For millennia, Christians around the world have observed the Sabbath by going to church. The Ten Commandments make explicit that Sunday observance is a Christian duty: ”Remember the Sabbath Day by keeping it holy”.
All this is to change, however, in Britain. The High Court ruled last week that Sunday is not a core part of a Christian’s belief. Mr Justice Langstaff has decided that a Baptist who works in a care home can be forced by her employers to work through Sunday too. This, even though her colleagues were happy to take Celestina Mba’s Sunday shift so she could do what all devout Christians do on a Sunday — go to church.
Her employers at Merton Council, however, wanted Miss Mba to drop her religious obligations.
The ruling further underlines what Christians in this country have begun to suspect for some time: they live in a hostile environment. I have written in my Daily Telegraph blog about the new rules that bind Christians in Britain: Don’t wear crucifixes, don’t pray for a patient, don’t try to foster a child. It doesn’t matter that the majority of Britons still count themselves as Christian; or that the PM claims to do. Censorship of religious practice has become a rule of 21st century life.
Miss Mba would have had a better case if she had been able to show that for the past 2000 years Christians had not worked on the Sabbath.
It has long been the case that Christians have worked, in every Industry from Electricity and Gas supply, through Social services, Medicine and Healthcare to Policing and the Armed forces. Even before the rise in the Modern Industrial state it was normal for Christians to carry out ‘non Religious’ work and duties. They even trained for war at the Butts after attending church.
This court Judgement was no more an attack on Christianity than requiring Police Officers to work on Sundays, or the Phones to work, etc….But Don’t let the truth get in the way of a poor story!
Barry PURKIS
January 1, 2013 at 10:23
Jesus healed on the sabbath because he knew he was doing the will of God and not man. That is the difference. The Judge may be able to declare this lady must agree to work on a Sunday irrespective of what she believes. But it is beyond his jurisdiction to assert what are or are not core beliefs for Christians. God, as the only Just Judge is the only one to lead someone to affirm what they believe or don’t believe as Christians.
John Munro
January 8, 2013 at 14:35