Submission from the Protestant Alliance
We are very concerned at the proposal to abolish
"certain religious offences". How could it be thought
right to remove safeguards regarding "disturbing a religious
service or religious devotions"?
The matter of "Religious Hatred" sounds
very laudable and right, but who is to define what exactly it
is and how it is to be differentiated from the criticism of some
religious groups—both their tenets of belief and their conduct—by
such as ourselves.
This historic society was founded in 1845 by
The Seventh Earl of Shaftesbury to contend against the Oxford
Movement and both Anglo and Roman Catholicism.
We are sometimes accused by people of very differing
religious views of a lack of love because we oppose the errors
of Romanism. It is our policy to extend to every Roman Catholic
our love in Jesus Christ; we long for them to experientially know
Him for He alone can save. It is not love to condone error, or
to imply that the fundamental differences between Roman Catholicism
and Biblical Christianity do not exist. It is therefore our policy
to preach the Word of God—contend for the Faith—educate
and instruct our people in the facts of our great heritage and
the manifest lessons of history that support the truth of the
Gospel.
Is the right to oppose what we understand to
be erroneous to be taken from us?
3 July 2002
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