Why Polly Toynbee is wrong about God
by Freddie Sayers, UnHerd:
The trouble with writing anything about religion is that if you’re not religious, like me, you’re not a legitimate voice (what’s it got to do with you?); if you are religious, you’re not a legitimate voice either (you would say that, wouldn’t you?). It’s easier to steer well clear. So this huge, foundational aspect of life is often absent from – or misrepresented in – the media.
The British Social Attitudes survey is the big annual state-of-the-nation report, and this year the headline finding was that for the first time ever, more than half of the country (52%) now sees themselves as totally unreligious. The Church of England has collapsed most spectacularly (only 1% of 18-24 year olds now identify as Anglican, compared to 33% of over-75s) and hard atheism is on the rise, with 26% of the population now saying with confidence that they don’t believe in God, up from 10% 20 years ago.1
This wasn’t the area most newspapers focused on, though. They led with the juicier findings about gender identity and acceptance of gay relationships. The religion stuff was reported neutrally, matter-of-factly, as yet another confirmation of a trend we can’t do anything about. The decline of the Church now sits alongside Capitalism, Globalisation and Technology in the ‘too big to spend time fretting about’ category.
There was one commentator, however, who did find something to say about the report. The Guardian’s Polly Toynbee was delighted with the findings and devoted her column to calling for any remaining role for the Church of England in public decision-making to be finally extinguished. She neatly managed to bring her political views into line with the good forces of rational correctness. “This visceral Brexit war between old and young,” she concluded, “has often felt like a conflict between reason and unreason, between economic fact and emotional national identity. But the BSA report reassuringly finds that beneath the surface of our present turmoil, superstition and unreason are on the retreat.” There was something of the grand inquisitor in her tone, chasing out the last vestiges of the forbidden faiths.
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