All of our faith-based respondents reported ‘?immense religious illiteracy’ on the part of local government officials, politicians and throughout the policy-making community as a whole. As we have said, the view most consistently expressed was that all faiths were ‘?˜private ideas’ or ‘?˜private practices’ with relevance only on one day of the week. This contrasted with a ‘gut feeling’ expressed in other quarters that the Church ‘?is doing a lot around the place’?. Prevalent also was a misinformed belief that across the board ‘Christian churches are declining and relying on ageing white women for their numbers’. Dioceses such as London and Southwark, which have enjoyed an increase in Church attendance and an internationalisation of congregations, would seem to refute such a claim. It is also a statistically contested area of forecasting. Notwithstanding these comments, we were astonished to be told by civil servants that there is no evidence base in government circles on Christian institutions. Indeed, in some quarters the very idea that such an evidence base may be relevant to a modern social or policy agenda seemed fantastic.
Based on our interviews with politicians, government officials and people in the faith communities themselves, we can only conclude that the absence of a ‘churches’ evidence base is grounded in a judgement that churches are not worthy to have even a modest role in government schemes. Such a judgement contrasts strongly with public declarations by Ministers that all of civil society is welcome to the public service reform table and that the government’s agenda is for all faiths rather than for a few. Yet if what we were told is correct, the churches simply do not register on the policy-making radar in serious terms.
Von Hügel Institute report – Moral but no Compass
