I was recently invited to join a Facebook group called “3 Million Hail Marys to End Abortion“. Obviously such a group attracts aggressive attacks from non-Chrsitians and pro-choicers. One such comment caught my eye:
Religious fanatics should not be allowed to preach on forums such as this. If you want to do something useful, stop interfering in other people’s lives, quit the Hail Marys and spend your time helping those already suffering, not those whose lives have not even started.
There is so much with that comment that I could take exception to – notably the author’s claim that life doesn’t begin at conception, that there is no foetal nociception and that prayer is inefficacious and “useless”. I don’t really think that starting a Facebook group is “interfering in people’s lives” in a particularly obtrusive way, and it seems to me to be very easy to ignore the “preaching” if you don’t want to hear it.
What bothers me most about that post is its efforts to label orthodox Catholics and Christians of other denominations as “fanatics” because of their deeply held religious beliefs. In modern political parlance, religious fanaticism is regarded as the most extreme form of religious fundamentalism and is linked to the rather vaguely termed “extremism” that has become a target of the “war on terror”. The term a “fanatic” has become one that is heavily loaded and increasingly negatively charged. Certainly, it is associated with terrorism: I am not condoning violence or “extremism” that leads to acts of terrorism, violence or indeed even the most low-level unkindness, but I am suggesting that the world needs more people who hold deep religious, moral and political convictions, not less. Let me make it clear – I unequivocally condemn in the strongest possible terms any acts of terror or violence perpetrated against anybody (born or unborn) – these acts are made only more distasteful when they claim to be rooted in moral convictions or religious belief.
Gordon Brown is criticised by the Conservative party as a “bottler” who “lacks vision“. Could not he, and British politics, benefit from some of the intense enthusiasm, zeal and deep commitment that is associated with some of those who are now labelled as “fanatic”? Have the days really gone when the world admires those who hold views – however much we may disagree with them – and stick by their beliefs through thick and thin, maintaining the courage of their convictions? Perhaps this is why, for all their faults, politicians like Dennis Skinner and George Galloway are elected to parliament year-after-year, against all the odds and in some cases against the large political parties: nobody is unsure of their conviction; nobody doubts that they will act as they promise.
There is, of course, a lot of bad that can be written about “fanaticism”. Churchill described a fanatic as: “one who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject“. Such an obsessional view is marked by intolerance and an appearence of being closed to any form of dialogue or discussion. I am not advocating such an isolated position and I am certainly opposed to all forms of intolerance.
Therefore, I think we need to review the terminology and we need to “step up to the plate”. There is nothing wrong with holding a deep conviction that something is right or wrong. Indeed in 1816, Christian parliamentarian William Wilberforce spoke out on exactly this issue:
“They charge me with fanaticism. If to be feelingly alive to the sufferings of my fellow creatures is to be a fanatic, I am one of the most incurable fanatics ever permitted to be at large.
