The State of Things To Come?

More and more, it seems, the media (at least they're reporting it, I guess!) are highlighting cases of people being silenced by apparatus of the State.

• A nurse who was recently suspended for asking someone if they would like to pray with them was suspended by a state-owned NHS Hospital...I think.
• A teacher was recently suspended because of a private email which let various people know about an incident which took place between a teacher and her child when the child talked about Our Lord with another child and the teacher silenced and reprimanded her.
• A bus driver was reprimanded recently for refusing to drive a bus with a slogan emblazoned on the side from the Humanist Association telling Londoners not to worry because God 'probably doesn't exist'.

Now, I dare say that the 'liberal' tendency which has taken hold of the UK has been encroaching upon religious freedom incrementally over a long time. But what is particularly disturbing about recent reports is the amount of fear that exists in secular society and yes, the State, about God and the fact that people at least respect Him or fear Him a little, fear Him more than the judgment of man.

It could only possibly be out of fear that there now exists a trend in secular society, and it seems the social apparatus of the State in particular, to reject discussion of God. For, if they were so sure that God did not exist, those who have recently done so would not hasten so quickly to dispel talk of Him. The only thing that people genuinely try and silence is the truth. Ironically, what the 'liberal' agenda really cannot stand is debate.

The rights of people to believe and express their faith without having to worry about losing their job or being told to 'shut up' are slowly and incrementally being eroded, though these are early days, I'll admit. Yet this is not yet China. People who opposed formation of UK law in certain areas, brave men and women (yes, there were a few) who during the debate on abortion and the HFE Bill in Parliament stood up and spoke their mind, were allowed to do so. It was just unfortunate that they were in a minority compared to those who thought so very differently to them and therefore British law again went on the side of the atheistic secular agenda.

I suppose the point is that people at the moment are allowed to speak about their faith publicly but recent reports could be indicative of a societal shift away from Christian faith and an almost paralised, fearful response of how to deal with people who are not afraid to express their deepest personal convictions publicly, unafraid of society's perception of them. All three of these cases of the bus driver, the nurse and the teacher are cases such as this. Christians are allowed to worship and are allowed to be religious to the point that nobody in this country is being slung into jail for it. However, once the State and society both reject God and discussion of faith to the point that there are some things you 'are just not allowed to say', then it is a denial of the right to religious freedom that is on its way...It is the forerunner, the embryo, if you like, of a deeper suppression not only of the practice of faith, but of freedom of speech, freedom of conscience and freedom in almost all of its forms.

'Liberals' who wish to deny men and women the freedom to speak their minds and hearts on any matter, be it religious or not, really are afraid of truth and are enemies of truth and enemies of freedom. They decry those who express their religious faith while at the same time lambasting the Inquisition, yet fail to see that they are imitating the methods of it. How long will it take for religious faith and expression of that religious faith in a secular World to be discarded and suppressed as 'heresy'? How long will it take for 'heresy' to be punishable by the apparatus of the State? How long before it becomes a criminal offence?

The post below highlights a case where the State has removed children from a family and then said it is just "too late" when it is revealed that they were not guilty of the charges against them. All human rights are inviolable and they include the right to a family, the right to life, the right to freedom of thought, speech and conscience. The Fourth Estate is the last bastion against the tyranny of the State and the tyranny of a new secular ideology that says that God and Faith, Truth and Freedom and the defence of all human rights are anathema.