Religious teachings have their place in political life

THE sermon during this year’s Henley civic service reflected on the place of biblical values in public life.

Held at St Mary’s Church in Hart Street on Sunday, Father Jeremy Tayler questioned the slogan “Keep religion out of politics.”

It was attended by Mayor Tom Buckley, together with his wife and consort, Claire, town councillors and other dignitaries, including Henley MP Freddie van Mierlo.

The service began with a procession from the town hall led by the town sergeant, James Churchill-Coleman, who carried the mace.

The procession into the church was flanked by the Royal British Legion standard, carried by Henley branch president John Green, followed by the servers, choir and rector.

Two of the mayor’s cadets, Corporal Kiara De Sousa, from the army cadets, and Cadet Corporal Raphie Barron, from the air cadets, were chosen to give readings.

The pair read from the book of Deuteronomy (15.7-11) before Cllr Buckley read a passage from 2 Corinthians (9.6-15).

Delivering the sermon from the pulpit, Fr Jeremy said: “I’m sure we’ve all heard the slogan ‘Keep religion out of politics’.

“There is, after all, a very obvious overlap. Both are concerned with answering questions about what it means to live a good life and how our life together can be best organised to allow a genuine human flourishing.

“Both are concerned with the questions of right and wrong. And so it would be quite strange for religion to have nothing to say about politics or, for that matter, for politics that have nothing to say about religion.”

Fr Jeremy explained that the slogan had roots in the religious conflicts of the 17th century in Europe.

He said: “Just as one might argue that our constitutional monarchy gives us, among many other things, a sort of pretend dictator to protect us from ever feeling the means to have a real one.

“So too, one might argue that having a sort of official channel to connect religion and politics protects us from the more dangerous sorts of religious influence over politics that at times have plagued other countries.

“Sometimes I think the slogan ‘keep religion out of politics’ has come to mean something quite different from making a case for an institutional separation of church and state.

“In fact, cynically, I think that the slogan means little more than ‘keep opinions I don’t like out of politics’. Because you can find Christians on different sides of practically every significant debate in modern British politics.”

Despite the disagreement on certain issues among Christians today, Fr Jeremy said that there was a lot that Christian tradition could offer when reflecting on public life.

He said: “Christians believe that we are both made in the image of God but also that we are deeply flawed and have a tendency to veer off in selfish and destructive directions.

“We believe that, at our best, we are capable of very great good but also that we should never underestimate our capacity for evil, nor our capacity to delude ourselves about what is right.

“And authentically Christian politics would be one that recognised that we do not have all the answers and that all too often our attempts to construct heaven on earth lead us to the other place.”

Fr Jeremy said that the lessons those in public office could take from Christianity extended to reserving judgment, humility and thinking of those less fortunate than ourselves.

He pointed to the example in John’s Gospel, when Jesus washed his disciples’ feet, as embodying the view that leadership was, in fact, a service.

This service, Fr Jeremy said, included sacrifice. “To be a politician in today’s climate means being a target for all sorts of abuse,” he said.

“Political leadership means becoming a sort of public person, sacrificing quite a large element of personal privacy.

“It means being harangued in Tesco about potholes. It means the risk of some unguarded or unfortunate moment ending up in the newspapers.

“Political violence in America has been in the news this past week, but we are not completely immune from these problems in our own political culture.

“Yet for Christians, we acknowledge that this is a part of the nature of leadership.”

Following the sermon, the congregation stood for the Nicene Creed before the Prayer of Intercession and communion.

The service was closed following the national anthem. The choir and ministers left the church to You Got the Love by Candi Staton, which was sung by Jenny Bell, accompanied by Tom Michell.

The choir was led by the church’s musical director, Sebastian Thomson, and the organist was Gabriele Damiani.