Baroness Warsi finds Christianity hiding in a massive Cathedral – it’s her illiberal crusade

BARONESS Warsi, the Conservative Party Chariman, made a speech to the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy. This is Sayeeda Warsi, who once wanted the hen Labour government to debate issues with extremist Muslims:

“We must engage with, not agreeing with, the radical groups who we have said in the past are complete nutters. We need to bring these groups into the fold of the democratic process. As long as we exclude them and don’t hear them out, we will allow them to continue their hate. It may not achieve results immediately, but it may stop the immediate violence.”

Why not just champion free speech and say what you feel. Why “engage” with “nutters” over tea and smiles?

This is the same Warsi who insulted a huge swath of voters for engaging in what might be termed free speech:

“It seems to me that Islamophobia has now crossed the threshold of middle class respectability. For far too many people, Islamophobia is seen as a legitimate – even commendable – thing. You could even say that Islamophobia has now passed the dinner-table-test. The drip feeding of fear fuels a rising tide of prejudice. So when people get on the tube and see a bearded Muslim, they think ‘terrorist’ …when they hear ‘Halal’ they think ‘that sounds like contaminated food’…and when they walk past a woman wearing a veil, they think automatically ‘that woman’s oppressed’. And what’s particularly worrying is that this can lead down the slippery slope to violence.”

It is very lack of free and frank speech that’s the problem. Warsi is no fan of genuine free speech. She wants control. She wants to suppress the ideas she does not like, not debate then openly. These are her views on the State:

“[The well-intentioned liberal elite] conversely, are trying to create equality by marginalising faith in society and think that the route to religious pluralism is by creating a path of faith-neutrality”. She said they aimed to “downgrade religion to a mere subcategory in public life.”

“But look at their supposed level playing field. Its terrain is all but impassable to anyone of belief. One of the arguments of the liberal elite is that faith and reason are incompatible. But they don’t realise, as the Holy Father has argued for many years, that faith and reason go hand in hand.” Just as reason should not be excluded from debates about faith…so too spirituality should not be excluded when we look at worldly matters.”

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Anorak

Posted: 16th, February 2012 | In: Reviews | Comments (2)