Foolish On Three Counts?

Posted in DocBlog (Christians & Politics)
at 6:38 pm by Calvin L. Smith

It will be interesting to see how people respond to the newly-elected Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg’s candid admission that he is an atheist. Given how most British politicians, in a tradition espousing privatised faith, tend to keep such views to themselves for fear of offending both believers and non-believers, Mr Clegg’s slip of the tongue seemed a trite risky, arguably even foolish. That he saw the need to issue a semi-retraction later in the day, albeit in typically wishy-washy Liberal Democrat doublespeak style, suggests a realisation that his original denial of God was not his most intelligent of moments. (The wording of his `clarification’ suggests he not only offended a large segment of the electorate, but also his own Roman Catholic Spanish wife). Of course, neither is his party affiliation perhaps the cleverest of moves for such an ambitious politician. Former Tory grandee Leon Brittain, who worked with Clegg at the European Union bureaucracy, suggested he could do very well if he joined and help mould the Conservative Party at a time when it was experiencing an acute ideological vacuum. Yet instead Mr Clegg opted for the little-fish-in-a-big-bowl approach in order to reach the dizzy heights of British politics (about 90 years too late if you know your British political party history). Again, one might respectfully note that this was not the cleverest of moves, and “Calamity Clegg”, a name mischievously coined by his rival for the LibDem leadership contest, looks like it is beginning to stick already. Personally, though, I prefer the words of the Psalmist in 14:1 and 53:1: “The fool hath said in his heart there is no God”. Whichever way you look at it, his cerebral own-goal(s) doesn’t/don’t bode particularly well for a clearly talented man with an Oxbridge education who speaks various languages. It will be interesting to see if he handles his party more intelligently than his tongue, especially with his party leadership secured with the tiniest of electoral majorities and that mischievous Mr Chris Huhne snapping at his heels.