What the Archbishop didn't say

Yet another Daily Mail front page (well, Mail on Sunday, actually, but they're the same bastards) alluding to the Archishop of Canterbury's "advocacy" of Sharia Law. It's truly astonishing the depths to which the media, and the newspapers especially, will stoop. Who cares about the truth, eh? We've got targets to hit.

I am not a churchgoer. I was baptised into the Church of England at the age of 13 because I wanted to go to a Catholic school (work that one out). Not, as has been the subject of various newspaper reports bemoaning the standard of modern-day parenting, because it was a good school and my parents wanted me to go there (in fact they were deeply reluctant), but because it was where my best friend was going and I was so desperately insecure that I felt I had to follow him. I am one of those dreadfully cowardly people who label themselves "agnostic", partly, I suspect, because I went to said Catholic school and had the gospel of John Mark drilled into me for three years. I am now trying to learn about different religions when I get the chance - Islam, Hinduism, and Sikhism among them - not because I intend to folow any of them, but purely because I believe it is important to understand different cultures to better interact with them. So my willingness to stand up for the Archbishop is not born of any religious deference. It is born out of despair at the manipulative expediency of the media.

Dr Rowan Williams never said anything about the adoption of Sharia Law in certain parts of the counntry being "inevitable". I know, because I've read the transcript of the lecture, rathr than relying on what the papers say, much of which is bollocks. He gave a wide-ranging lecture on the concept of allowing community jurisdiction to act alongside the rule of law in certain cases in certain areas. He touched on Jewish customs, Catholic customs, Christian customs and, yes, Islamic customs. His point was that in certain cases, on certain issues - including, for example, abortion, divorce, marriage, family-planning - certain communities recognise a code of conduct and customs which is particular to membership of that community and this should be understood in the context of UK law which prizes the rights of the individual above all else. With the legal ystem apparently creaking under the weight of litigious traffic in our blame-obsessed, fear-driven society, is it really beyond the pale to even consider such a thing?

No, but it doesn't sell papers, does it? What's next, the special commemorative Enoch Powell DVD, complete with quiz and "Rivers of Blood" rafting game for the kids?

By the way, this issue does fall within the remit of this blog because lots of people on the train read the Daily Mail. Oh, and I'm not just being what Richard Littledick would call a "bleeding heart liberal" - The Guardian is just as bad.