Gambling ënot a siní
-18/11/04
In a broadside against Christian campaigners, Tom Baldwi
Gambling ënot a siní
-18/11/04
In a broadside against Christian campaigners, Tom Baldwin writing in todayís Times newspaper, has pronounced that gambling ëis not a siní.
Singling out groups by name that have been lobbying for changes in the Governmentís new Gambling Bill he writes; ìI donít need lectures on morality from the Evangelical Alliance, the Salvation Army or the Daily Mail to know that opening American-style casinos in this country is a dumb policy.î
But, he suggests, ìthe forces being unleashed by the furoreî are ìmore troubling than the proposal itself.î
According to Baldwin, ìConcepts of vice and virtue are creeping back into our heroically secular British political culture.î
The ìmoral agendaî against gambling, he says, ìalso finds an echo in other current debates on smacking children, gay civil partnerships, smoking in public, 24-hour drinking and antisocial behaviour.î
ìWe have only to look across the Atlantic to see the dangers of mixing religion with politics. George Bush believes that God put him in the White House to fulfil His Will ó and he certainly would not have been re-elected this month without the help of millions of born-again Christian voters.î
Baldwin also directed criticism at the Prime Minister.
ìTony Blair is undoubtedly another fully pledged God-bothererî writes Baldwin. ìFor instance, when his Anglicanism was deemed to debar him taking Communion with his Catholic family, his letter to the late Cardinal Basil Hume ended with the phrase: ìWhat would Jesus say!î The Prime Minister has an obsessive interest in the links between Christianity and other Abrahamic faiths and has found time to read the Koran several times since entering Downing Street. ì
Issues such as gambling should ìnot be polluted by religion, nor lobbying from ëfaith groupsí suggests the columnist.
ìThe social and economic effects of new casinos should be sufficient to win the argument without reference to a set of religious beliefs formed 2,000 years ago in a faraway land.î
Apparently missing the fact that many Muslims are also opposed to the new gambling proposals, Baldwin asks; ìDo we really want Christian values imposed on us at a time when young Muslims already feel alienated from the rest of society? People will behave in ways which others dislike and the question for politicians is how to make good laws, built on as broad a consensus as possible.î
ìThe moral outrage generated over gambling threatens to open up a political Pandoraís box of values which will chip away at the cement binding us all togetherî concludes the columnist.
Gambling ënot a siní
-18/11/04
In a broadside against Christian campaigners, Tom Baldwin writing in todayís Times newspaper, has pronounced that gambling ëis not a siní.
Singling out groups by name that have been lobbying for changes in the Governmentís new Gambling Bill he writes; ìI donít need lectures on morality from the Evangelical Alliance, the Salvation Army or the Daily Mail to know that opening American-style casinos in this country is a dumb policy.î
But, he suggests, ìthe forces being unleashed by the furoreî are ìmore troubling than the proposal itself.î
According to Baldwin, ìConcepts of vice and virtue are creeping back into our heroically secular British political culture.î
The ìmoral agendaî against gambling, he says, ìalso finds an echo in other current debates on smacking children, gay civil partnerships, smoking in public, 24-hour drinking and antisocial behaviour.î
ìWe have only to look across the Atlantic to see the dangers of mixing religion with politics. George Bush believes that God put him in the White House to fulfil His Will ó and he certainly would not have been re-elected this month without the help of millions of born-again Christian voters.î
Baldwin also directed criticism at the Prime Minister.
ìTony Blair is undoubtedly another fully pledged God-bothererî writes Baldwin. ìFor instance, when his Anglicanism was deemed to debar him taking Communion with his Catholic family, his letter to the late Cardinal Basil Hume ended with the phrase: ìWhat would Jesus say!î The Prime Minister has an obsessive interest in the links between Christianity and other Abrahamic faiths and has found time to read the Koran several times since entering Downing Street. ì
Issues such as gambling should ìnot be polluted by religion, nor lobbying from ëfaith groupsí suggests the columnist.
ìThe social and economic effects of new casinos should be sufficient to win the argument without reference to a set of religious beliefs formed 2,000 years ago in a faraway land.î
Apparently missing the fact that many Muslims are also opposed to the new gambling proposals, Baldwin asks; ìDo we really want Christian values imposed on us at a time when young Muslims already feel alienated from the rest of society? People will behave in ways which others dislike and the question for politicians is how to make good laws, built on as broad a consensus as possible.î
ìThe moral outrage generated over gambling threatens to open up a political Pandoraís box of values which will chip away at the cement binding us all togetherî concludes the columnist.