Philobiblon

The Observer today has an expose on Philippa Stroud, expected on Friday to be a Tory MP. She’s a fundamentalist Christian who has been praying to rid Britain of homosexuality – not in some sort of metaphorical sense, but directly and purposefully ecause she believes that’s what God wants and she wants to get him to do it. And she’s tried to do the same thing with individuals.

At a personal level, this kind of thing has a hideous effect on people – as the Observer quotes… “Angela Paterson, who was an administrator at the Bedford church, said: “With hindsight, the thing that freaks me out was everybody praying that a demon would be cast out of me because I was gay. Anything – drugs, alcohol or homosexuality, they thought you had a demon in you.”

It is something that I feel strongly about after an experience in Bankok. A Christian woman I knew had lots of personal issues, and also physical health issues. She arrived on my door one day in a terrible state, because she was ill (mostly related to diabetes), but mostly because the Christians with whom she lived had thrown her out because they were convinced the illness came from demonic possession. Not only had they thrown out an ill woman, they also dumped her possessions on the street, in case they were possessed…. She had been brainwashed into more than half believing they were right.

Of course all parties have prospective MPs with odd views, but Stroud apparently has great influence in the party – this a party that has Chris Grayling, who wants to allow prospective B&B guests to be thrown out on the street if they happen to be gay, and a leader who wants to reduce the abortion limit.

And this isn’t only limited to the Tories. Shockingly the allegedly “liberal” Liberal Democrats have had at least three MPs who have had interns from the heavily misnamed Care (Christian Action, Research and Education), which is anti-homosexual and anti-abortion rights – Paul Burstow, Tim Farron, and Steve Webb. (And there are also at least three Labour MPs.)

And there are also three Labour MPs, and SEVEN Tories.

Unfortunately none of these issues have been really aired in the election debates, but it does raise the question of whether the nasty, bigoted, “back to the 50s on ‘moral’ questions” party has really changed. Just look at where the money comes from.

Abortion Rights is already gearing up for a huge fight in the next parliament to defend access to abortion, and I fear similar struggles on other ‘moral’ issues.