The Archbishop wriggles and must resign

In a previous post I was very critical about the Archbishop of Cantebury calling for Sharia Law in the UK.

The criticism of the Archbishop following his remarks came from all corners of the media and public and there have been mounting calls for him to resign following his foolish remarks. To add insult to injury the Archbishop is now trying to claim that he was not calling for Sharia Law to be set up in some kind of parallel way to British law but "simply that it should be recognised" and only in relation to family and financial matters.

The Archbishop simply compounds his offence however because as he well knows in civil matters of contract it is already open to the parties to agree to follow a preferred process for arbitrating or managing their dispute. In that sense, if what he now claims is true, he was calling for something that is already possible. This is of course not what he was calling for and he knows it.

He was calling for formal legal Sharia pathways to be recognised distinct from the current uk legal system. This is a call for a parallel legal system.

The Archbishop was attempting to argue for more formal integration of religious mechanisms into the existing Uk legal framework and did this by focussing on Sharia law. All he has succeded in doing is stirring unneccessary community tensions. Further, he has actually strengthened the hand of the silent majority who want our law to be religiously neutral and secular and who certainly want to see no place for Sharia Law in the legal framework.

So despite the Archbishops wriggling he will continue to face calls for his resignation and accusations that he is completely and dangerously out of touch with the mood in the UK.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Please leave a comment. The best substantial comments will be edited into the end of this post to give you lovely link juice.