If you live in the UK and you’ve been reading or watching the news, you may know that the Pope is coming to town. But rather than visiting to provide warm encouragement to his devoted fellow Catholics in this difficult time, he is coming to complain about our equal rights law, which will make it illegal for religions to refuse to hire openly gay men. He claims that the law strips religions of their freedom to choose who they hire.
A recent Pew study revealed that US Generation Y (and it will be similar in the UK), are the most progressive and liberal of all the living generations, being the most approving of once controversial subjects, such as inter-racial relationships. At the same time, another study suggests that Generation Y is the most ‘God-apathetic’ (two thirds of UK teens don’t believe in a God). However, particularly many of those who are suffering at the cruel hands of unemployment are searching for meaning and looking to religion to fill that hole, and many believe that Generation Y, rather than rejecting religion, are redefining what it means to them.
Now, with the Pope making – in the name of religion of course – the effort to come all the way to Britain in order to reprimand our government for protecting the fundamental human rights of all its citizens, do you think for a second that Generation Y is going to be impressed by this? For a religion which is struggling to recruit youth, this action by the Pope will go down like a lead balloon and alienate an entire generation of young people at a time when they most need meaning and guidance.
Faith is supposed to be about acceptance and peace, not about tyranny and narrow-mindedness. Isn’t it?
