Sir: Your leader – Not in Church' (December I) came as something
of a surprise. The Spectator appears in a new role as guardian of "the purity of Christianity" and as protector of the politician from those members of the public who may be " undesirably ideologically motivated" — whatever that splendid phrase may mean.
Still, The Spectator is in distinguished company. Was it not Lord Melbourne in the last century who protested that things had come to a pretty pass when Christianity started to interfere with his private life?
By all means let us attack any "ignorant churchmen and their lay lackeys" who pontificate on subjects where their ignorance is self-evident, but by the same token should we not point a finger at their journalistic counterparts who rush in to define and confine the limits of Christian acitivity within our democracy?
Why should not economists, 'sociologists and ordinary men and women take into St. Paul's Cathedral or any other church their concern with the Third World and their conviction that trade and aid have been left in the hands of international politicians for far too long? • If The Spectator is afraid of what might happen if more people related the problems of the world and the message of the Christian Church, all well and good. But don't try to introduce censorship or try to smother Christian witness by ill-informed editorial opinion on what is and what is not "the teaching of the word of God." Jesus Himself had some harsh things to say about people who thought that religion was just a matter of saying "Lord, Lord" and who did not make the effort to relate the love of God to the poor and naked and hungry of this world.
Laurence Taylor
1 Whitecliff. Ludlow, Salop •
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