Ann Widdecombe’s huge bundle of straw
Ann Widdecombe explains it all to the New Statesman.
Under the last government we saw a raft of law, principally equality law, which specifically set out to crush religious freedom and to crush freedom of conscience. There is an immense difference between being told that you must not discriminate against something and being told that you must promote it.
Like what, the NS asks. Poofters, of course. Poofter adoptions, poofters in your B&B. Half the population are non-believers, the NS says feebly; not a bit of it, says Widdecombe, most are Christians and what they say goes. No, really, the NS bleats; Widdecombe says not at all.
People may say they’re not religious, and when Richard Dawkins says he’s not religious he actually means it; so would Christopher Hitchens and Stephen Fry. But when people who are shrugging say they’re not religious, they mean they’re not attached to a particular church, they’re not practising at the moment. They may not necessarily mean that they discard the concept of God altogether.
Case closed! Three people really are not religious, but the others are all just shrugging, so we get to count them as believers. And yes, thank you, that does mean we get to force Christianity on everyone.
You can’t get away from the fact that our culture and our heritage is that way, and if we just deny it all and become nothing and everything we shall lose our character. That actually weakens a country: it can weaken a country very, very badly not to have a clearly defined character…So I think there are all manner of reasons for keeping the church at the centre of society, and the established Church in this country is Anglican.
So there. Take it or leave it, liberalism be damned.
And the pope was absolutely right to interfere with UK legislation.
The Vatican is a state, and we all have diplomatic relations with the Vatican. It’s not some isolated little cult somewhere, it represents 17.5 per cent of the world’s population. And that’s just the Catholics — there are all the other Christians on top of that.
It’s a state, god damn it! Plus it represents a lot of people. Plus there are all the Christians. Therefore, the pope is pretty much an honorary MP, and it’s just fine if he meddles with lawmaking in the UK.
And the child rape was only 2% of the priests, and teachers and plumbers and florists do it too.
And then there’s that pesky women question.
I left the Church of England because there was a huge bundle of straw. The ordination of women was the last straw, but it was only one of many. For years I had been disillusioned by the Church of England’s compromising on everything. The Catholic Church doesn’t care if something is unpopular. As far as the Catholic Church is concerned if it’s true it’s true, and if it’s false it’s false. The issue over women priests was not only that I think it’s theologically impossible to ordain women, it was the nature of the debate that was the damaging thing, because instead of the debate being “Is this theologically possible?” the debate was “If we don’t do this we won’t be acceptable to the outside world”. To me, that was an abdication of the Church’s role, which is to lead, not to follow.
There speaks the theocratic mind at its purest. It can’t even entertain the possibility that acceptability to what she calls the outside world, by which she means everybody who is not a priest, actually has something to do with morality and justice and equality, and that those are good things and priests should take them into account. No, to her that’s just whoring after popularity instead of buckling down and being dogmatic and authoritarian and keeping women Out.
This is not news, of course; it’s Ann Widdecombe, but it’s interesting…and it’s in the New Statesman. Make of that what you will.
Gosh yes, the last government was all about crushing religion. Vicious stuff all that enforced secularist legislation they passed.
As you say, this is Ann Widdecombe so bucketsful of crazishit is what we should expect… But still.
Seems to me all you need is a revelation from the big guy saying homosexuality or ordination of women is fine with me. Doesn’t that trump tradition?
The LDS church does it – how do you think they went from polygamy to monogamy or non-whites as bishops or no caffeine to drinking Pepsi when they bought stock.
Seems to me someone is not listening.
Make of that what you will.
kindling?
It’s hard to for me to listen to Ann Widdicombe without half-wondering whether she is joking around with a Terry Jones caricature. Even putting that aside, the content of what she says seems like another kind of caricature.
I love the contradiction between this:
and this:
First she makes an Argument from Popularity, somehow managing to value the harmony of agreement over the search for truth as a sign of “character” — and then she suddenly whips around and admires the Catholic Church because it stands for truth over popularity. “We’re the majority, so what we say should go, except when the majority disagrees with us, in which case, what price virtue?”
Geez. Pick a horse and ride it.
This is hilarious.
See? She’s not simply being dogmatic. It’s because if the priest is a woman the magic won’t work. See? Perfectly rational when you think about it. Even scientific.
Having it both ways, anyone?
I thought this post was more humorously scathing than usual. (Have you been drinking your Funny Juice today, Oph?) Or maybe there’s something intrinsically amusing about anyone who defends the Catholic Church on any grounds.
So, even if that character is rabidly homophobic, misogynistic, backward-thinking and morally corrupt – it’s better than none. And certainly much better than that wishy-washy inclusive liberal secular one.
Aha! I figured out the latent source of the hilarity: Ann Widdicombe is the same pitiful soul who was debunked by Hitchens and Fry in this debate. http://www.intelligencesquared.com/events/catholic-church
And when I say “she was debunked”, I mean she, as a person, was debunked. Really, there is no such thing as Ann Widdicombe anymore, there’s just this strange machine who makes hi-pitched noises in a vaguely syllogistic form.
I am enjoying contrasting her current statements with her defense of the Church in the Fry/Hitchens/Widdecombe/some guy debate. She’s doing her best now to substantiate Fry and Hitchens in their criticisms.
Spelling mishap, Ophelia. It’s “Widdecombe,” not “Widdicombe.”
If Anne Widdecombe protested against the ordination of women in the Anglican Church, by entering Roman Catholic Church, how on earth’s name did she get her head around the transubstantiation issue within Catholicism? I’m puzzled?
In 1996 Widdecombe as prisons minister she defended the Government’s policy to shackle pregnant women with handcuffs and chains when in hospital giving birth. The policy was later dropped after public outcry. She’s all out to protect religious freedom, but, with the same token does not give a hoot about pregnant women. Her priorities seem rather twisted.
This is such a dishonest argument, as she clearly doesn’t believe any character will do for Ann Widdicombe. She definitely doesn’t seem to like a country based on Enlightenment ideals.
I remember the day that Widdecombe joined her latest church. It started with the usual high-pitched shrieking of disapproval as the C of E voted for the ordination of woman, followed by a stomping procession up Victoria St. to the RC cathedral, accompanied by press, photographers, TV crews etc, to sign-up in double-quick time so as to get her display of piety and new-found conviction on the evening news and in the morning papers.
Who said there’s not such thing as truth? Isn’t commitment to truth what leads people away from myth?
In any event, I suppose we should be grateful that Ann Widdecombe is a believer. Otherwise, by her own account, she would be a morally despicable sociopath.
I hazard a guess that she’ll be once again stomping up Victoria St, in the Autumn, to make her way to the reserved balcony at the side of Archbishop’s House, off Victoria St, to wave the coming of Christ’s successor on earth. And then afterwards she’ll probably join with highest prelate of all, as he gathers in the banquet hall to meet with all the other privileged guests. Her conversion will be all the much sweeter as she shrieks for joy. She’ll be in her element with all the world media at her feet.
At the debate in the Methodist Central hall in late 2009 she despaired at the constant harping on about child abuse, and said that the Church should be judged on such matters according to the morality of the time.
Thanks for spelling alert Zach. Widdecombe is a bear to spell.
Whew! I just watched Stephen Fry giving Widdecombe and her church what for. Inne marvelous. Thanks for the link Ben.
I was thinking about Widdecombe when I read your ‘Does God Hate Women?’. If someone told her she couldn’t be an MP because she’s a woman, then she would be furious. However she changed her religion because the Anglican church was inching towards giving women the same opportunities as men. Her reason? God says so!
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by ManOrMoose, Ophelia Benson. Ophelia Benson said: Ann Widdicombe’s huge bundle of straw http://dlvr.it/2p2Kf […]
I suppose the RC church has correctly identified some true things as true, and that some false things are false. But they also say that if it’s false it’s true (transubstantiation) and if it’s true it’s false (condoms prevent AIDS).
Conclusion?
I see that Archbishop Nichols (Head Honcho in England and Wales) said that he didn’t want the Pope to be greeted by vuvuzelas. Hey, there’s a thought!
It’s a huge bundle of straw. Man-sized, in fact.
I’ve often wondered how Ann Widdecombe explains her own celibacy to herself, in the context of Biblical teachings?
It’s very strange. In the same issue of the New Statesman where Anne Widdecombe’s interview features, there is also an interview with Rowan Williams, the present Archbishop of Canterbury. He, like Widdecombe, thinks we need religion to have value, and here are some telling words:
Now, perhaps the good archbishop would not like to be yoked with the redoubtable Widdecombe, but he is saying precisely the same thing as she. Whether something is sensible or successful in the world’s terms — that is, whether it meets with our own immanent standards of what is humane and human — matters not in the slightest to the archbishop, with his elevated spiritual imagination. There are absolutes, and that’s all there is to it, and the only people who can talk relevantly about absolutes are god botherers.
That’s what they do in the case of abortion. Abortion is an absolute wrong, because it is, according to those who believe they have grounded their morality in a transcendent absolute, the killing of something that is intrinsically valuable or sacred. So, a child is raped. This is a minor detail. So, the child is pregnant. So, the child might die. These too are minor details. The right is absolute, the child must bear the foetuses to term. And if she dies, then that is up to the god who has led to this sequence of events: rape, pregnancy, birth, death, suffering, misery. That’s absolute value for you.
If the bloody archbishop wants to bow down to his absolutes, by all means, archie, bow, but don’t come on heavy with me or with little girls. You look after your absolutes, I’ll look after my values, thank you very much, and, according to my understanding of human value, your values stink. Same goes, of course, for the immaculate Widdecombe, who thinks a Latin tag is all you need to diminish women. What a stupid troll, even one who speaks Latin.
The notion that members of the same religious sect can hold different views of “Eucharistic theology” is baffling to me — pogroms have started over less.
Then again, the term “Anglican theology” seems itself somewhat laughable, as it has always been a rather pragmatic religion (and was established largely for political rather than theological reasons).
Ann Widdecombe on climate change: “There is no climate change, hasn’t anybody looked out of their window recently?”
That should have settled the issue for good and all.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_Widdecombe
“You can’t get away from the fact that our culture and our heritage is that way…”
A little calculation I did recently:
Protestantism is approximately 500 years old (in the UK).
Catholicism is approximately 1,300 years old (in the UK).
Human beings have occupied the British Isles for approximately 14,700 years since the end of the last Ice Age.
Therefore, post-Ice Age, Christianity has been around for 8.8% of human history in Britain, and the Church of England specifically for 3.4%. Some ‘culture and heritage’.
The truth is that British ‘heritage’ is a mish mash of all kinds of things. Cultures change, religions come and go, people disagree with each other, and the powerful usually get to record events at the expense of the less powerful. But saying “It’s what a small group of powerful people have imposed on a country with varying degrees of success for a small percentage of human history” doesn’t have quite the same ring as “it’s our culture and our heritage”…
Perhaps Widdecombe should consider returning to the <a href=”http://www.burbler.com/unknown-old-time-religion-lyrics.html”><i>Really</i> Old Time Religion</a>.
(That link should be: Really Old Time Religion)
“we lose something of the sense that certain acts may be good independently of whether they are sensible or successful in the world’s terms.”
Wtf? This is exactly what we should be losing. Why do we want to say that something is good indepedently of that? I mean, I’m assuming that an act is sensible in the world’s terms if it really does reduce suffering. Maybe he has some very narrow concept of “sensible or successful in the world’s terms”, but I certainly don’t want acts to be praised as “good” if they are of no worldly benefit to anyone or anything.