The stupid party
Sir: Mr Quintin Hogg is on very doubtful ground when he states, by implication, that when people no longer believe in religion it may continue to be true (Letters, 3 January). But he fails to see that belief and truth are fellows that cannot share the same bed. Belief, in the religious context, is a feeling or con- viction—what religionists themselves call faith. Truth is intellectual in nature and makes no pretence to finality or to dogmatic assertion.
Mr Hogg should not have taken up Patrick Cosgrave on this point, for he invites us to counter that a religion when no longer com- manding belief ceases to exist.
As a member of the Conservative party I do wish that Mr Hogg would abandon the pursuit of politics and concentrate .his un- doubted gifts on the propagation of religion. By displaying in public active interest in both fields he inevitably brings the clarity of his own motives into doubt. Are his politics in- tended to bolster up his religion or vice versa? Certain it is that, today, even in the Conser- vative party, religion and politics do not go hand in hand; and Mr Hogg, in forgetting this, helps neither the party nor himself.
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