Whose words can we trust?

Examining the true spirit behind all the election promises.

The manifestoes are published! The day has arrived! No more leaks. No more fake news or half-truths. The real thing is now here. Each of the main parties has now published its policies for the next five years.

The politicians and their advisers have been poring over the texts, burning the midnight oil, arguing over each point and how to express it to the public. At last agreement has been reached and the results have been printed – there for all to see!

But how many voters will actually read the manifestoes? I decided to investigate what the politicians have actually said. I wanted to get past the big stuff on the NHS and migration; the economy and Brexit. I wanted to get the feel of what lies behind the policies. I wanted to read the small print – the things the politicians and their professional advisers have slipped in to the text – things they probably hope the public won’t really notice – the things they want to get away with undetected.

These are the things that reveal the true spirit behind the political promises that are being poured out this election time.

The Spirit of the Age

Upon closer inspection, all three main party manifestoes are pandering to the spirit of the age, seeking to endorse and extend radically anti-Christian values. Just look at some of the social issues that crop up across all three:-

• Extending sex education to all children
  
• Promoting LGBT+ lifestyles
  
• Tackling hate crime
  
• Enforcing and strengthening equalities law
  
• Promoting humanist values worldwide
  

Let’s look at what the parties have to say on these issues. The following are a few quotes:

Not-so-hidden agendas: Tim Farron makes it clear where the Lib Dems stand on Brexit.

Sex Education

The Conservative Party “will introduce comprehensive relationships and sex education in all primary and secondary schools” (p79).

Labour will “make age appropriate sex and relationship education a compulsory part of the curriculum” (p77). Labour will “ensure that all teachers receive initial and ongoing training on the issues students face and how to address them. We will ensure that the new guidance for relationships and sex education is LGBT inclusive” (p111).

The Liberal Democrats will “include in SRE teaching about sexual consent, LGBT+ relationships, and issues surrounding explicit images and content” (p29).

Promoting LGBT+ Lifestyles

The Labour Party says “A Labour Government will reform the Gender Recognition Act and The Equality Act 2010 to ensure they protect trans-people” (p111).

The Liberal Democrats will “strengthen legal rights and obligations for couples by introducing mixed-sex civil partnerships and extending rights to cohabiting couples” (p72). They will also “extend The Equality Act to all large companies with more than 250 employees, requiring them to monitor and publish data on gender, BAME, and LGBT+ employment levels and pay gaps” (p71).

Tackling Hate Crime

The Conservative Party will “push forward with our plan for tackling hate crime committed on the basis of religion, disability, sexual orientation or transgender identity” (p44).

The Labour Party will “bring the law on LGBT hate crimes into line with hate crimes based on race and faith, by making them aggravated offences” (p111).

The Liberal Democrats will “tackle bullying in schools, including bullying on the basis of gender, sexuality, gender identity or gender expression” (p30).

Enforcing and Strengthening Equalities Law

Theresa May launches the Conservative manifesto, Thursday 18 May.

The Conservative Party will “strengthen the enforcement of equalities law – so that private landlords and businesses who deny people a service on the basis of ethnicity, religion or gender are properly investigated and prosecuted” (p56) (This is a direct threat to Christians).

“A Labour Government will enhance the powers and functions of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, making it truly independent” (p108).

The Liberal Democrats will “extend protection of gender reassignment in Equality Law to explicitly cover gender identity and expression, and streamline and simplify The Gender Recognition Act 2004 to allow individuals to change their legal gender without unnecessary bureaucratic hurdles” (p72).

Promoting Humanist Values Worldwide

The Conservative Party will “continue to champion British values around the globe: freedom, democracy, tolerance and the rule of law” (p38).

The Labour Party commits to “appoint dedicated global ambassadors for women’s rights, LGBT rights and religious freedom to fight discrimination and promote equality globally” (p118). Labour will also “continue to ensure a woman’s right to choose a safe, legal abortion – and we will work with the Assembly to extend that right to women in Northern Ireland” (p109).

British Values?

All of these policies are either expressly anti-biblical or more subtly so – dressed in language that seems to promise good for society. The protections of hate laws and equality legislation, for instance, are difficult to argue against from a Christian standpoint without being labelled hateful or bigoted. However, it is these catch-all policies that are being used to shut down freedom of conscience and speech for Christians, while enforcing the nation to not only accept but also endorse wrongdoing.

All of these policies are either expressly anti-biblical or more subtly so – dressed in language that seems to promise good for society.

Moreover, the Conservatives are the only ones who spell out the values that lie behind all their policy decisions: freedom, democracy, tolerance and the rule of law. They claim these to be British values - and to untrained ears they sound positive - but there has been no national debate upon what constitutes British values, where these concepts have come from and what they are being used to promote.

They certainly are not the values of our forefathers, which were the biblical values of truth, justice, righteousness, faithfulness, integrity and love. These are the values of our Judeo-Christian heritage that former generations embraced and became the foundations of our civilisation. Are we to allow them to be abandoned without even protest?

Aggressive Humanism

All the values underlying the policies put out by all three parties in their manifestoes have come from Darwin, Freud, Marx and other humanists. They are based fundamentally upon evolutionary/secular humanist beliefs, not on Judeo-Christian values. By what right do our politicians champion humanist values “around the globe”, calling them British?

This is the spirit of the age that is driving the political policies being promoted in Britain today – aggressive humanism. Continued unchecked, these policies will undoubtedly bring Christians into conflict with the law in the future. Our freedom of speech risks being curtailed by hate laws and soon we will not even be able to quote parts of the Bible in public worship services. No doubt the day may even come when our home-based Bible study groups will also be under threat.

All the party manifestoes are based fundamentally upon evolutionary/secular humanist beliefs.

We Need the Word of the Lord!

When similar things were happening in Israel the prophets thundered forth the word of God, but today our church leaders are silent. Why do we not hear the word of the Lord declared in our nation?

“This is what the Lord says, cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He will be like a bush in the wastelands; he will not see prosperity when it comes…But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream…It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” (Jer 17:5-8)