The ravings of Sindy

The Independent on Sunday (aka the 'Sindy') cused quite a stir yesterday by running a front page article on the 'Evangelical conspiracy' to influence parliament.

It turns out that their gripe is with CARE, the Christian campaigning group who (amongst other things) have about a dozen young people working as interns in MP's offices in and around Westminster.

I know a number of the CARE interns, who must have been surprised (to say the least) to find their names splashed across the front page of a national newspaper yesterday. On the face of it, it is difficult to work out why they have been singled out for such harsh treatment. There are well over a thousand interns working in and around Westminster. Labour MPs frequently have staff members provided by trade unions, Conservatives get their assistants funded by private industry, campaign groups provide researchers, and so on. This is simply how the system works; MPs get resources to represent effectively on their issues of interest, and groups get a chance to participate in the democratic process and ensure their views are heard in the debate. Far from roaming the corridors of power seeking to manipulate unsuspecting MPs (even if such a thing existed), most interns work hard on the mundane aspects of an MP's role: administration, correspondence, and trying to assist ordinary constituents like you and I.

The only question of any substance in the Sindy's rant is that of charitable status. The Charities Commission are already looking at this as part of their review of religeous charities and public benefit. It would be deeply concerning if they concluded that engaging via democratic institutions is no longer deemed to be 'in the public interest'. This is the exactly the kind of social exclusion that extremists of all shades thrive on. However, the impact on CARE would be negligible. The £70K they spend on the intern programme is less than 4% of their budget, and moving it into the 'non-charitable activities' category would be a purely technical adjustment with no real-world effect.

The only explanation for why such a non-issue could make it to the front page of a national newspaper is that the secularist lobby are getting nervous. It is already clear that, far from being a spent force, religeous thinking will be one of the key influences shaping global politics in the 21st century. Despite the best efforts of militant atheist Evan Harris MP to nobble the committee stage, Gordon Brown has already had to make unprecedented concessions in allowing a free vote on the morally controversial Human Fertilisation & Embryology bill.

As Mahatma Ghandi said: 'First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win'. For those of us who are used to having our faith ignored or laughed at, the Sindy have just declared that stage 3 is about to begin. It's going to be a rough and uncomfortable ride, but we can at least take comfort that there is only one more stage to go.