Conservatism and Christianity: the Fourth Wilberforce Address
November 2000
by Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach
given at Conservative Central Office

A magnificent defence of Christian Conservatism delivered on the CCF's tenth anniversary

Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach gave the Fourth William Wilberforce address on the occasion of the CCF's Tenth Anniversay. Other CCF Wilberforce addresses by Peter Lilley, William Hague and Charles Moore can be accessed by clicking on the links at the foot of this page. Brian Griffiths was Director of Margaret Thatcher's Downing Street Policy Unit. He is a Governor of the Fellowship.

· Lord Griffiths examines the roots of conservative philosophy, and concludes that the best, reforming, conservatism was and continues to be based on principles derived from a religious worldview.
· There is still a need for conservatism based on those principles today, as opposed to liberalism, based on secular beliefs, which lacks any objective standard of morality.

*****

It is a very great pleasure to be invited to deliver an address in honour of William Wilberforce.

William Wilberforce stands out in British history as one of the great social reformers of the nineteenth century. Although he is associated in the public mind with the campaigns to abolish the slave trade and then slavery itself, he took up many other causes, such as penal reform, medical aid for the poor, education for the deaf, restrictions on the use of child labour, an improvement in the conditions of the Poor Law and the reform of morals. Such was the respect in which he was held that when he died, both Houses of Parliament suspended business to enable members to attend his funeral, and among the pallbearers were the Speaker and the Lord Chancellor.

The memorial to him in Westminster Abbey states that in an age and country where there were many great and good men, he was among the foremost of those who fixed the character of his times, not simply because of his high and various talents, his warm benevolence and his universal candour, but also because of the abiding eloquence of a Christian life. At the age of twenty six he experienced a religious conversion, which influenced his life and thinking, and especially his approach to politics, which from that time on was taken up with a commitment to remedy injustice, to help the poor and to strengthen moral standards.

He was a member of the House of Commons for nearly fifty years, though he stood as an independent and not as a Tory because he believed that the concept of party was divisive. Despite his rejection of a party label he was a close friend and supporter of the Prime Minister William Pitt, and his views on most political issues would have put him firmly in the camp of someone whom today we would call a conservative.

In the light of this I believe that the Conservative Christian Fellowship were inspired in naming their annual lecture in memory of such an outstanding individual, and it is because of this that it is an honour to be invited to deliver it.

(I) WHAT IS CHRISTIANITY? WHAT IS CONSERVATISM?

The title I have chosen for this address is 'Conservatism and Christianity'. It is an ambitious subject and at the risk of stating the obvious it is necessary to make certain points clear at the outset.

One is that we should never lose sight of the contrasting nature of religion and politics. The Christian religion is an account of eternal truth. It is an explanation of our origin and our destiny. It is about the purposes of God and the salvation of mankind. The book of Genesis starts with the ringing declaration "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" while the Revelation of John is a vision of a new heaven and a new earth, a final judgement and an eternity of torment. The Incarnation is the story of how God took human form and died on a cross for the redemption of mankind with the result that the Christian faith is an answer to the most searching questions we can ever ask of ourselves. Who am I? What is the purpose of life? Can I know God? Is there life after death?

By contrast politics deals with something of a totally different character, namely the activity of governing in this world. It is an activity which is specific and limited. It is concerned with the temporal, the things of Caesar, not the spiritual, the things of God. It is about expediency and the art of the possible. As a result no political doctrine, creed, ideology or even disposition should ever claim an exclusive status because it is in some way based uniquely on the Christian religion. Conservatism has no monopoly of Christian understanding. I believe that the Christian faith has relevance to politics, but this relationship is neither simple nor direct. We cannot extract unambiguous statements from the Bible which will give detailed guidance on proposed legislation. At every stage in dealing with a political issue, namely defining the problem, devising a policy and then drafting legislation, and even with regard to issues such as abortion, divorce and homosexuality, which some might think are very straightforward, there will be many detailed practical considerations which will of necessity have to be taken into account, not least because a law which is put on the statute book must be something which is enforceable.

Although religion and politics are essentially different kinds of activities, which is the point St. Augustine made so eloquently in 'The City of God', the Christian must however be wary of dualism. To say that they are different is not to say that they bear no relationship to each other. The Christian faith provides a framework for understanding the created world and therefore the setting in which government must exist.

A second point which needs to be made, is that the Conservative party has never been, or aspired to be, a Christian party. In this respect the Conservative Party is different from the Christian democratic parties which exist in many countries in continental Europe. It has never been based on a religious credo. It has always been open to people of all faiths and to people of no faith. It has accommodated within its ranks people committed to very different lifestyles. Certain of its leaders have been people of faith, even deep faith, but this has typically been expressed in personal terms and not publicly paraded as a party credential. In fact the exact opposite has been the case. Conservative politicians have taken to heart Burke's words that "politics and the pulpit are terms that have little agreement", with the result that they tend to be careful, even to a fault, in ensuring that they can never be open to the charge that they have used religion to secure votes.

(II) THE RELIGIOUS BASIS OF ARGUMENTS FOR CONSERVATISM

Having said this, it is also the case that since the title 'Conservative' was used as a party label in the early nineteenth century, the argument for conservatism, beginning with Edmund Burke, has been based on a religious world view, and in particular, on the truth of the Christian religion. There have been exceptions, perhaps the most notable being Michael Oakeshott, but in general the case for conservatism has been presented as inextricably linked to religion. That is certainly the conclusion of Hearnshaw's study 'Conservatism in England' published in the nineteen thirties and of Russell Kirk's scholarly work 'The Conservative Mind' published in the early nineteen fifties. It might be thought that Anthony Quinton's study 'The Politics of Imperfection', which is an attempt to detach conservatism from its religious roots, leads to the opposite conclusion. He argues that there have been agnostics who have argued the case for conservatism, just as much as Christians, that in the writings of Burke, Newman and Salisbury, their religious beliefs are not crucial to their political views, and that what all conservatives have in common is a view of the imperfection of mankind, which can be deduced from other than religious principles. Of these three points, the first is certainly true, though the only example he provides since Burke is Oakeshott whose conservatism is limited by his secular assumptions, the second I would strongly dispute; and the third, while correct as far as it goes, is a rather limited conception of conservatism. Let me give some examples.

If there was one event which led to a major divide in British politics, and resulted ultimately in the formation of the Conservative party, it was the French Revolution. Burke said of the French revolution that it was "the most astonishing crisis that has hitherto happened in the world". It was something radical, experimental, bloody, chaotic, a 'monstrous tragic comic scene' which confiscated property, plundered the church, undermined the family and tradition, overthrew the monarchy and encouraged irreligion. In his 'Reflections on the Revolution in France', published in 1790, Burke attacked the revolutionaries and their sympathisers in this country, but invariably with arguments which were firmly rooted in the religious nature of man and the religious basis of society. "We know, and it is our pride to know" he asserts, "that man is by his constitution a religious animal: that atheism is against, not only our reason but our instincts; and that it cannot prevail long", from which it followed that "religion is the basis of civil society and the source of all good and of all comfort", and in particular that "the Christian religion has hitherto been our boost and comfort, and one great source of civilisation amongst us". It would not be too strong to say, that virtually every statement of a conservative approach to politics since the time of Burke, has acknowledged its debt to the 'Reflections'.

Certainly Burke's sentiments were echoed by Disraeli. "The most powerful principle which governs man is the religious principle.... A wise Government, allying itself with religion, would as it were consecrate society, and sanctify the State". Or again "the spiritual nature of man is stronger than codes or constitutions. No government can endure which does not recognise that for its foundation, and no legislation last which does not flow from that fountain. The principle may develop itself in manifold forms, in the shape of many creeds and many churches. But the principle is divine. As time is divided into day and night, so religion rests upon the Providence of God and the responsibility of man".

At first sight John Henry Newman may be an unlikely candidate to be thought of as a conservative philosopher: he was ordained in the Church of England at the age of twenty three, was one of the leaders of the Oxford Movement, became a cardinal in the Roman Catholic church, wrote no treatise on political philosophy but in a series of articles in The Times in 1841 made a stinging attack on Robert Peel's 'Tamworth Manifesto', and said in later life "I have no great love for the Conservatives" (Kenny p161). Yet Russell Kirk and Anthony Quinton both conclude that Newman, although not in any sense a politician, was the master of philosophical conservatism in the Victorian era.

He was a conservative with a small 'c'. His conservatism was founded on his religious beliefs and in particular the emphasis which he placed on the significance of the fall of mankind and the doctrine of original sin, allied to a belief in the order and harmony of the visible world, which mirrored the reality of the invisible world, and reflected the providence of God, and of which the State and every individual is a part.

His conservatism showed itself in many ways. He was a relentless opponent of liberalism. He had a profound sense of the law and order which existed in the world, not simply of the laws at work in the physical universe but also the existence of laws in the moral, political and social spheres as well. He attached great importance to the wisdom embodied in institutions "which have stood the trial and received the sanction of ages" and which as a consequence do not depend on the vagaries of individuals. He placed great value on tradition, which to him was more than the ideas embodied in institutions or the handing down of intellectual traditions. It was something unwritten certainly but best expressed in the way society has felt or behaved during a period of time and something which he claimed could not therefore be conveyed easily in a set of propositions.

Similarly the two great statements of conservatism in the twentieth century, 'Conservatism' by Lord Hugh Cecil, published in 1912 and 'The Case for Conservatism' by Quentin Hogg published in 1959 make the Christian faith central to their defence of conservatism.

Lord Hugh Cecil's book, which is probably the finest statement ever made of a conservative position, argues that in any discussion of political principles we must have some standards of right and wrong to which they conform and he is very clear in basing his on those in the New Testament. He is unable therefore to discuss issues such as the claims of rich and poor, the operations of a competitive market economy, the problem of poverty, measures for ameliorating the condition of the people and the content and structure of national education without reference to religion. He considered it a scandal to Christianity that large numbers of people in the country lived in poverty and misery. He was firmly of the view that Christianity stood for social reform, "To the Conservative this purpose (i.e. social reform) comes with a sacred sanction, for the religious foundation of his Tory beliefs gives to the sorrows of the poor an urgent claim upon his care." More than that he emphasised that religion was not only directly relevant to political issues but also had an indirect influence, because any political matter which raised issues of moral obligation could not be addressed without reference to Christian standards. One of the fascinating parts of the chapter in his book which deals with religion and politics is the ethics of a competitive market economy.

His conclusion was that "the championship of religion is the most important of the functions of Conservatism. It is the keystone of the arch upon which the whole fabric rests.. As long as Conservatism makes the fulfilment of its duties to religion the first of its purposes, it will be saved from the two principal dangers that alternatively threaten it: the danger of sinking into a mere factious variation of Liberalism, supporting the claims of another set of politicians, but propounding measures not distinguished by any pervading principle: or the other danger of standing only for the defence of those who are well off, without any sincere endeavour to consider the interests of the whole people, or any higher object than the triumph of the sagacious selfishness of the prosperous. Religion is the standard by which the plans of politicians must be judged, and a religious purpose must purify their aims and methods. Emphasising this truth, Conservatism will be the creed neither of a superfluous faction nor of a selfish class." In terms of the Conservative Party he said "Conservatism must not shrink from the appeal to Christian morality. Its characteristic as a party ought to be, in view of its past as its future, the readiness to apply a religious standard to politics".

In 'The Case for Conservatism', Quentin Hogg, now Lord Hailsham, says that he "pondered desperately long" before writing the chapter in his book which deals with religion and society. It is the opening chapter of a section which deals with basic Conservative ideas, and is placed at the beginning of the section because it logically precedes those ideas which we traditionally associate with conservatism, such as the organic nature of society, political liberty, private property, the rule of law, individual enterprise and continuity as a condition of progress, and the wisdom embodied in traditions and institutions. Hailsham says that he despised nothing more than a politician who used religion to advance his politics, 'the end of honest politics' he termed it, but he went on to say, "nevertheless I am compelled to write what I believe to be true, and I am fortified in my belief by the fact that I can discover no important writer on conservatism who has not been driven to the same conclusion", namely that "there can be no genuine Conservatism which is not founded upon a religious view of the basis of civil obligation, and there can be no true religion where the basis of civil obligation is treated as purely secular". He says that he was driven to this conclusion, because he found that he could not divorce his political faith from his ultimate view of reality. This is a very important observation. The Christian faith is a world view and it is because of this that politics cannot exist as a separate independent set of activities divorced from the foundation of religion.

Although he is most recognised for his contribution to literature, the notion that religion should underpin the political philosophy of conservatism with a small 'c', comes out very clearly from certain of the writings of T. S. Eliot. A political philosophy he suggests, is not simply a set of policies or programmes for a political party, but a way of life for a people. For a political philosophy to grasp this it must reach down to what he calls, "the substratum of collective temperament", to "ways of behaviour and unconscious values". In fact he was explicit in recognising that this would lead to the religious roots of society. "As political philosophy derives its sanction from ethics, and ethics from the truth of religion, it is only by returning to the eternal source of truth that we can hope for any social organisation which will not, to its ultimate destruction, ignore some essential aspect of reality".

He published 'The Idea of a Christian Society' in 1939 against the background of the growth of fascism in Europe. If a small number of people could have such a devastating and evil impact in their countries, could not a small number of Christians have an influence for good?

In the book he posed the choice facing society at that time in stark terms, namely to advance further in the direction of a pagan society, with its materialistic and stunted culture, or to choose a religious based society, which however imperfect would be vastly superior to the liberal alternative. Despite the sanctity which had been attached to the word in the Western world, he was scathing in his attack on Liberalism because he argued it would destroy the social habits of the people, dissolve their natural collective consciousness into individual constituents, license the opinions of the most foolish by replacing education with instruction, encourage cleverness rather than wisdom, and the upstart rather than the qualified. Liberalism was defined more by its starting point as a movement away from something, rather than by the end which it would bring. It was something which released energy rather than conserving it. His concern was that its end might be very different from that which it intended, a sort of nihilistic chaos which would require as a remedy some form of brutalised control.

But in contrast to Liberalism he also attacked Conservatism with a capital 'C'. This was not necessarily a philosophy of life and indeed may be no more than a set of habits with the result that it was not something which could guide us. Because of this it was just as repellant as liberalism and would result in 'petrification'. It could not, he claimed, within its own limits of simply being a conservative disposition, answer the question "what must be preserved?"

This could only be done, he suggested many years later in an address 'The Literature of Politics' which he gave to the Conservative Political Centre, by reaching down into what he called, the prepolitical. It recalls his earlier emphasis on political philosophy and he characterised it as, "the stratum down to which any sound political thinking must push its roots, and from which it must derive its nourishment. It is also, if you don't mind my changing the metaphor so abruptly, the land in which dwell the Gods of the Copy Book Headings; and, abandoning figurative language altogether, it is the domain of ethics, in the end, the domain of theology. For the question of questions, which no political philosophy can escape, and by the right answer to which all political thinking must in the end be judged, is simply this: What is Man? What are his limitations? What is his misery and what his greatness? and what, finally, his destiny?".

(III) CHRISTIANITY'S MORAL TEACHINGS AND CONSERVATISM

It is to this question of questions posed by Eliot which we must now turn, because it is in answer to this that we are able to understand why conservatism has been built on a religious foundation.

In the first place Christianity provides an answer to Eliot's question and in answering it shows why society needs a religious basis. The point of departure for the Christian is that we live in a world God created, not in a universe which is the product of chance. We are part of His creation. As the Hebrew text puts it, we have been made in his image; we possess a mind, a soul, a will, a conscience. We are capable of anger and of love. It is to Him we are accountable and answerable. We are restless, homeless, lost, ultimately unfulfilled independently of God. He is the source of all truth. For Edmund Burke to say therefore, that man is by his constitution a religious animal is to accept the authority of God and to reject the autonomy of man. It is to acknowledge our dependence on divine providence. It is to realise our place in the order of the universe. It is to admit the truth of moral laws, which set out the meaning of right and wrong, and which make social life possible; laws which we could no more invent than we could the physical laws of the universe.

Perhaps the implication of this view can be seen by comparing John Maynard Keynes' description of life in the Bloomsbury Group with Edmund Burke's understanding of obligation in human society. Keynes said of his friends and himself, "We repudiated entirely customary morals, conventions and traditional wisdom. We were, that is to say, in the strict sense of the term, immoralists. The consequences of being found out had, of course, to be considered for what they were worth. But we recognised no moral obligation on us, no inner sanction, to conform or to obey. Before heaven we came to be our own judge in our own case".

Contrast this with Burke in his Reflections: "We fear God; we look up with awe to kings; with affection to parliaments; with duty to magistrates; with reverence to priests; and with respect to nobility. Why? Because when such ideas are brought before our minds it is natural (italics original) to be affected; because all other feelings are fake and spurious, and tend to corrupt our minds, to vitiate our primary morals, to render us unfit for rational liberty; and by teaching us a servile, licentious and abandoned insolence, to be our low sport for a few holidays, to make us perfectly fit for, and justly deserving of slavery, through the whole course of our lives".

To declare that religion is the basis of civil society, is to recognise first and foremost that society can only function effectively, when we accept moral obligations and acknowledge personal responsibility. This is true of life within a family, a school, a company, indeed within any human institution, including the state. These obligations could in principle be based on any set of ethics, including of course those which make no appeal to religion. But the contrast between those based on a secular liberal ethic and those based on a revealed religion is important. In the case of Judaism the injunctions 'Thou Shalt' and 'Thou Shalt Not' were written down on tablets of stone. They were unambiguous and they carried sanctions. The reason the attempt to construct morality on a secular basis is so uncertain and unreliable is precisely because of its lack of absolutes and its absence of sanctions. A society which accepts religion as its basis will be one in which obligations entered into by individuals are reflected in the constitution and practices of its institutions, monarchy, parliament, government, church, family and schools. Each will claim a moral legitimacy based on an obligation to God. It is because of our religious heritage that we have the coronation oath, the prayers said at the beginning of each daily session of parliament, the established church, the special nature of the marriage contract, the significance attached to private property, the distinctive character of church schools and the fiscal incentives which have traditionally been given to charitable institutions. A conservative will value these as part of our tradition, but it is important to notice that it is a tradition embodying truths and virtues which have as their source the Christian religion. Newman, who placed great emphasis on the importance of tradition as an initial way of understanding, makes the same point when he recognises that in the end tradition requires "some ultimate authority to make it trustworthy". I do not believe this is a statement which could have been made by Michael Oakeshott.

In history we have seen many attempts to construct civil society without a religious basis; the French Revolution, Nazi Germany and aethistic Marxism in the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and parts of Asia come readily to mind. The consequences of such attempts are instructive for two reasons: one is that although they sought to eradicate traditional religion, they created in reality an alternative ideology which turned out to be just as 'religious' as the religion which they sought to discard; the other is that the violence, disruption, uncertainty, fear and human suffering created in these instances points to the weakness of political experiments based on nothing but theory and ideology. These of course are not the choices we face today. But there is a powerful tendency to establish a purely secular society detached from its Christian roots in which the unifying principle is nothing more than a hedonistic libertarianism based on the slogan 'freedom of choice', and for which we have no successful historical precedent that it will ever be successful.

One insight of the Christian religion which has been particularly emphasised by conservatives is the moral and intellectual imperfection of human nature. The doctrine of 'Original Sin' is perhaps the least popular, and the most offensive of all Christian teaching, and yet ironically, the one for which there is such overwhelming evidence. Far from human nature being naturally good and pure, inclined to act virtuously, Wilberforce reckoned that the language of Christianity was humiliating.

"From it" he says "we learn that man is an apostate creature, fallen from his high original, degraded in his nature, deprived in his faculties, prone to vice, disinclined to virtue; he is tainted with sin not slightly and superficially, but radically and to the very core". He pronounces man as majestic yet in ruin. The dignity of man is that he has been created a child of God, the tragedy of man is that he has chosen a life of total self centredness.

I believe that Wilberforce's interpretation of Christian teaching is correct, but one misunderstanding should be avoided. The fact of the inherent depravity of human nature does not mean that every act of every individual is sinful. The image of God in man may be defaced but it remains recognisable. People without faith can demonstrate remarkable acts of charity, altruism and sacrifice. The Fall of man is total in that every facet of his being is affected, but that does not mean that he has been reduced to a brute. Curiously enough, it is those who attempt to live by the highest standards, such as the mystics, who have known most and described so convincingly the extent of this self centredness.

How does this relate to conservatism? A conservative is someone who is by temperament, cautious. He or she is someone sceptical of change, partly because of a distrust of the unknown and partly because of a regard for the familiar. The familiar is something which has been tried, is known to work, has been handed on, typically personally, and has been taught by example. By the same token history teaches us to be guarded about political experiments, untested programmes, or some leap in the dark especially, when it is associated with some new theory or ideology. The doctrine of original sin is a powerful basis for caution in the face of utopian rhetoric. It is the reason we can be sure that the Kingdom of God will not be built through revolution, legislation or the decrees of government. We have in this life as a result to settle for something far less romantic and idealistic. As a consequence of this the conservative will be realistic about what government can achieve and aim not for the ideal but for the possible.

Such pessimism over the potential of fallen human nature however, should not be an obstacle to reform. Indeed the very opposite should be the case. "A state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation" remarked Burke. Reforms which are properly thought out, which redress obvious grievances, and which are acceptable to the electorate, are both necessary and desirable.

Another emphasis of Christian theology is the significance it attaches to liberty. In the history of the Jews, the feast of the Passover is the celebration of their freedom from slavery in Egypt. Israel could not become the society God intended while they suffered the indignities of slavery. Political liberty gave the Jewish people the freedom to worship and build an economic and social order, which would embody the ideals of their faith. That faith saw every person as being of infinite worth, possessed of dignity, because they had been created in the image of God. A respect for the dignity of the individual person is the primary focus of Christian ethics, so that the protection of individual liberty and property has been characteristically a legitimate Christian concern.

Conservatism has recognised the importance of liberty by ensuring that the constitution maintains a balance between authority and freedom and protects individuals and their property, material and immaterial against injustice through the rule of law. The major threat to individual liberty has come from the state, which accounts for the emphasis placed especially on economic freedom by postwar governments in Britain. The Judaeo Christian defence of liberty is however radically different from the idea of freedom embraced by the philosophers of the Enlightenment, which took as its starting point the autonomy of man. The Christian defence of freedom is not of unlimited freedom, but of freedom within a moral order in which there are well defined limits.

A fourth theme which I would like to extract from Christian theology which is of extreme importance to this subject is the idea of community. The Christian has a distinct conception of God. Christianity is a theistic not a deistic religion, because of the belief that God has entered into a personal relationship with those he created. In addition Christianity is a Trinitarian and not a Unitarian religion; the Godhead itself is made up of a community of three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, rather than being a solitary, lonely individual extending from eternity to eternity. The theistic and trinitarian basis of Christian theology means that great significance is attached to the notion of community in the created order. Hence the emphasis on the family, the tribe, the village, the city, the church and the nation each as a separate community through which people establish their identity, and live their lives. This theology leads naturally to an organic, rather than an individualistic view of society. The emphasis is on society as a unitary, living entity rather than a collection of individuals held together by law.

Conservatives have always singled out communities, the 'little platoons' as Burke called them, which make up civil society as being of importance. Hence the significance which conservatives attach today to the need to strengthen civil society. The family, even when under assault from our culture and facing fiscal disincentives, still remains the basic unit of society. In it children are shown love and respect and taught the basic rules of civilised behaviour. They learn the virtues necessary for the development of character. Our children are the future of our society and consequently they deserve special protection from the state. Moreover, a commitment to marriage and stable family life remain the ideal to which most people aspire in society. The family is only one community. Alongside it there are the many others, such as the neighbourhood, the village, the school, corporations, clubs, charities, and churches to which people belong, to which they devote a great deal of time and through which they can work and serve others. Finally there is the nation itself which is also a distinct community and which has the responsibility, not just to defend itself, but to play a responsible part in its relations with others.

Within a conservative approach it is absolutely essential that these various communities should each be allowed to retain their own integrity and pursue their own objectives, independent of the interfering arm of the state.

A final theme which emerges from the Christian faith is the injunction to love and serve others, especially the poor and to stand against injustice. The ten commandments of the Mosaic Law were summed up by Jesus in two statements: to love God with heart, mind, soul and strength and to love our neighbour as ourself. Wilberforce remarked that this grace was "the indispensable.. the characteristic duty of Christians". He argued in the most moving section of his book 'A Practical View' that it was cultivated with greatest advantage by meditating on the crucifixion. "Our hearts become tender while we contemplate this single act of loving kindness. We grow desirous of imitating what we cannot but admire. A vigorous principle of enlarged and active charity springs up within us; and we go forth with alacrity, desirous of treading in the steps of our blessed Master, and of manifesting our gratitude for his unmerited goodness, by bearing each others' burdens, and abounding in the disinterested labours of benevolence".

It may be argued that there is nothing distinctly conservative in a statement such as this. It is not about tradition, it is not about scepticism, it is not about the wisdom of collective institutions, it is not about the many sources of authority, it is not about continuity. Such a charge is absolutely justified. Such a statement could be made by a liberal, a socialist, a nationalist or a green. But it is important that such a statement not only can, but should and must be made by conservatives who profess a Christian faith. The enlarged and active charity, and the disinterested labours of benevolence, of which Wilberforce speaks, is the only response which is worthy of any Christian, of whatever political persuasion, to the passion and death of Christ.

(IV) THE CONTRADICTIONS OF LIBERALISM

Those who subscribed to a conservative political philosophy which has had deep roots in a religious world view also identified the enemy: it was liberalism.

I recognise that Friedrich Hayek has made much of the distinction between continental European liberals, such as the French philosophers from Voltaire to Condorcet whom he described as constructivist rationalists with their faith in the power of an absolute state to design a structure of centralised government, and those of the Anglo Scottish Enlightenment such as Mandeville, Hume, Ferguson and to a lesser extent Smith who were the heirs to a more liberal intellectual tradition which recognised the significance of spontaneous forms of adjustment in the social order, and who as a result tended to be non interventionist, especially in economic affairs. For his purpose, which was to make the case for a free society, this was a valid distinction to make; but from a Christian perspective it is not a helpful one.

Both these groups were unreservedly secular in their thinking. Even though many liberals have recognised the value of religion as a unifying and stabilising force in society, the fact is that they see no inherent reason for a sacred canopy over society. As this is not a created world, individuals are autonomous beings, so that the state has no right to restrict the freedom of individuals, providing they do not harm others. Hayek made it very clear that morals had evolved in an impersonal natural way and he was especially dismissive of those who believed that ethical rules were immutable and eternal. As there is no revealed morality, each individual is free to choose the standards by which they live and the only authority ultimately is the appeal to the reason and judgement of the individual. One may value the wisdom embodied in tradition but in the final analysis Hayek, Mandeville and Hume are as secular in their thinking as any of the continental philosophers from who they wish to distance themselves.

Within this view the idea of original sin is an alien concept: human nature is essentially 'good', or at worse neutral but corrupted by institutions; from one point of view through the inequalities and injustices of capitalism and from another by the unnecessary intervention of the state. Liberals such as these are people of great faith: in their ability to solve social problems by a combination of 'facts' and reason but certainly without any appeal to 'values'; or through the power of the spontaneous, evolutionary and self regulating forces of society and the market to produce laws, conventions, morals, language, and technical knowledge which will result in harmony and prosperity.

Liberalism, conceived of as a secular world view, is still a powerful influence in the political, economic and social fields.

In the political field perhaps the most dramatic contemporary example of the kind of liberalism which conservatism has stood up against is the attempt by the European Union to construct a brand new European superstate, with a Commission, a Council of Ministers, a Parliament, a Court of Justice, a single currency, a single value added tax, a common agricultural policy, a common trading policy, an army, a judiciary, a bureaucracy, a common citizenship, a presidency, a flag, an anthem, as well as the three Maastricht pillars of common monetary, defence and foreign policies, and then to protect the freedom of individuals in law by enunciating a Charter of Rights. The project is proceeding at a breathtaking pace, and while it lacks the bloodshed and violence of the French Revolution, its grand design starts from the same tabula rasa as the revolutionaries did, and pays scant attention to tradition, continuity or legitimacy.

Moreover, the heart of the project is deeply secular. One example of this was the publication, earlier this year, of a new European Union employment directive, which sought to strengthen the fight against discrimination at work, by extending the traditional grounds on which discrimination is based, namely sex, race and disability, to include religion or belief, age and sexual orientation. In giving evidence to the House of Lords Select Committee, the senior civil servant from Brussels made it very clear that the intention of the Directive was to restrict the ground on which organisations, including religious organisations, could claim exemption from the new proposals. If the directive were to be implemented for example, then while a religious school could appoint someone of that religion to teach religious instruction in the school, it could not restrict other jobs, such as the teaching of literature, history or health to people of that faith. The UK government along with others fought against the proposed directive, so that safeguards have now been built into the legislation to protect religious schools. Such protection however does not extend to partnerships or companies which have been set up on the basis of a religious culture, or to religious charities and religious based think tanks and lobbying groups. In my judgement only a thorough going secularism could have inspired such a contentious proposal as this.

Liberalism is also a powerful influence in the economic field. Conservatism in Britain today is closely identified with the market economy. Yet a Conservative defence of the market needs to be distanced from that form of secular liberalism which underpins the defence of free markets by economists such as Friedman, Becker and most of all Hayek. The free market is one example of what Hayek describes as a spontaneous social order, namely a self maintaining or self regulating system. It allows each individual to pursue their own course of action, while ensuring that at the same time and through some form of competitive mechanism, the whole process leads to continued growth and prosperity. Because of its ability to harness information, a market economy based on private property will systematically outperform any system based on state ownership and state planning. No planning system will ever be able to cope with handling information in this way. Hayek recognises however that such a system depends for its existence on the maintenance of certain ethics and values. Typically these have been bourgeois values such as hard work, honesty, restraint, deferred gratification, respect for authority, an obligation for the community and so on. But in the Hayekian scheme these too are the product of cultural evolution, and should not be considered immutable or eternal.

This view of the market economy raises a number of issues; it raises technical issues, such as competition, externalities and various potential inefficiencies, which I think can be dealt with; it raises issues of justice, which I find more difficult, largely because of its insistence that it can say little with respect to distributive justice and the problem of poverty. But most importantly it raises the question of the source of those values which are essential if the market economy is to function. A secular liberal society has no guarantee that it can generate those values which are the necessary basis of a market society. While I believe that the evidence shows conclusively that the market economy systematically outperforms any other system of wealth creation, there is at the heart of Hayek's philosophy a fundamental weakness, which can only be addressed by a belief in values for which, independently of religion, he has no source.

Perhaps the most topical, and certainly the most tendentious area of contemporary secular liberalism, relates to a series of issues dealing with the family. If there is a classic statement of a modern liberal view on this subject it is those sections of 'The Third Way' by Anthony Giddens which deal with these issues. One of the trends which he claims is very clear in our society is the decline of the traditional family, the rise in divorce and the growth of single parent families. These he believes in turn are the result of the increasing equality between the sexes, the entry of women into the labour force in a major way, changes in sexual behaviour and expectations and the changing relationship between home and work. His conclusion is that because these are such profound processes of change the return to the traditional family or even the idealistic family of the 1950s is a non starter.

The future for the family which he then proposes is 'the democratic family. As public democracy has been extended, so the family has and certainly should become increasingly democratised. In the public sphere democracy involves formal equality, individual rights, public discussion of issues without resort to violence, and authority which is negotiated, not based on tradition. The ideal he proposes for the democratic family is emotional and sexual equality, the autonomy and mutual rights of each partner, decision making through communication, freedom from violence and life long parental contracts. In the past he says that marriage and parenthood have always been thought of together, but in the detraditionalised family, where having a child is a totally different kind of decision from in the past, the two are separate. "Contractual commitment to a child should thus be separated from marriage and made by each parent as a binding matter of law" (p95). The principles which underpin 'the democratic family' are not restricted to heterosexual relationships but apply just as strongly to homosexual ones as well.

From such examples, drawn from very different fields, it is not surprising that secular liberalism has been and continues to be the enemy of conservatism. It has no respect for tradition, it has no objective standards of morality, and it has no anchor which gives stability to the social order. It is an optimism about politics, economics and the social order based on reason and the autonomy and potential of the human person, in which in the final analysis the individual is the supreme judge.

(V) RELIGION AND TODAY'S BRITAIN

I would now like to consider one possible objection which may be made to the argument so far, namely, that while the relationship between the Christian faith and a conservative political philosophy is interesting as a matter of history, it is of limited relevance today. Britain is now a multi religious society made up of Christians, Jews, Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus. Perhaps even more importantly the process of secularisation has taken a heavy toll. The practise of the Christian religion, judged by the statistics on churchgoing, baptisms, confirmations, ordinations, religious marriages and funerals is in unambiguous decline. Modern Britain therefore requires a modern conservatism which is detached from its historic religious roots.

John Gray confidently declares that the great political fact of our age is the passing of Christianity, which he understands not as a variety of personal faith but as the unifying world view of a culture. He pours scorn particularly on what he calls "the fundamentalist project for the rechristianisation of Western societies" which he says can be taken seriously by noone with any sense of historical perspective". He thunders on confidently asserting that "Most of Britain is a post religious, and in particular, a post Christian society" and declaring that "The current neo fundamentalist clamour for a return to the traditional family (is). misconceived and frivolous in the highest degree. It expresses no serious concern for the needs of people in families, nor any understanding of the diverse forms in which the institution of the family is now to be found. Such vulgar clamour is symptomatic of contemporary conservative thought in the unreality of its perception of real people and their needs".

He raises issues which need to be addressed. Britain today is clearly a multi religious society and it is important that there is freedom and space for people of all religious faiths. The irony however is that in terms of their approach to social questions people of different religious faiths have more in common with each other than they do with those who subscribe to secular liberalism. People of different religions value tradition, the family, and religious schools. They are firmly opposed to the immoralism of Bloomsbury. They do not make a sharp distinction between private morality and public morality. The fact that Britain is a multi religious society, far from undermining the need for a political philosophy to be grounded in religion, only strengthens it.

The claim however that Britain is a post religious and post Christian society needs to be challenged. The notion that we live in a post religious society is simply not true. In the course of the twentieth century Max Weber's thesis regarding secularisation gained enormous ground. He had argued that with the advance of industrialisation, rationalisation, urbanisation and the spread of education and science, there would be no room left in our society for God and the supernatural. The consequence of these trends would be the decline of religion and the emergence of a secular society which would be pluralist, tolerant, uncommitted to any particular world view and in which there would be a sharp distinction between private and public morality. It is a thesis however which is no longer accepted by sociologists and the reason is that it flies in the face of evidence documenting the continued strength of traditional religions, the growth of new age religions and astrology, and the continuing importance of traditional religious belief in political debate. In the country in which secularisation might have been expected to have advanced furthest, namely the United States of America, a new book by Professor Robert Fogel, the nobel laureate at the University of Chicago, describes the last forty to fifty years as the Fourth Great Awakening, namely a religious revival, comparable in its significance to the three other great religious awakenings in the US, in the late eighteenth century, the mid nineteenth century and the late nineteenth century. Professor Rodney Stark, a sociologist at Washington University sums up the views of many of his colleagues when he says that the evidence "leads to the conclusion that secularisation will not usher in a post religious era. Instead it will lead repeatedly to a resupply of vigorous other worldly religious organisations by promoting revival."

The case for Britain having become a post Christian society is stronger but again the issue is far from simple. Statistics of official religious practices certainly suggest a major decline, as does the change in the law relating to abortion, divorce, homosexuality, Sunday trading, the lottery and so on. But against this there is the numerical strength of informal Christian practices such as prayer groups, the remarkable success of the Alpha course, (which is an introductory course to the Christian faith), of Spring Harvest, the continuing strength and significance of religion in Parliament (as part of which I would include the CCF), the continued popularity of church schools, the fact that the language we are driven to use to explain the horrors of phenomena such as Dunblane, the murder of James Bulger and the Holocaust cannot avoid the category of evil, and the fact that a high percentage of the population when asked "Do you believe in God?" answer "Yes".

When we move away from simple statistics the issue of assessing the vitality and vigour of a Christian society is more difficult. In attempting to do so T. S. Eliot made three distinctions which I find helpful: namely the Christian State, which is the emphasis given to the Christian religion in legislation, public administration and legal tradition; the Christian Community, which is that part of the population in which there exists a unified religious social code, which is ingrained, even though it may consist of largely unconscious behaviour: it would be supported by the structure of a national church, education would be religiously based, and the organisation of society would be on a Christian basis though he declines to develop this theme; and finally the Community of Christians, which might be conceived of as the Church within the Church, and which would consist of consciously and thoughtfully practising Christians, especially Elliot remarked, those of intellectual and spiritual superiority. Such a community would not be an organisation, but something today we might loosely describe as a network, made up of both clergy (though not all clergy) and laity, having an identity of belief and aspiration, in all probability a common educational background, a common culture and who collectively would make up the "conscious mind and the conscience of the nation".

In coming to a conclusion about whether Britain is a post Christian society it is necessary to make a judgement on all of these. One can only hazard a guess: the Christian Community judged in terms of official statistics has certainly been in decline, as has to a lesser extent the Christian state: the irony is however that the Community of Christians remains strong, active and vigorous. Over recent decades the practice of the Christian religion has declined, but the debate over religion, especially in matters of public morality, remains strong and is one reason therefore why I would not come to a hasty conclusion in assessing the state of religion in British society. It is also because of this that I believe that groups such as the CCF have an important part to play in the life of this country.

(VI) EDUCATION, THE FAMILY AND FAITH BASED SOCIAL ACTION

Let me now turn to my final section. I believe that a conservatism which is based on a religious world view is as relevant to Britain today as it has been at any time since Burke wrote his 'Reflections'. Let me give some examples.

Education is a subject which it is difficult to separate from religion. Whether it is the teaching of religious instruction itself, the framework within which various intellectual disciplines are taught, or the values embodied in the culture of a school, it is impossible for a Christian to separate education from religion. This was why in 1811, the Church of England took a major step in the provision of education in England and Wales, by setting up the 'National Society for Promoting the Education of the Poor in the Principles of the Established Church throughout England and Wales,' at a time when there was no state provision and was followed in the nineteenth century by the establishment of various Anglican teacher training colleges to supply trained teachers. Today there are about 4,500 Church of England primary schools, roughly one fifth of the total number of primary schools in England and 202 secondary schools which account for only 4% of this sector. There are nearly 2,100 Roman Catholic Schools and a small number of Jewish and Muslim schools. These schools are financed largely but not exclusively by taxpayers' money. In addition there are a considerable number of independent schools, but probably less than a 1,000 of which have a Christian foundation. Other than the independent schools, these are financed largely but not exclusively by taxpayers' money.

In addition to this, successive Education Acts have laid down specific duties for all schools: namely that the curriculum of a school should promote the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development of the pupils, that there should be arrangements for an act of collective worship on a daily basis, wholly, or mainly, of a broadly Christian character, and that the religious education of the school, should reflect the religious tradition of Britain which is in the main Christian, while taking into account the teaching and practices of the other principal religions in this country as well.

Church schools serve a much wider community than the children of church members, and include children of parents of no faith, and of parents who belong to other churches and other religions. Judged by the demand for places, church schools must be considered successful. The reason for their success is that apart from what might be expected from any good school, they teach moral principles and values based on the Christian religion, governors and staff are committed to creating an ethos in the school in which Christian character is held up a virtue, and by respecting the Christian calendar they help children understand the traditions and public festivals of our country which have extended over centuries. The ethos of a church school was put successfully recently by one head teacher "We don't admit children, we admit families".

It is because of the demand for such schools that the Archbishop of Canterbury established the Church Schools Review Group under the Chairmanship of Lord Dearing to look into the future of church schools in early 1999. In their interim report published in July 1999, they noted that there are major cities and towns such as Bournemouth, Brighton, Gloucester, Newcastle upon Tyne, Plymouth and Sheffield without a maintained C of E secondary school and other areas without primary church schools, and recommended that 100 additional Church of England secondary schools should be established. Their view was that these schools should have a substantial core of Christian teachers and pupils from Christian families so that they could be living Christian communities. This is a very significant initiative and in my judgement deserves the support of all Christian people as an attempt to restore the importance of faith, morality and the sacred in our society. One example of a recently created Christian school is the Emmanuel City Technology College in Gateshead, which was the only city technology college established on a religious basis. It has achieved remarkable academic success, coming second in the GCSE league tables, quite apart from the emphasis placed on developing the whole person. It is convinced that its success is due to its emphasis on Christian values and standards being integral to the life of the school.

A second area in which a religious based conservatism is relevant has to do with the family. From a theological point of view one could argue that the institution of the family is part of the created order, that marriage not cohabitation should be the norm for society and that gay marriage is an oxymoron. From a political point of view however, the case will need to be argued primarily on the basis of research evidence. It has been becoming increasingly clear for some time now that the body of research in this area supports a number of important conclusions:

· that a stable marriage, with two parents of different sexes, is the best environment in which to raise children: it results in superior educational attainment, less probability of being involved in crime or being the victim of domestic violence, less likelihood of teenage pregnancy, less likelihood of divorce should they remarry and a greater probability of getting higher paid work.
· that the effects on children of divorce and separation are much greater than is appreciated resulting especially in low esteem for the children themselves.
· that young children suffer from spending long periods in day care, while surveys of working mothers suggest that many would prefer the greater choice which a more evenhanded tax and benefit system might provide.

William Hague's commitment to reform the tax and benefit system to support the institution of marriage is an important step in the right direction and will ease the present burden imposed on parents in bringing up children. It should be welcomed not just by conservatives but anyone who has an interest in strengthening the family. This is not an attack on single parents who have one of the most difficult and emotionally draining jobs to do, but it is simply a recognition that ideally children are better off with two parents and that families committed to marriage are the most stable. Such a policy would also, as Jill Kirby has so convincingly argued, ensure that mothers are not under financial pressure to return to work before their children are ready and would therefore be a boost to valuing motherhood. In this connection I believe that the establishment of the 'Renewing One Nation' team to develop an inclusive conservatism is important.

My final example is the part that religious based charities could play in the strengthening of civil society. Noone doubts the needs that exist today. Again William Hague said recently, reminiscent of Wilberforce's concern, "No decent society can be at peace with itself when so many children are excluded from prosperity and opportunity. No decent society can just sit back and watch as drug abuse spreads to the school playground. No decent society can be indifferent as more children grow up in homes where no father has ever been present. And no decent society can allow the same communities to suffer long term unemployment, generation after generation."

Some of these problems can only be tackled by governments. Even when there is a private option the public sector may have a role to play. I have known at first hand over recent years, social service staff of a local authority who have provided an excellent personal, caring service. We have to be careful in denouncing the role of government as a service provider carte blanche. Nevertheless there is within the world of religious charities a potential to be tapped which could be extremely helpful. It may not be as great as some imagine but it is certainly an option which needs to be explored. We should not expect it to be a panacea, and in any event some organisation will have to accept overall responsibility for identifying those needing help and not receiving it. But the innumerable examples from the history of this country over the last two hundred years suggests that instead of simply paying taxes and assuming the State will do the rest, we ourselves will have to accept greater personal responsibility for the needs of our neighbours.

(VII) THE PURPOSE OF CONSERVATISM

Let me now sum up and draw some conclusions. The case I have sought to argue is that since the Conservative party was founded nearly two hundred years ago the case for conservatism has been presented as inextricably bound up with a religious perspective. I have tried to show how Christianity underpins a reforming conservatism, which values tradition, believes in an objective basis for morality, wishes to strengthen civil society, is sceptical of any attempt to realise through politics heaven on earth but is strongly committed to addressing the needs of the poor and remedying injustice.

The danger we face today is to be seduced in the name of tolerance by a libertarian social philosophy, which contains no objective standards of morality, which will lead through the abuse of freedom and neglect of responsibility, to a multiplicity of social problems, and which ultimately, and this is the real irony, will require a more authoritarian framework for society to redress the chaos which such a society will inevitably produce. Conservatism has always stood against libertarianism, as the negation of everything it stands for. If the Conservative party were to become libertarian it would in my judgement be the end of the Conservative party as we have known it.

Let me be very clear in what I am saying. No individual can play God. We have no right to judge another person's private lifestyle. But in terms of public morality and the preservation of those institutions on which the future of our society depends we are entitled to argue for what is in the best interests of society itself. As Christians we will have a religious basis for our views, though increasingly the currency of political debate will mean that it will only be accepted on the basis of what works.

This is a lecture in honour of William Wilberforce, and in reading about him and what he wrote I have been particularly struck by his humility and piety. We will continue to debate the pros and cons of his policies, but his abiding legacy is that above everything else, each one of us should show something personally of the love of God to those around us and especially, as we are reminded in the picture of the final judgement in St. Matthew, to those in need, the hungry, the thirsty, the sick, the naked, those in prison, to be reminded finally of the words of the Shepherd, "Inasmuch as you did it unto one of the least of these my brethren you did it unto me".