Thursday 18 February, 2010

UK
Politics
Family
Education

By Charles Gardner

As all three main political parties in the UK are set on undermining Christian morality with their sexual equalities agenda, the Christian People’s Alliance is rising to the challenge with a line that is decidedly non-PC.

And with Opposition leader David Cameron throwing in his lot with the homosexual lobby, we have the perfect recipe for the complete social collapse of an already ‘Broken Britain’ (Mr Cameron’s much-used phrase).

But plans by Labour, Conservatives and Liberal Democrats to impose their sex agenda on schools are being contested in the May local elections by CPA candidates.

Following statements this year by Mr Cameron and Nick Clegg (the Liberal leader) that they support Labour’s plans for relationships outside of heterosexual marriage to be taught as normative to schoolchildren, the CPA is urging parents to assert their legal right for children to be brought up in conformity with their own Christian ethical stance.

The party is pledging that, if elected, its councillors will fight to uphold Christian rights of conscience in all schools.

Speaking at a meeting in Kensington of the CPA national executive, party leader Alan Craig said: “The leaders of our three main parties – Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg – have set themselves in favour of a sexual rights agenda that is opposed to 2,000 years of church teaching. They seek to collapse Christian morality into a relativistic heap – sowing confusion and worsening the problem of breakdown Britain.

“We know sexual relationships happen outside of marriage and SRE (Sex and Relationships Education) must be taught with wisdom, respect and sensitivity. But what children need is a clear message: sex is a gift intended by God for a lifelong marriage between one man and one woman. All other relationships are less than God’s best.”

Under new government guidelines, all schools – including faith schools – will be legally required to provide classes in sex and relationships. From the age of 11, pupils will be encouraged to debate issues surrounding sexual orientation, same-sex relationships and civil partnerships.

The Christian People’s Alliance is pointing out that Conservatives, Labour and Liberal Democrats oppose the biblical guidance that the primary responsibility for education lies with parents, which is enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as article 26.3 states: “Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.”

The secular parties also risk infringing Protocol 1 of Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights which provides that the state shall, in exercising its functions in relation to education and teaching, “respect the right of parents to ensure such education and teaching is in conformity with their own religion and philosophical convictions”.

The Department for Children, Schools and Families announced last year that it will take forward all the major recommendations of the Teenage Pregnancy Independent Advisory Group, including making Sex and Relationships Education statutory from 2011. It also declared that parents’ right to pull their children out of sex education classes in England will be ended once pupils turn 15.

Under government plans all schools including church schools must “teach all aspects of SRE within the context of relationships in an anti-discriminatory way; contraception, abortion and homosexuality are all legal in this country…”

The Government’s review of SRE also requires schools to make “explicit links to young people’s advisory services and provision of contraception and sexual health services and demonstrate this by teaching people how to access services.”

Cllr Craig, who is Leader of the Opposition on Newham Borough Council, added: “All parents have a prior right to bring their children up according to their own values. Yet the secular parties want to impose an alien morality on all children – even Christian children. It is deeply troubling and illiberal for parents who seek to teach the ideals of faithfulness, purity and respect for life to their children in the home, to have teachers then totally undermine Christian morality by teaching the ambiguity of ‘anything goes’ sex in the classroom.”

Meanwhile Mr Cameron, through gay magazine Attitude, has told Archbishop Rowan Williams that the Church of England needs to clean up its act and stop behaving as if there was something morally reprehensible about homosexuality, as Christianity had mistakenly been doing for 2,000 years.

He is reported to have said that “…if our Lord Jesus was around today he would very much be backing a strong agenda on equality and equal rights, and not judging people on their sexuality.”

But if that is the case, as someone has said, why did Jesus, when he actually was around, not pursue that agenda? Why, for example, did he tell the woman taken in adultery to sin no more, instead of taking a laid-back, relaxed view of the matter?

Indeed, he never endorsed or championed loose sexual conduct, which was strongly condemned by Jewish law about which he said that “until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.

“Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven…”

Among these commandments was this one: “Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.” And there are several others along this line in the Jewish Scriptures. Can anything be clearer than this?

When former Prime Minister Tony Blair repealed the law which forbad the promotion of homosexuality in schools, Mr Cameron denounced him for “moving heaven and earth” to do so.

But now, with the economy in meltdown and an election looming, he is devoting much time to homosexual issues and being interviewed by the pink press.

Yet how can the man who claims to champion marriage and the family at the same time support the homosexual agenda which undermines both at every level? Not to put too fine a point on it, family life would eventually become as extinct as the people of Sodom and Gomorrah if the gay movement were allowed to continue spewing out its venom. God help us!

Photo: Luke Wilson Photography