On various occasions I had to ask myself recently whether I was living in London in 2022 or 1980s Italy. The soap opera of government crisis and mass resignations wasn’t very British; we pray for stability and integrity in national life.

I have written a book on the religious faith of British prime ministers – up to and including Tony Blair. Therefore, on Thursday I had a BBC journalist asking me whether these difficulties are because recent generations lack a grounding in Christian faith and morals. I think there is something in that. The Labour prime minister Clement Attlee was, at best, an agnostic. Yet his family were committed churchgoers, engaged in social work in the community. A brother was a Church of Anglican vicar, a sister a missionary in Africa. Even when he doubted the doctrine, Attlee continued to believe in Christian ethics. Thanks to his upbringing, Attlee was a fundamentally decent man in private and in public life.

I don’t think necessarily you have to be a Christian to be a good prime minister, nor that any one political party is necessarily more Christian than the others. But I do think if Christian values don’t underpin politics, if Christianity no longer influences public life, then we are in deep trouble. And this isn’t just about politics; it concerns life at every conceivable level. 

The Conservative prime minister Harold Macmillan was a man of deep faith, at church on Sundays, praying every night. In his youth he came within a hair’s breadth of conversion to Catholicism. In old age, Macmillan said, “If you don’t believe in God, all you have to believe in is decency… decency is very good. Better decent than indecent. But I don’t think it’s enough.” Too many people today, perhaps even within the Church, base themselves on decency alone. But decency is not enough.

Why? Because if our beliefs and actions are not based on God, what are they based on? Popular consensus? My personal preferences? But these can bend and change very quickly under regimes like the Nazis and the Communists. If it’s just my personal opinion, I can change my values at any time if they suddenly become inconvenient. As we have seen, we are building on sand. Our beliefs and our values must come from outside ourselves. They must be rooted in God, Who is truth and love.

Moses said to the people: “Obey the voice of the Lord your God, keeping [His] commandments.” He went on to say: “For this Law that I enjoin on you today is not beyond your strength or beyond your reach… No, the Word is very near to you.” As Christians, we know that “Christ Jesus is the image of the unseen God”. He entered the world so that we might know God, His love for us and how we are meant to behave. This isn’t just for the lucky people who happened to meet Jesus in Israel 2,000 years ago. “Now the Church is His body, He is its head.” As Catholics, we know we encounter Christ, we hear His voice, in and through the Church. We need to act as if we believe it.

Why do we need Christianity, and not just decency? Because we need to know that one day we must account for our actions. One day all those politicians will face judgement – and so will we. “Who is my neighbour?” We need to know that all human beings are fundamentally equal because we are all created by God and loved by Him – regardless of race or nationality or class, whether we are born or unborn. Jesus challenges us to take up our cross, to do the right thing – the sacrificial thing – rather than just take the easy option, the selfish choice.

We need to know that human beings are limited and flawed. But God offers us the means of rising above our limitations: through the grace of Jesus Christ, given through the sacraments in His Church. This isn’t theory. It has real practical application for each one of us. Do we let our children see us make our decisions, big and small, after prayer and in accordance with the teachings of Jesus? Or do we simply do what we want, and try to justify it afterwards? Serious illness and emergencies excepted, do we come to Church, Sunday by Sunday, to meet Jesus at Mass, hear Him in Scripture and grow in His grace? Am I prepared to forego a particular relationship because I know it isn’t compatible with God’s teaching? Do I do as Jesus asks, denying myself, to say yes to God and yes to the needy in the world?

These are practical questions to be answered every day. We need profound change in politics, that that change starts when individuals come to know Jesus and conform their lives to His. Jesus is the Good Samaritan in the parable, who gave everything that we might have life. Now He says: “Go, and do the same yourself.”

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