the way for pedestrians. It is not that Christians should not and do not have the right to march along the Queen’s highway; it is simply that 40 people is not 400. While the latter would be a considerable statement justifying use of the road, the former would appear as an irritating or ‘cultic’ minority.
How would any of you feel if 40 Muslims were marching along the road celebrating Eid, and your journey were delayed by 5 minutes or so?
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Though I’m sure the motorists could have shown a little more restraint I would have to side with them. Roads are for cars, pavements are for people. If you weigh the inconveniences up against one another, surely the Church goers could have walked on the pavement and delayed their own journey for a few minutes rather than taking the law into their own hands and delaying everyone else.
I’ve been to many shows, fairs, etc … and if we all decided to take to the roads instead of the pavement their would be chaos. Above anything else, it’s just dangerous to comandeer a road at the drop of a hat.
I don’t think it’s a sign of new tensions between traditional society and a consumer society. Just common courtesy on everyone’s part; motorist or pedestrian.
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In this parish beating the bounds is done on the pavement, although I haven’t seen it done for years, but the roads are closed for a Sikh ceremony where they walk around giving out sweets.
I would prefer that the roads were shut properly and cars made to wait for the time these things take.
In this Parish church attendance is rising because of two energetic vicars. Christianity is at the root of much of England’s culture and should be celebrated. After all, if Christianity is right other faiths or belief systems are wrong.
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I’d say it depends whether they had the correct permissions to walk down the road. Bureaucratic, yes, but we have a system and it is better if people follow it.
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At the top of my street is the local Methodist church. Every Easter Sunday they process up the middle of the road on their way to their Mass carrying banners. It’s a long road and the disruption is considerable, but they have the permission of the local elected busybodies.
As usual, I was in the pub and could see all of this passing outside through the window. This year, however, one of the more enthusiastic celebrants broke off from the mob and ran into the bar shouting “You’re all damned, you’re all going to Hell”.
We all drank on, safe in our before-lunch alcoholically-reinforced atheism. I have no objection to God-bothering but please just include me out. Walk on the pavements, or even better, nag the local council for a car park right next to the church and just keep the organ volume turned down a bit lower. Sorry.
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