Religion and Heritage PDF (British Cultural Identities)

1111 2 3 4 5 British Cultural 6 7...

1111 2 3 4 5 British Cultural 6 7 8 Identities 9 10111 1 2 3 SECOND EDITION 4 5 6 7 8 9 Edited by Mike Storry and Peter Childs 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 3011 1 2 3 4 5 6 LE 7 UT D 8 RO GE 9 4011 p Ta ou or 1 y r l & F r n cis G a 2 London and New York 3111 1111 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10111 First edition published in 1997 by Routledge 1 Second edition published in 2002 by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE 2 Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada 3 by Routledge 4 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 5 Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis Group 6 This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2003. 7 © 1997, 2002 selection and editorial matter, Mike Storry and Peter Childs 8 © 1997, 2002 individual chapters, their authors 9 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, 20 now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, 1 or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in 2 writing from the publishers. 3 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library 4 Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data 5 has been applied for 6 7 ISBN 0-203-36169-5 Master e-book ISBN 8 9 3011 ISBN 0-203-37427-4 (Adobe eReader Format) 1 ISBN 0–415–27860–0 (hbk) ISBN 0–415–27861–9 (pbk) 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 4011 1 2 3111 Chapter 7 1111 2 3 4 Religion and 5 6 heritage Chapter 7 7 8 Edmund Cusick 9 10111 1 2 3 4 5 6 The established church 245 7 Background religion 249 8 9 Other world religions in Britain 251 20 Religious festivals 255 1 2 The New Age 258 3 Religious differences: age and sex 262 4 5 The heritage industry 264 6 Conclusion 268 7 8 Exercises 269 9 Reading 270 3011 1 Cultural examples 270 2 Websites 271 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 4011 1 2 3111  240 British Cultural Identities 1111 2 Timeline 3 4 1532 Formation of Church of England 5 1580 Formation of Congregationalists 6 7 1652 Formation of Quakers 8 1739 Formation of Methodists 9 10111 1760 Board of Deputies of British Jews 1 1774 First Unitarian Chapel in London 2 3 1833 John Keble: Oxford Movement 4 1843 The Free church splits from Church of Scotland 5 6 1850s Broad Church formed 7 1880s Christian Socialism 8 9 1942 British Council of Churches (all non-Roman Catholic) 20 1 1948 World Council of Churches 2 1972 United Reformed church (Congregational and Presbyterians) 3 4 1978 The London Mosque, Regent’s Park 5 1980 Modern English Church of England service 6 7 1988 Lord Chancellor censured by Free Church for attending Roman Catholic funerals 8 9 1994 First Church of England woman priest 3011 1 1995 Hindu Temple, Neasden 2 Sheffield rave services condemned 3 4 2001 Archbishop Carey: ‘Tacit atheism prevails’ 5 6 7 8 9 4011 1 2 3111  Religion and heritage 241 1111 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 H E T I M E L I N E O P P O S I T E provides a quick snapshot of key religious 10111 T movements, milestones, and changes in the UK over the last five hundred years. Most will be touched upon in this chapter, which will be 1 2 looking at the importance of public and private religion in the lives of 3 British people and considering the role that notions of ‘heritage’ have come 4 to play in ideas of national identity in recent years. 5 A peculiarly British phenomenon is the presence of established 6 churches such as the Church of England. These churches have an official 7 constitutional status within the legal and political framework of Britain, 8 and the Christian religion is to some degree woven into every level of British 9 life: government, education, architecture, the arts, broadcasting, and many 20 other areas. In Northern Ireland, religion has the extra political significance 1 of marking the line between Catholic and Protestant paramilitary factions. 2 At a personal level, Christianity may have been encountered in the form of 3 prayers or hymns that were taught at school, or personal acquaintance 4 with a local vicar or a chaplain at a hospital. Most British people feel in 5 some way reassured by the background presence of this religion, even if 6 they do not wish to become actively involved with it. Only in 2001 was a 7 voluntary question on religious affiliation included for the first time on the 8 census form. 9 Yet, despite the official uniformity provided by an established church, 3011 and the shared heritage of, for example, religious music and the Lord’s 1 Prayer (‘Our father, which art in Heaven’), the religious experiences 2 available in contemporary Britain form a complex and remarkably varied 3 picture. The fact that Britain is commonly assumed to be a Christian 4 country (and a majority of people feel themselves to be ‘Christian’ in terms 5 of their general principles) is undermined by a number of factors: the 6 rapidly declining levels of people’s involvement with the churches to which 7 they nominally belong; the sharp decline in the value which young people 8 attach to Christianity; the growth of a range of New Age religious prac- 9 tices; and the presence of large Hindu, Sikh, and Muslim communities as 4011 a result of postwar immigration. All of these changes result in considerable 1 differences between the religious identity of the segments of society and of 2 different generations. 3111  242 British Cultural Identities 1111 One way in which this ‘ingrained’ religious identity of British people 2 is communicated is through the physical landscape. The historical evolu- 3 tion of British religion is visible to any visitor. In the countryside, every 4 village will have one or more churches, and even quite small English towns 5 usually have a range of different churches, representing Protestant and 6 Catholic belief, most of which have been present in Britain for two centuries 7 or more, though in larger towns and cities new churches such as those of 8 the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (the Mormons), Jehovah’s 9 Witnesses, or Christian Science and Friends’ Meeting Houses (Quakers) 10111 may also be seen. The visitor will also notice a large range of church build- 1 ings which are no longer in use as places of worship. Some lie derelict, 2 while others have been converted to new uses as apartments, restaurants, 3 warehouses, or even night clubs. 4 Alongside this decline in Christian practice over the last fifty years, 5 particularly in the big cities, there has been a rise in other faiths (see 6 Table 7.1). In addition, in every town high street, bookshops have exten- 7 sive sections devoted to mythology, witchcraft, palmistry, spiritualism, and 8 related subjects. Off the high street, particularly in seaside, market, or 9 university towns, there are small shops selling incense, crystals, relaxing 20 music, jewellery, and books on magic and meditation. In gross terms, the 1 people who attend the churches are few, elderly, and overwhelmingly 2 female. The people in the New Age shops are young, enquiring, and 3 unbound by any sense of religious duty, motivated rather by their genera- 4 tion’s belief in personal freedom. These all indicate Britain’s changing 5 religious environment. 6 Another part of this change is the way in which religious buildings 7 have become a part of what is called ‘British heritage’. One obvious 8 example is the marketing of a number of great cathedrals which are to be 9 found across the UK, though this is particularly noticeable in medieval cities 3011 such as Chester, York, Winchester, and Durham. These buildings are now 1 both religious centres and centres of tourism. A new meaning to the term 2 ‘heritage’ has arisen – heritage now reflects the intervention of the tourist 3 industry to recreate images and artifacts from Britain’s past. The ‘heritage 4 industry’ has grown rapidly to become one of the fastest developing, and 5 most visible, of Britain’s areas of employment and enterprise. It is also one 6 that promotes a particular version of Britain which celebrates continuity, 7 tradition, and conservative values. Partly for this reason, Christianity in 8 Britain is in many ways more of a cultural force than a spiritual one. Table 9 7.1 indicates that the number of practising Christians is in fact much more 4011 in balance with, than exceeding, that of other faiths. 1 In the 1990s there were, nominally, 27 million Anglicans in Britain. 2 That is, almost two-thirds of the population claimed to belong to the 3111 Church of England. However, at the same time the Anglican church had  Religion and heritage 243 TABLE 7.1 Attendance at religious ceremonies (total membership in 1111 parentheses) (thousands) 2 3 Christian denominations 1992 1998 4 Anglicans 1,808 980 (1,500) 5 Roman Catholics 2,049 1,230 (8,900) 6 7 Presbyterians 1,242 1,010 (1,200) 8 Church of Scotland 700 600 (700) 9 Methodists 458 379 (380) 10111 United Reformed Church 148 121 (100) 1 Baptists 170 277 (300) 2 Quakers 18 15 (19) 3 4 Other faiths 5 Muslims 1,200 1,000 (1,100) 6 Hindus 400 350 (370) 7 Sikhs 500 400 (420) 8 Jews 410 285 (350) 9 20 Source: Religious Trends No. 2 2000/2001, Christian Research Association, Whitaker’s 1 Almanac 2 3 fewer than two million registered members. Membership signifies active 4 involvement with the church, for example in attending services and offering 5 financial contributions. Between 1960 and 1985, the Church of England’s 6 registered membership has halved, while the number who think of them- 7 selves as belonging to the church has, in comparison, barely changed. This 8 apparent contradiction between those who choose to think of themselves 9 as Anglicans and those who are actively committed to Anglicanism is 3011 perhaps the single most important feature of British Christian life, and is 1 discussed in more detail below. 2 There are 5 million Catholics in Britain. However on any given 3 Sunday more Catholics than Anglicans will attend a church service – it has 4 been estimated that in Britain 40 per cent of Catholics registered as church 5 members actually attend regularly, as against only 11 per cent of non- 6 Catholics. The north-west of England and the west of Scotland (particularly 7 Liverpool and Glasgow) have had historically, and retain today, a distinc- 8 tively Roman Catholic heritage. Liverpool is Britain’s only Catholic city. 9 In 2001, pessimistic sound bites on religion were attributed to two 4011 senior clergymen, the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr George 1 Carey, and Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, the Catholic Archbishop 2 of Westminster. Dr Carey, addressing a congregation in the Isle of Man, 3111  244 British Cultural Identities 1111 declared Britain to be a country where ‘tacit atheism prevails’. He said that 2 British society concentrated only on the ‘here and now’ with thoughts 3 of eternity rendered ‘irrelevant’. Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor, speaking to 4 a gathering of a hundred priests in Leeds, said, ‘Christianity as a back- 5 ground to people’s lives and moral decisions and to the Government and 6 to the social life of Britain has almost been vanquished.’ 7 Both statements generated considerable publicity. There were laments 8 about the state of the nation, on the one hand, and complaints about the 9 churches’ defeatism on the other. However, both clergymen went on to 10111 offer rays of hope. Dr Carey said that despite massive changes religion had 1 survived and there was growth in churches in Africa and the Far East and 2 ‘signs of real life’ in Europe. Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor said that clergy 3 should use this difficult period in the Church’s history ‘to change the culture 4 of Catholicism’. He believed the answer for the church could lie in new 5 movements, such as Youth 2000 and New Faith, and the building of small 6 Bible study and prayer groups. He said ‘these small communities are the 7 secret for the future of the Church’. 8 From the 1960s till the present day religious issues in Northern 9 Ireland have been overshadowed by ‘the Troubles’ – the continuing violence 20 generated by the unresolved political issue of whether Northern Ireland 1 should form part of the UK or of a united Ireland. The religious differences 2 between Protestants and Catholics have thus been exacerbated, as 3 Nationalists want Northern Ireland to be part of a Catholic country (with 4 the South) while Unionists want the province to belong to a Protestant 5 country – that is, the UK. It is often implied by British people that ‘the 6 Troubles’ are based on religion, but it is probably more accurate to see the 7 conflict as political at root, a stand-off in which the communities have both 8 looked to their differing churches for support. At no time has either church 9 condoned the use of violence in the dispute. As Table 7.2 shows, church 3011 membership in Northern Ireland, like attendance, far exceeds that in 1 evidence on the mainland of the UK, and this is the case in both Catholic 2 3 TABLE 7.2 Church members by country: thousands of adult population 4 5 1985 1992 6 7 England 11.6 10.1 8 Wales 17.0 15.0 9 Scotland 32.4 29.4 4011 Northern Ireland 81.6 82.7 1 Total 15.6 14.4 2 3111 Source: UK Christian Handbook, 1994/5, Christian Research Association  Religion and heritage 245 and Protestant communities. This is probably largely for political and 1111 cultural reasons, as church going is an important way both of establishing 2 solidarity within a community, and of defining its differences with other 3 communities. 4 Wales has a separate religious tradition in which Methodism and the 5 Congregational church have traditionally played an important part, both 6 churches laying an emphasis on individual devotion and strict adherence 7 to puritanical rules of abstention from worldly behaviour, such as drinking 8 and fornication (sex outside of marriage). ‘Chapel’ (the word means a 9 small, simple church) has come, in Wales, to represent the ordinary people 10111 who embraced nonconformism (a form of Protestantism comparatively 1 extreme in comparison to the Church of England). Welsh chapels are plain, 2 and unadorned, and Welsh nonconformist Christianity has traditionally 3 had no concept of the minister as priest (one with unique spiritual powers 4 and authority to administer sacraments such as the Eucharist, or Holy 5 Communion) but has a strong sense of the prophetic tradition (preachers 6 inspired directly by God). There has been no established church in Wales 7 since 1920 – the Anglican church in Wales is known as ‘the Church in 8 Wales’. Nearly all Welsh denominations hold at least some of their services 9 in Welsh, particularly in Welsh-speaking areas. The past devotion of the 20 Welsh (as well as changing population patterns) is evident in the appear- 1 ance of chapels, many of which are now neglected, in the most remote 2 areas, and the smallest of settlements. 3 4 5 The established church 6 7 The Church of England occupies both a political role and a spiritual one. 8 The organisation is referred to as ‘the Church of England’ when consid- 9 ering its place in the constitution or life of the nation, and as ‘the Anglican 3011 church’ when its spiritual or theological identity is at issue. Because it is 1 the body chosen by, and connected to, the British political system of 2 government, the Church of England is the established church (it differs, 3 however, from the Church of Scotland). It is thus formally tied both to 4 Parliament and to the monarchy. 5 Partly because of this link, the relation between religious principles 6 and the personal morality of members of the Royal Family is closely 7 observed and, as noted in the introductory chapter, is of continuous interest 8 to the British people and the tabloid press. Though the monarch’s religious 9 role no longer includes the ‘divine right of Kings’ (the idea that the 4011 monarch’s rule is endorsed by God), people now expect the royals to set 1 personal standards in social and religious institutions such as matrimony. 2 Revelations in the mid-1990s about the adulterous liaisons of both Prince 3111  246 British Cultural Identities 1111 Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales, compounded by speculation about 2 possible future marriages, matter to many people because the reigning 3 monarch is still the head of the church, the institution which above all 4 others is supposed to offer moral guidance to the country. Likewise, promi- 5 nent politicians in the UK are still expected to endorse religious belief and 6 to attend church occasionally, while the Church is expected not to get 7 involved in party politics. 8 The fact that the Church of England has also been known as ‘the 9 Tory Party at prayer’ has less to do with any identification with the polit- 10111 ical policies of Conservative governments in the 1980s and the 1990s than 1 with its role as a guardian of the past, and of established views. It is, as 2 British people will say, conservative with a small ‘c’. On rare occasions the 3 spiritual and the perceived political function of the church may come into 4 conflict – the memorial service held after the Falklands war aroused anger 5 from many Conservative politicians because of its emphasis on the 6 Christian values of forgiveness and compassion for all in the war, including 7 the relatives of Argentinian forces killed, an attitude not shared by those 8 who felt that the national church should identify itself only with the vic- 9 torious British forces. The Church of England is, in fact, also represented 20 within the armed forces – every regiment has its chaplain and barracks 1 have their own chapels. It is not unusual to see stained glass windows 2 commemorating British Armed forces (through the flags or insignia of local 3 regiments) or of Royal Air Force squadrons within English churches, and 4 particularly in cathedrals. 5 The presence of the established church is evident in numerous ways 6 in British life. British coins bear the head of the monarch plus the Latin 7 initials ‘F. D.’ signifying that the monarch is defender of the faith, a title 8 given to Henry VIII by Pope Leo X in 1521. In 1995, Prince Charles caused 9 some controversy among traditionalists by suggesting that at his corona- 3011 tion he would like to be known as Defender of the Faiths (plural) in 1 recognition that Britain was no longer an exclusively Christian country. He 2 again caused controversy in 1996 when he suggested that money from the 3 ‘millennium fund’ (a fund of money from the National Lottery which is 4 intended to finance projects to enhance Britain’s cultural life and national 5 prestige) should in part be spent on mosques. Despite many moves towards 6 multiculturalism in Britain, sections of the tabloid press reacted with 7 hostility to this suggestion, seeing mosques as a symbol of a foreign and 8 minority religion despite the fact that British Muslims now outnumber 9 adherents of most British Protestant denominations. Meanwhile, even 4011 government proposals to reform the House of Lords in 2001 rejected the 1 idea of giving a formal place in the Lords for religions outside the Church 2 of England. Methodists, Presbyterians, Baptists, and Quakers share much 3111 the same struggle as Anglicans and Roman Catholics to retain the interest  Religion and heritage 247 1111 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10111 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 3011 1 2 3 4 5 6 F I G U R E 7. 1 Every monarch since William the Conqueror (with the exception of 7 Edward V and Edward VIII) has been crowned in Westminster Abbey, which was 8 built and developed in the thirteenth to sixteenth centuries. Over three hundred people are either buried or memorialised in Westminster Abbey, including ‘the 9 Unknown Warrior’, whose grave has become a place of pilgrimage, and the 4011 figures celebrated at ‘Poets’ Corner’, from Geoffrey Chaucer, Charles Dickens, 1 and Thomas Hardy to Sir John Betjeman 2 3111  248 British Cultural Identities 1111 of the population at large. The divisions within Christianity which sep- 2 arated the denominations alienated potential members, and, although they 3 have been addressed by the reconciliatory ecumenical movement, none of 4 the churches is really thriving. 5 At all levels of society, Britain’s churches are involved in its cultural 6 life. Church halls are used for whist drives, jumble sales, play groups, 7 badminton, barn dances, sales of jam by the Women’s Institute, and an 8 array of other events for charity and local causes which may be entirely 9 secular. Most of the church’s cathedrals hold concerts of classical music, 10111 both secular and religious, and may also hold exhibitions of painting. 1 Nearly all British cathedrals have a gift shop, for buying cards, tapes, orna- 2 ments, and books, and many also have a ‘coffee shop’ or café where visitors 3 are encouraged to come and eat. This partly offsets any decline in revenue 4 caused by the fact that marriages may now legally take place in many 5 venues besides a church and a register office. It is perhaps because of this 6 greater flexibility in their use, as well as because of the aesthetic or histor- 7 ical appeal of beautiful buildings and stained glass, that, while churchgoing 8 is in marked decline, attendance at cathedrals (both by tourists and by 9 worshippers) is on the increase. In 1999, Canterbury Cathedral had 1.4 20 million visitors – more than London Zoo. 1 Religious tourism for recreation is also very popular, taking the 2 place that pilgrimage for a spiritual purpose held for previous ages, and 3 converging on the same sites. Holy Island (Lindisfarne), for example, which 4 is situated off the Northumbrian coast near Berwick, and which combines a 5 peaceful atmosphere and dramatic setting with the sites of some of the ear- 6 liest Christian settlements in Britain, receives more than three hundred thou- 7 sand visitors a year, most of them British. Such spiritual tourism is not always 8 welcome however – such is the demand for property for retreat houses and 9 meditation centres that local people complain of not being able to afford 3011 houses on the island, which cost twice as much as they do on the mainland. 1 Throughout the period between the 1960s and the turn of the new 2 century the church was in a state of change. Conscious of its rapidly dimin- 3 ishing appeal to the population at large, it attempted to change traditions, 4 in some cases hundreds of years old, in order to be more modern and hence 5 attract more worshippers. The decision in 1992 to admit women as priests, 6 in particular, proved controversial and divisive, resulting in many priests 7 leaving the faith to take up holy orders in the Roman Catholic church. 8 Those Church of England priests who were most opposed to women priests 9 may feel at home there but, ironically, many Catholics do not welcome 4011 what they see as their male chauvinism, and themselves see the advent of 1 Catholic women priests as both desirable and inevitable. 2 A further illustration of the shift in the manner of religious expression 3111 occurred in 2001 when Tony Blair offered the Americans the redundant  Religion and heritage 249 Greenwich Dome to cover the site of Ground Zero, the New York site of 1111 the Twin Towers destroyed in the 11 September attack. He was perhaps 2 intending to capitalise on the melding of religious belief with heritage, 3 to cement the Anglo-American ‘special relationship’, and to bolster the 4 flagging tourist industry. His offer was not taken up. 5 6 7 Background religion 8 9 The English capacity for compromise can be seen to have emerged in what 10111 we could call ‘half belief’ or ‘passive belief’. While membership of all 1 Christian churches in Britain, and churchgoing, are in steep long-term 2 decline, active Christianity in Britain is not, in general, being replaced 3 by atheism, but rather by a less taxing, and harder to define, ‘passive 4 Christianity’ (a vague belief in a God, and a vaguer belief in Christ, but a 5 strong adherence to the idea of being Christian). As suggested earlier, the 6 contradiction at the heart of Christianity in Britain is that, while most of 7 the population believe themselves to be in some sense Christian, they have 8 no commitment to, little knowledge of, or belief in, things that the Church 9 regards as central to Christianity. There is in many quarters of the non- 20 churchgoing population an assumption that being English automatically 1 qualifies one for membership of the Church of England and hence confers 2 the right to be considered a Christian. This position is made easier to hold 3 by the Church of England’s status as the established church. As the church’s 4 rituals of baptism, marriage, and funeral have traditionally been extended 5 to anyone who lives within the parish of a particular church, it has been 6 easy to assume that membership of the church, too, is a right that everyone 7 shares. Thus the English choose the Church of England, but choose to stay 8 away from it – preferring a loose sense of association with it to actually 9 attending its services. Despite this, over all more people still attend church 3011 on Sunday than football matches on Saturday. Moreover events such as the 1 2001 Twin Towers bombings sparked an increase of up to 20 per cent in 2 attendance. Surveys of religious attitudes in Britain regularly reveal a higher 3 percentage of people who claim to be Christian than of people who claim 4 to believe in God, implying a ‘cultural Christianity’ in which no orthodox 5 spiritual faith in a divine being is necessary, however strange such a concept 6 may be to a traditional believer. 7 Most British people, it can be said, live in a state of ‘popular reli- 8 gion’, which, while loosely based on Christianity, would not be recognised 9 as faith by most priests. In moments of crisis, it is the Christian God in 4011 some form to whom they will turn in private prayer. Such religion requires 1 no active participation, but may be satisfied for example by listening to 2 radio or television broadcasts. A Sunday service is broadcast nationally 3111  250 British Cultural Identities 1111 every week, while morning radio programmes have ‘Thought for the Day’ 2 or ‘Prayer for the Day’ slots – uplifting spiritual thoughts offered to 3 the nation. (For example, the foremost news and current affairs radio 4 programme, ‘Today’, early morning on Radio 4, has not only a daily 5 interview with a prominent politician but a message from a prominent spir- 6 itual leader.) Similarly, Songs of Praise, a weekly televised Christian act of 7 worship which focuses on hymn-singing, regularly attracts a greater audi- 8 ence than does Match of the Day – the most popular weekly showcase for 9 Britain’s national sport, football. The same enjoyment of passive religion 10111 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 3011 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 4011 F I G U R E 7. 2 The Salvation Army hall on Oxford Street is taken over by The 1 Alpha Course: a ‘short course’ programme of Christian values (mainly for young 2 people disillusioned by the traditionalism of the church), heavily promoted on 3111 television by David Frost  Religion and heritage 251 is evidenced by the local and national newspapers which carry a weekly 1111 column on spiritual decisions written by a pastor. In Scotland, some local 2 papers carry a daily sermon. Across the UK, religious broadcasting, which 3 produces thoughtful programmes of high quality, is surprisingly popular. 4 On an average Sunday in Britain six hours of religious programming will 5 be broadcast by the BBC and independent television companies, and four 6 hours by BBC radio. In general, it is the older generations who watch such 7 programmes. In keeping with British reticence on the subject, religion only 8 occasionally features in television drama. One exception is Brookside, a 9 popular soap opera set in Liverpool, whose story lines have included a 10111 Catholic priest who leaves the church after an affair with one of his parish- 1 ioners and one which dealt with a cult of extreme evangelical Christians. 2 On BBC television, The Vicar of Dibley is a comedy drama series based 3 around the life of a woman priest in the Church of England, and derives 4 much of its humour from the clash of expectations between the traditional 5 role of a clergyman and the new clergywoman. 6 7 8 Other world religions in Britain 9 20 Britain has approximately 1,200,000 Muslims, the majority of whom were 1 born in the UK. Others have arrived from the Indian subcontinent or from 2 African countries. The larger Muslim communities are concentrated in the 3 industrial cities of the Midlands, in London, Bradford, and Strathclyde, and 4 in the textile towns of Yorkshire and Lancashire where in the 1960s the 5 clothing industry attracted workers from overseas. Additionally, immigrant 6 communities who arrived in Britain from colonies and ex-colonies in Asia, 7 West Africa and the Caribbean in the 1950s and 1960s tended to concen- 8 trate in particular areas – notably London, Birmingham, Glasgow, and the 9 big industrial towns of northern England – and this has led to large commu- 3011 nities of Muslims, Hindus, and Sikhs in these areas. Glasgow, Newcastle, 1 and Leeds have sizeable Muslim populations. Britain’s Muslim population 2 is predominately Sunni, with only around twenty-five thousand Shias. For 3 the first generation of Asian settlers, the practice of Islam and the heritage 4 of Asian culture are inextricably intertwined. For their children, who have 5 grown up in Britain, however, Islam is a cultural and religious force in 6 its own right, so that many young Britons of Asian origin may think of 7 themselves as British Muslims, rather than as Asians or as Black Britons. 8 Whereas in the 1980s only a fifth of the Muslims in Britain claimed to prac- 9 tise their religion actively, in the 1990s that figure rose to half. 4011 For this generation the challenge is to continue to find ways to inte- 1 grate the religious traditions of Islam into contemporary British life and to 2 create a new British Islamic identity. It is a process which involves some 3111  252 British Cultural Identities 1111 difficulty, exacerbated by the fact that, although Britain has laws of blas- 2 phemy which could be invoked when Christians were offended by Martin 3 Scorsese’s film The Last Temptation of Christ, Muslims who objected to 4 Salman Rushdie’s novel The Satanic Verses had no legal recourse. The 5 Rushdie Affair, as it came to be called, in many ways started abroad. 6 Objections to Rushdie’s blasphemy against the Prophet in his book were 7 first voiced in India, and later in Pakistan and, of course, Iran, from where 8 the Ayatollah Khomeini issued his fatwa, which Rushdie heard on 9 Valentine’s Day 1989. In Britain, the famous organised book burnings 10111 began only the month before. The affair raised awareness of Islam in 1 Britain, and several groups emerged into the public eye. For example, 2 the Bradford Council of Mosques attacked Rushdie, while trying to create 3 a political Muslim collective, and the Women Against Fundamentalism 4 group defended him while trying to dislodge stereotypical views of Muslim 5 women. Meanwhile British law did not recognise that any blasphemy had 6 occurred. 7 In 1996, there was a widespread boycott by Muslims of religious 8 education classes in schools (which, by law, may teach about other religions 9 but must be predominantly Christian). Despite there being state-funded 20 schools offering an education which is distinctively Anglican, Catholic, or 1 Jewish, no state money had by then been awarded to assist in creating a 2 Muslim school. (This situation was not redressed until the year 2000.) The 3 anomaly arose possibly because Islam was still seen as intolerant, or even 4 as a threat, by many conservative Britons, whose folk-memory of Islam was 5 in terms of the medieval Crusades (a word used with a positive emphasis 6 in Britain generally, but which must have adverse connotations for 7 Muslims). Young British Muslims, however, represent an important strand 8 in British identity, feeling themselves to be in the forefront of the develop- 9 ment of Islam in Europe. Positive cultural public images have been supplied 3011 by the cricketer Imran Khan and Yusuf Islam, the pop singer formerly 1 known as Cat Stevens. 2 The history of the presence of other faiths and peoples, and their role 3 in public life in Britain, is not widely known. For example, Asian 4 performers are recorded in London in the seventeenth century, and Indian 5 sailors, called Lascars, were living in London at the end of the eighteenth 6 century. England had several Indian professors in the 1800s and a British 7 India Society was established in 1839 (under the influence of the first widely 8 known Indian nationalist, Raja Rammohun Roy), followed by a London 9 Indian Society in 1872. Already by the middle of the nineteenth century 4011 there were significant Indian communities in London, Southampton, and 1 Liverpool, though they were smaller than other black communities in 2 Britain. As an indication of this level of cultural presence, it is worth 3111 noting that Queen Victoria – who never visited India – asked a Muslim  Religion and heritage 253 1111 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10111 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 FIGURE 7.3 Community-built mosque in Hounslow, West London 8 9 3011 servant, Abdul Karim, to teach her Hindustani. The founding President 1 of the London Indian Society, Dadabhai Naoroji, also one of the early 2 presidents of the Indian National Congress, was the first Indian elected to 3 the British Parliament, in 1892, when he stood as a Liberal candidate in 4 East Finchley, and another Parsi, Mancherjee Merwanjee Bhownaggree, a 5 merchant from Bombay, was elected Conservative MP for Bethnal Green 6 Northeast in 1895. 7 There is therefore a long cultural heritage of Asian people and faiths 8 in the UK. This was well demonstrated in 1995, by the opening of the 9 largest Hindu temple outside India, in Neasden in London. This event 4011 attracted much media interest since it was the only such structure to be 1 built outside India for a thousand years. It used largely volunteer labour 2 and was paid for entirely by donations from the Hindu community. Now, 3111  254 British Cultural Identities 1111 the majority of Hindus live in Greater London although Birmingham, in 2 the Midlands, has also become a centre of the community. Many British 3 Hindu families came from India and Sri Lanka but considerable numbers 4 also arrived from Uganda and Kenya, when they were expelled by the 5 authorities there in the early 1970s. There are now Hindu temples across 6 the UK in major cities and towns. The Sikh community is also well repres- 7 ented in Britain and is concentrated in particular areas – for example, in 8 Southall and Gravesend in Greater London. Most early postwar migrants, 9 in the 1950s, came from the Jat caste, and were predominantly men. At 10111 first they would hold a diwan or religious meetings at home, often in all- 1 male households, but soon set up Gurdwaras (Sikh temples) for Sunday 2 services. Their families followed from the Punjab in the 1960s and stronger 3 domestic and religious ties were established. 4 Britain has the second largest Jewish population in Europe. Most Jews 5 live in London, but there are several hundred Jewish congregations in the 6 UK, many Jewish schools, and synagogues serving both the Orthodox faith 7 and the minority Reform group. Fears have been voiced that nowadays half 8 of Jewish men are marrying non-Jewish women and that this will lead to 9 a decline in faith and religious observance. 20 Finally, the Rastafarian religion has had a sizeable cultural influence 1 in Britain. Rastafarians’ philosophy of life was originally based on their 2 adaptation of the Christianity they experienced in the colonial West Indies. 3 They see themselves as Israelites displaced from their homeland, and 4 Babylon is the collective name for all countries of exile outside Africa. 5 Rastafarians have been influential in many cultural ways in Britain. Their 6 ‘dreadlocks’ hair style is shared by some New Age travellers or Crusties, 7 and they were probably influential in promoting a climate of tolerance 8 towards soft drugs, a major aspect of their religion, in the 1980s. They 9 staked out their territory in urban areas of cities such as Liverpool with 3011 graffiti such as ‘Toxteth Not Croxteth’, meaning that marijuana was 1 welcome in Toxteth, but not the heroin which was available in another 2 district of the city. 3 Though the religious group is small, millions appreciate the charac- 4 teristic Rastafarian music, reggae, and particularly that of Bob Marley and 5 the Wailers. Marley’s music has been enormously influential, even with 6 many British white punk bands such as The Clash, Stiff Little Fingers, and 7 The Ruts, plus more mainstream groups such as Culture Club and UB40. 8 Among other black British groups displaying Rasta influence are Aswad, 9 Misty in Roots, and Steel Pulse. Also, the critically acclaimed and widely 4011 published Rastafarian poets Benjamin Zephaniah and Levi Tafari have 1 raised the profile of Rastafarianism, promoted the interests of ethnic 2 minority groups generally, and contributed to the transformation of British 3111 cultural identities.  Religion and heritage 255 Religious festivals 1111 2 One of the most obvious examples of religion in contemporary British life 3 is in the progression of the year through festivals and significant dates. The 4 Anglican church has traditionally divided the year according to a liturgical 5 calendar – basing the year around a number of key religious feasts and thus 6 creating holidays such as Whitsun, named after the feast of the Pentecost 7 which is celebrated on the seventh Sunday after Easter, when the Holy 8 Spirit appeared to the apostles. British life is punctuated by such national 9 holidays, some of which still have a religious meaning, but many of which 10111 are now largely secular festivals. An example of the latter is Mother’s Day, 1 which is based on Lady’s Day (25 March), a celebration of the annuncia- 2 tion to Mary that she was pregnant with Christ, who was to be born nine 3 months later on 25 December. Some public festivals have roots in the pagan 4 religions that held sway in Britain before the arrival of Christianity, lost 5 religions whose customs are being recreated and celebrated by a new gener- 6 ation of ‘pagans’, who celebrate seasonal events such as the winter and 7 summer solstices (mid-points), by meeting out of doors at ancient sites of 8 worship, most famously at Stonehenge. 9 The name Easter is derived from the name of the Saxon goddess of 20 spring, Eostre (related to a Mediterranean pagan goddess mentioned in 1 the Bible, Astarte). In some areas, Easter rituals, as well as celebrating the 2 resurrection of Christ, include ceremonies which were once probably part 3 of pagan fertility rites, though now performed in a spirit of secular fun, 4 for example, the rolling of eggs down hills or the eating of pancakes on 5 Shrove Tuesday, at the beginning of Lent, the period of fasting before 6 Easter (observed by few Christians in Britain, in contrast with the month 7 of Ramadan, observed by Muslims). For most non-religious British people 8 Easter is an occasion for the exchange of chocolate, though this chocolate 9 is usually in the shape of an egg or a rabbit (the Easter Bunny), both 3011 symbols of fertility. Many British people who never normally go to church 1 will attend a service on Easter morning. The day after Easter Day, Easter 2 Monday, is also a public holiday. 3 The first of May or May Day is a public holiday introduced by a 4 Labour government. It is a socialist revival of a much more ancient pagan 5 festival of Beltane which is still celebrated by Morris dancers, who dance 6 traditional dances, clad in straw hats and with bells on their ankles, around 7 a Maypole. In places such as Oxford (where there is a tradition of greeting 8 the dawn on May Day morning), Morris dancers are likely to be joined by 9 neo-pagans – young people dressed in the fashions of youth counterculture 4011 – ex-army coats, trousers, and boots, dreadlocks, strings of coloured beads 1 or leather thongs worn as bracelets or necklaces, and pierced noses and 2 ears. That such people will share the same celebration as well-heeled 3111  256 British Cultural Identities 1111 middle-class students and conservative middle-aged people points to the 2 deeper rhythms of British life which unite people who otherwise feel them- 3 selves to be profoundly different, politically and culturally. 4 Hallowe’en, on 31 October, is a British festival which now shows 5 many traces of American influence. For example children are now beginning 6 to play ‘trick or treat’ – that is, to call at houses on Hallowe’en dressed in 7 macabre fancy-dress costumes and ask for sweets. This new and growing 8 fashion, pagan in origin, can be contrasted with the Christian tradition of 9 groups of carol-singers going from door to door at Christmas, singing in 10111 exchange for coins or refreshments. Carol-singing is in marked decline. 1 Some people feel uneasy about Hallowe’en. It was originally a pagan festi- 2 val of remembrance for the end of the old year (according to the pagan 3 calendar) and of communion with the dead (it falls on All Souls’ Eve). It is 4 celebrated principally by children, who enjoy the frightening atmosphere 5 created by make-up, masks and costumes on the theme of ghosts, witches, 6 spectres, and skeletons. While in the 1960s and 1970s schools would enthu- 7 siastically participate in Hallowe’en, from the 1980s onwards many schools, 8 particularly in Scotland, which had a particularly strong Hallowe’en tradi- 9 tion, banned the celebration, because of pressure from Christian parents 20 who believed the festival was connected with black magic and witchcraft, 1 or because it encouraged children to go out unsupervised, at night. 2 Guy Fawkes Night (5 November), also known as ‘Bonfire Night’ or 3 ‘Fireworks Night’, is another example of how a festival which is now seen 4 as entirely secular can grow from religious origins. While, again, its origins 5 6 7 8 9 3011 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 4011 1 2 F I G U R E 7. 4 Last night of the Proms: young and old share patriotic fervour 3111 (© Adam Woolfitt/CORBIS)  Religion and heritage 257 lie in pre-Christian pagan customs (a fire festival to welcome the winter), 1111 this custom of gathering to light outdoor bonfires, and to burn effigies 2 symbolically representing the old year, was adapted by the Christian state 3 in the seventeenth century to commemorate the defeat of a Catholic plot 4 led by Guy Fawkes (the Gunpowder Plot) to blow up the Houses of 5 Parliament. Like Christmas, Bonfire Night is remarkable in being one 6 of the few customs which actively unite British people. All across the UK, 7 everyone is acutely aware of, if not participating in, festivities typically 8 consisting of a display of fireworks around a bonfire, on which a human 9 effigy of Guy Fawkes is burned. 10111 The role of the traditional churches as part of the British state is 1 most obvious on Armistice Day (the Sunday nearest to 11 November). This 2 day is also known as ‘Poppy Day’, as many British people, particularly of 3 the older generations, will wear a red paper poppy to show that they 4 remember those who have died fighting for their country. (In the First 5 World War many British soldiers were killed in battle in the wheat fields 6 of Flanders, which had poppies growing in them.) All over the country, 7 ceremonies which combine military drill and Christian ritual are held to 8 remember the war dead, especially those killed in the 1939–45 war. This 9 is principally a time of mourning and of celebration for the generations 20 who have lived through the Second World War, and those who died. 1 However, even many young people, who feel uncomfortable about the 2 solemnity and emphasis on the past of Poppy Day, also feel that some of 3 their sense of identity as British subjects is defined by this day. Even if 4 the themes of patriotism and military service are not those with which 5 they personally identify, the commemoration ceremonies held in schools, 6 churches, and town centres provide an annual reminder of another history 7 of British identity – one which now needs to be negotiated alongside 8 strengthening links with the EU. 9 For those without significant religious festivals, Christmas (25 3011 December) is without question the single most important event in the 1 British social, religious, and cultural calendar (though it should be noted 2 that in Scotland, where it was not until the 1950s that Christmas Day 3 became a public holiday, the alternative celebration of ‘Hogmanay’ or New 4 Year has historically been of much greater importance and, in the 5 Highlands of Scotland particularly, remains so). Christmas Day is the one 6 time when people feel the need to re-enact the importance of the family, 7 and most young people who otherwise live elsewhere will still spend that 8 day with their parents. For most British families the Christmas period is 9 the only time, apart from weddings and funerals, when the ‘extended 4011 family’ – including different generations and the children of different 1 branches of the family are gathered together. It is the time when, as John 2 Betjeman put it in his poem ‘Christmas’, ‘girls in slacks remember Dad / 3111  258 British Cultural Identities 1111 And oafish louts remember Mum’. For many people, this proves to be 2 something of a strain, as British people are not used to sharing their lives 3 so closely with so many other relatives for several days, and this is reflected 4 in statistics for violent domestic crime. 5 While the Christmas festival, celebrating the birth of Jesus, is of 6 course a religious one, it could be argued that, for most British people, any 7 religious meaning is very slight, and the celebration consists chiefly of 8 drinking and eating (especially Christmas dinner of turkey, roast potatoes, 9 Christmas pudding (a very rich fruitcake), mince pies (sweet fruit pies of 10111 mixed dried fruit and brandy), the giving of presents, and the watching 1 of special Christmas programmes on television. Passive religion, however, 2 is more popular at Christmas than at any other time, with many people 3 listening to carol services on the radio, such as that broadcast by the BBC 4 from King’s College in Cambridge. For many British people, the Christmas 5 story has sentimental appeal, if only because it reminds them of when they 6 first heard it as children, and it is this, rather than religious faith, which 7 makes the church seem more attractive at Christmas. Generally speaking, 8 public performances of the nativity story of Jesus’s birth, which is primarily 9 reserved for children’s school plays, take a second place to pantomimes and 20 productions of Dickens’s A Christmas Carol across the country. 1 Some Christmas traditions are of fairly recent manufacture. Prince 2 Albert, Queen Victoria’s consort, introduced the Christmas tree to Britain 3 from his native Germany. The red uniform and white beard of ‘Father 4 Christmas’ or ‘Santa Claus’ are said to have been inspired by a Coca-Cola 5 advertising campaign in only the 1920s. Despite the widespread commer- 6 cialism, however, most British people do derive some religious meaning 7 from Christmas and, for this one time in the year, will participate in a 8 Christian ceremony. They will also listen to the monarch’s only annual talk 9 to the nation, which has an ostensibly religious purpose. It is broadcast on 3011 both radio and television and the queen or king asks for God’s blessing on 1 the British people. For most of the nation this is a dated occasion devoid 2 of any religious meaning, and indeed of any meaning at all. While in the 3 1970s up to 27 million people, more than half the population, watched this 4 broadcast, in 1994 this number had fallen to around 15 million, and in 5 2000 to 11 million. One may only speculate on why 11 million British 6 people watched the broadcast, and what they got out of it. For many it is 7 simply ‘a tradition’ – part of the Christmas ritual. 8 9 4011 The New Age 1 2 ‘New Age’ is a broad term devised to describe the renewal of interest in a 3111 range of approaches to the spiritual dimension which promote individuals’  Religion and heritage 259 ability to discover and develop their own spirituality. Whereas Christianity 1111 is seen by many as emphasising adherence to a strict moral code (for 2 example through the Ten Commandments, the Bible, confession, or 3 sermons), New Age religions concentrate on developing the spiritual aware- 4 ness which they believe is present in each person. Their practices have a 5 huge variety in their origin – some being revivals of the pagan magical and 6 religious systems that Christianity replaced in Britain, some being exten- 7 sions of Eastern meditative and religious practices, and some, such as Yoga 8 and t’ai chi, being concerned with physical exercises. It may be that the 9 presence of an increasingly diverse multiethnic community in Britain has 10111 boosted the popularity of some practices. For example, interest has grown 1 in vegetarianism and veganism (large Hindu and other communities have 2 added a considerable market for vegetarian food, which has in turn stim- 3 ulated British caterers and retailers, and thus aided their popularity) and, 4 while ten years ago vegetarian options on a pub menu were rare, they are 5 now standard. The practice of Chinese medicine, meditation, and yoga is 6 also rapidly increasing in Britain. 7 The belief in reincarnation, which many young people who have 8 been influenced by paganism adhere to, is one which, while alien to older 9 generations brought up under Christianity, is fundamental to Hinduism for 20 example. Similarly, it is not unusual for young British people involved in the 1 New Age to talk about ‘karma’, a religious idea of divine cause and effect 2 passed on through different acts and incarnations which they have derived 3 from Hinduism. Other New Age practices have a distinctly European 4 origin, stemming from a revival of interest in Celtic myth and culture, or 5 from new publicity given to old systems of occult knowledge through for 6 example the Kabbalah or palmistry. Hundreds of thousands of people are 7 involved directly in activities such as meditation or astrology (the belief 8 system where people’s personalities and destinies are determined by the star 9 signs under which they are born). But more significant is the effect of these 3011 beliefs on the overall sense of how British people see themselves and their 1 world. A quarter of British people, for example, claimed in a recent survey 2 regularly to read their horoscope as published in a magazine. Many more 3 will read their horoscope as a form of light-hearted entertainment, but will 4 still hope for good news. Television programmes such as The Para-normal 5 World of Paul McKenna, which explores ‘inexplicable’ phenomena, are also 6 extremely popular. So is Mystic Meg, a television seer formerly on the BBC’s 7 weekly National Lottery show who predicted the type of person destined 8 to win the jackpot each week. Also, business people have adopted many 9 alternative spiritual practices, as a cure for stress and as a source of inspi- 4011 ration or energy. Feng shui is also used to create a comfortable working 1 environment for offices. Finally, a small but growing number of people 2 among the professional classes are choosing Buddhism. 3111  260 British Cultural Identities 1111 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10111 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 F I G U R E 7. 5 The Globe: Shakespeare’s theatre reconstructed by Sam 20 Wanamaker on London’s South Bank 1 2 3 The term ‘New Age’ is used to link all of the above activities, and 4 this grouping has some justification, not least because those who have an 5 interest in one of these practices often also have an interest in others. The 6 term itself is derived from astrology, which holds that every two thousand 7 years the solar system enters a new age. The Piscean age (from the sign of 8 the fish) which started approximately at the birth of Christ was the 9 Christian age (Pisces is seen by astrologers as the sign of self-sacrifice and 3011 mass movements), while the new astrological era will be that of Aquarius 1 (Aquarius is the sign of individualism, and hence of any religion which 2 allows individuals freedom). 3 Some of the increasingly popular practices which have been placed 4 by the media in the New Age category are distinctively religious. For 5 example Wicca (witchcraft, or worship of British forms of the Mother 6 Goddess, often associated with the practice of magic) and Buddhism are 7 religious preoccupations. Interest in oriental medicine, health food, and 8 yoga, however does not require or imply faith. Many facets of the New 9 Age, such as the interest in astrology or in Eastern meditation, are religious 4011 in the sense that they involve establishing a link between individuals and 1 a spiritual realm. However, in other ways these activities seem more 2 like hobbies than parts of organised religions because they involve indi- 3111 vidual study or meditation rather than a formal organisation with its own  Religion and heritage 261 hierarchy and moral code. New Age groups are thus the antithesis of the 1111 highly controlled, brainwashed ‘cults’ which fascinate newspaper editors in 2 Great Britain (such as followers of the Unification Church, known as 3 ‘Moonies’). 4 New Age practices, in the widest sense, are the most important, and 5 most rapidly developing area of religious change across Britain, and must 6 be considered seriously. Aspects of the New Age have permeated very 7 different sections of British society: from business people turning to 8 meditation as a release from the stress of pressurised, urban, executive life, 9 to the Donga tribe – young pagans who have abandoned normal British 10111 society and who live, largely, out of doors, and who came to national 1 prominence for their role in actively protesting against the government’s 2 appropriation of sites of rare natural value to build new motorways. 3 In many ways, currents of New Age religion have enabled changes 4 which have occurred in British life between the 1980s and the 1990s to 5 find a religious expression. The rising tide of concern for the environment, 6 for animal welfare and rights (a subject the British think themselves very 7 concerned with, though they have fewer domestic pets per capita than for 8 example the Dutch), for conservation, and for green or ecological politics, 9 has helped to create a climate in which religions such as paganism, 20 which celebrate the earth and its wildlife, fulfil a need for many people. A 1 powerful element within the identity of young British people is a sense 2 of identification with the countryside, and a resentment of the loss of 3 countryside to modern building, and in particular of the road-building 4 programme which successive governments have pursued. 5 Famously, while statistically very few young people seek active 6 involvement in any of the national political parties, and there is generally 7 much cynicism about politics in British life, concern for the landscape is an 8 area for which there is genuine enthusiasm. Many environmental protesters 9 endure poverty and physical hardship to fight new road-building. Such 3011 activity earns considerable sympathy from many Britons of all generations. 1 Television coverage of campaigners against the Newbury road bypass and 2 a new runway at Manchester airport turned one young male protester, 3 ‘Swampy’, into a national hero. Far more young people are involved in 4 such ‘single issue’ protests than in party politics, as referred to elsewhere 5 in this book. Whereas for previous generations the sense of belonging to a 6 nation may have been expressed through such institutions as the church, 7 the armed forces, or in some cases a university or a public school, many 8 of the young generation find their ideals, and their sense of belonging, in 9 nature and in the land itself. 4011 While Christianity is identified politically with authority, the 1 Establishment, and the older generation, many New Age beliefs, and 2 paganism in particular, are identified with the young and the disaffected. 3111  262 British Cultural Identities 1111 The most visible adherents are ‘New Age Travellers’, who, in the hot 2 summers of the 1980s, fought annual battles against the police to reach 3 Stonehenge, Britain’s most important ancient site, because they believed 4 that they had both the right and the duty to celebrate the summer solstice, 5 and, in particular, to name their children there. The latter idea offers an 6 example of how quickly an idea essential to identity – the ritual of naming 7 – can become part of British subculture, and how the New Age generates 8 its own ‘instant’ mythology through which people define themselves. 9 The British appetite for passive religion, and the commercial forces 10111 of tourism show their influence on pagan sites as well as Christian ones. 1 Stonehenge is one of Britain’s most popular attractions, receiving 672,000 2 visitors a year, many of whom are drawn by a vague, but powerful, sense 3 of communion with some other world, or mystic power, which lives on in 4 the imagination of the visitors, if not in the stones themselves. The young 5 New Age pagans who worship at the stones are in a sense a natural exten- 6 sion of British instincts rather than a violation of them, despite their 7 anti-Establishment posture. 8 9 20 Religious differences: age and sex 1 2 The decline of Christianity in Britain is not due to individuals’ losing their 3 religion, but rather to a process of generational change. A generation which 4 was very religious, at least in terms of church attendance and social atti- 5 tudes, and which has been the mainstay of church life in England over the 6 last thirty years, is literally dying out, and being replaced by a generation 7 which cares far less for church observance, and for Christianity in general. 8 Christianity is associated for young people with the unfashionable and 9 unnecessary code of restrictive, negative morality of the value systems of 3011 their parents or grandparents. Many associate a figure such as the Pope 1 with an authoritarian patriarchal Jehovah and tend to see Christianity, and 2 Catholicism in particular, as a series of prohibitions – ‘don’t take drugs’, 3 ‘don’t have sex’, ‘don’t get drunk’, and ‘don’t swear’. As such it has very 4 little appeal and has also been seen as male-centred, dictating women’s 5 lives: under Catholicism, women cannot be priests, or use contraception, 6 or have an abortion. Attempts by some within the church to integrate 7 elements of 1990s youth culture into worship, including some ideas 8 borrowed from New Age spirituality and others from the ‘rave’ music 9 scene, have caused problems and controversy. They have been backed by 4011 many bishops as an attempt to bridge the enormous cultural gap between 1 the church and young people, yet resisted by many ordinary worshippers 2 who cannot reconcile flashing lights, amplified electronic music, and cinema 3111 screens as part of recognisable Christian worship. A visitor to a church  Religion and heritage 263 service in Britain will be struck by the advanced age of the worshippers: 1111 many congregations are largely made up of women in their sixties or seven- 2 ties, or still older. The chief exceptions to this are evangelical congregations, 3 both within the Church of England and outside it in churches such as the 4 House churches, Baptists, or Pentecostals, which place a strong emphasis 5 on a dramatically emotional conversion experience, and conservative moral 6 values and family structures (for example, no sex except in marriage). 7 One example of the gulf between the church and society was the 8 church’s hostility towards the National Lottery. The church was once again 9 seen as basically prohibitive. While some serious commentators on national 10111 life agreed with its reservations about the damaging effects, particularly on 1 poor people, of the compulsion to gamble, and those of extreme wealth on 2 the winners, the week in 1996 when the church raised its strongest objec- 3 tions was also one in which nine out of ten British people bought a lottery 4 ticket for a £40 million jackpot. The church may still try to exercise its role 5 as moral guardian of the nation, but few people take this seriously enough 6 to be guided by it in their own lives. This is even more the case with the 7 young. For them, Christianity is profoundly unfashionable. It is significant 8 that, almost in imitation of the subcultural pagan practice of wearing 9 occult jewellery whose meaning is known only to another ‘initiate’ of the 20 subculture, Christians have, in Britain, increasingly embraced the symbol 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 3011 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 4011 1 2 FIGURE 7.6 Horse Guard and street performer guardsman 3111  264 British Cultural Identities 1111 of the fish (an ancient secret sign used when Christianity was itself a minor 2 religion, a cult) rather than the cross, as a badge to identify themselves only 3 to other believers. 4 Church weddings, despite the aesthetic attraction of historic church 5 buildings and music, are in decline. The comment of one future bride, 6 ‘We’re not religious at all, we don’t believe in God but we want to get 7 married in a church’, sums up the confused motives behind many such 8 weddings – the fact that the wedding is a Christian ritual, involving 9 religious vows, is somehow invisible to those used to passive religion. The 10111 hit film Four Weddings and a Funeral offered an illustration of the lack of 1 religious interest in the church at English and Scottish weddings, which is, 2 paradoxically, matched by the cultural importance to the upper classes of 3 having a church wedding. Christening – the Christian rite of baptism – is 4 now becoming rare. 5 It should be noted that, while the church is dominated by men, 6 surveys reveal that in groups of every age women are more likely to 7 acknowledge the importance of religious experience than are men. In both 8 New Age groups and Christian churches, it is women who predominate. 9 It may be that British women are more open to spiritual practice and 20 belief than men (a survey conducted for Channel 4 in 1987 found that 1 roughly half of British women believed in astrology, while only a quarter 2 of men shared that belief). It may be that men are simply more reluctant 3 to show religious feeling outwardly. No men’s magazines have astrology 4 columns, but almost every woman’s magazine has its own named 5 astrologer. Two-thirds of the private clients of leading astrologers are 6 reported to be women. 7 8 9 The heritage industry 3011 1 A major cultural change in British life from the 1970s through to the 2 present has been that Britons spend more leisure time and money on visiting 3 historical sites and exhibits. It has been argued that the growth in the 4 heritage industry has in some ways filled a gap left in people’s lives by 5 the loss of a religious dimension. Reverence for the past could be seen as 6 replacing the religious reverence of previous generations. Britons who, a 7 generation before, might have gone to church now spend their Sunday 8 visiting a stately home or exhibition of local ‘heritage’ – a modern 9 pilgrimage. The Jorvik Centre in York (the town’s modern name is derived 4011 from Jorvik, its Viking name) was the first purpose-built centre for heritage 1 tourism. The life-size plastic Vikings of Jorvik have been followed by 2 other exhibition centres showing everything from Oxford scholars to high- 3111 land Scottish crofters. Such exhibitions use mannequins dressed up in  Religion and heritage 265 1111 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10111 1 2 3 FIGURE 7.7 Buckingham Palace 4 5 historic costume, in restored or imitation historic houses, shops, castles, or 6 factories. They may even be staffed by actors dressed in historic costume. 7 Paradoxically, the increasing secularisation of British life has led to less 8 leisure time on Sunday for many, as in the 1990s shops began to open 9 routinely on Sundays, giving the traditionally quiet Sabbath day more a 20 feel of ‘business as usual’. 1 The attraction of a ‘museum culture’ does not just extend to the 2 remote past, but applies even to the twentieth century, and to areas of life 3 that have only recently been part of normal life, rather than historical 4 curiosities. In south Wales, for example (where coal mining was until the 5 1980s the dominant industry, but has now almost disappeared), it is 6 possible to be guided around a redundant coal mine by men who used to 7 work as miners there, but who are now only dressed as miners to show 8 tourists around. While much of this repackaging, particularly in metro- 9 politan areas, might seem to be arranged or created for foreign tourists, in 3011 fact most of the visitors to many such attractions are British, being rein- 1 troduced to their own past through the professional presentation of a host 2 of corners of its geography and commerce. As justifications for the former 3 ‘Greatness’ of Great Britain fall away, it could be said that its people turn 4 to the past to find symbols of their identity, and indeed, their importance. 5 Of these, the stately home is one of the most enduring as well as the most 6 successfully marketed to the public. 7 In some ways the church has benefited from this – the great cathe- 8 drals which combine Christian heritage and monuments from the past have 9 never been so popular. In other ways, too, the British could be accused of 4011 living in their past. Many films lovingly recreate Edwardian England, 1 particularly those of Merchant and Ivory, who have specialised in finely 2 detailed costume dramas and adaptations of literary classics such as 3111  266 British Cultural Identities 1111 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10111 1 2 3 4 FIGURE 7.8 Shakespeare’s Head Pub at the end of Carnaby Street, London 5 6 7 A Room with a View and Howards End. Other films of the 1980s and 8 1990s, such as The Remains of the Day or A Month in the Country, and 9 television series such as Brideshead Revisited are profitably sold around the 20 world as an image of an ideal Britain, and eagerly consumed by Britons 1 themselves as a kind of national myth. The common elements of the aris- 2 tocracy, venerable buildings, and English eccentrics occur over and over in 3 such films, offering a picture of a quaint, gentle England. 4 Fantasies of the Britain of previous generations, particularly of rural 5 Britain, predominate in television drama series such as Heartbeat, All 6 Creatures Great and Small, The Darling Buds of May, and Brideshead 7 Revisited, and in advertising – notably for various brands of bread, biscuits, 8 and cakes. Historical settings are also used in some of the numerous ‘situ- 9 ation-comedies’ which British people watch. Dad’s Army and ’Allo ’Allo 3011 for example, are set during the Second World War, a time which many in 1 the older generations look back to with nostalgia and pride. The celebra- 2 tions in 1995 to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of VE (Victory in 3 Europe) Day were the occasion of a collective nostalgia for the comrade- 4 ship and certainties of wartime. It should be stressed, however, that 5 children and young people in general know very little about ‘the [1939–45] 6 war’ – the defining moment in