The Ballad of Church and State

Certain senior individuals within the Church of England have recently been very vocal in their opposition to changes to the UK's marriage laws; changes designed to allow gay and lesbian couples to marry (Malnick & Moreton, 2012).

Their stance opposes the coalition junior partner Liberal Democrats, whose leader Mr Nick Clegg has affirmed that equal marriage is a matter of 'when not if' (Grice, 2012).

The conflict brewing here has all facets of a self-made problem - one likely to afflict any state church. Once established at the heart of a nation, particularly at the heart of a democracy, it becomes bound to the tides of those people. For the Church of England, its struggle is with a core ideal of democratic society - that those who have to obey the laws have the right to make them.

Continued opposition to reforms that fit that democratic basis - in this case by denying a group the right to peacefully express themselves (in love of all things) - only serves to question the validity of that establishment's own authority.

The deeply conservative landowning class that dominated the House of Lords discovered this in opposition to the Liberal welfare reforms of the early 1900s - their attempts to use their unelected institutional power to trammel democratic reforms resulted in reforms of the House of Lords that largely stripped it of its powers.

The best defence of liberty has always been defending the liberty of others. To support each individual in their right to think, speak and live freely & peacefully. The arbitrary outlawing of individuals or entire groups within a society flies in the face of this and is a dangerous road for any democracy to travel down.

There have already been calls to disestablish the church as part of the British state (Jenkins, 2012). The upcoming general synod of the Church of England will be an important event for the church - where it must largely decide whether to reform, to challenge or to depart from its privileged position within the UK's establishment.

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References:
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+ Edward Malnick & Cole Moreton's 'Bishops rebel against Church marriage policy'; in The Telegraph; 24 June 2012.

+ Andrew Grice's 'Moves to block gay marriage "a waste of time"'; in The Independent; 21 June 2012.

+ Simon Jenkins' 'The marriage of church and state is anything but gay'; in The Guardian; 12 June 2012.