The persecution of practising Christians in Britain has been a recurring theme of this column.
Publicly-funded bodies seem to take a perverse delight in targeting staff with a strong Christian faith.
‘Celebrating diversity’ is our new State religion. We must accommodate all beliefs and, in the case of extremist Islam, tolerate practices which most people in this country find alien and abhorrent.
If you’re Muslim, special prayer rooms will be set aside for you. Hospital canteens will force everyone to eat halal meat. Feel free to wear the veil, madam. If you’re a Pagan, you’ll be granted time off work to celebrate the Summer Solstice.
But if you’re Christian, you praise the Lord at your peril. Take that crucifix off now, or find another job.
This week, a Christian doctor lost his appeal against dismissal for sending a prayer to his colleagues by email. Consultant paediatrician David Drew thought the 16th century prayer, To Give And Not To Count The Cost, by St Ignatius Loyola, would be motivational.
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Dr Drew claims that his bosses at Walsall Manor Hospital were looking for an excuse to get rid of him because he had consistently accused them of putting patient safety at risk.
He’s almost certainly right, so why did they choose to sack him over his ‘motivational’ email? Simple: they knew that a devout Christian doesn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of convincing a tribunal that he’s been the victim of religious discrimination.
The corridors of the industrial tribunals system are littered with the corpses of Christians sacrificed on the altar of ‘diversity’.
Members of tribunals are trained to be concerned only with upholding the rights of perceived ‘persecuted minorities’. Their verdicts are guided by the doctrines of ‘sexism’, ‘racism’ and a litany of fashionable ‘phobias’.
Adherents of ‘minority’ religions will always get the benefit of the doubt. But Christians are on a hiding to nothing, since they represent the ‘oppressors