UK Independence Party excludes member for voicing religious opinion

The right-wing/libertarian UK Independence Party (UKIP) has suspended one of its members after a letter he wrote to the local newspaper was published and his opinion, that Britain’s worst seasonal flooding in over a hundred years is due to the ascension of homosexual marriage into law.

David Silvester, a UKIP locally elected councillor in the Tory stronghold of Henley-on-Thames also claimed he had written to Prime Minister David Cameron warning him that “disasters would accompany the passage of his same sex marriage Bill.” Silvester is a defector from the Conservative Party and is still listed as its local Branch Secretary. Following media driven uproar, UKIP party leader Nigel Farage folded in days and withdrew the whip from Silvester, meaning he is at least temporarily unrecognized by the party. Unlike with a couple of high profile situations last year where Farage resisted action in the face of a media witch-hunt, there was definitely some grass roots support within the party for his removal. One UKIP member said “We might have a fundamentalist Christian homophobe in UKIP.” The core of the offending letter to the local paper goes as follows:

”The scriptures make it abundantly clear that a Christian nation that abandons its faith and acts contrary to the Gospel (and in naked breach of a coronation oath) will be beset by natural disasters such as storms, disease, pestilence and war. But (David Cameron) went ahead (with same sex marriage) despite a 600,000-signature petition by concerned Christians and more than half of his own parliamentary party saying that he should not do so. Now, even as Cameron sheds crocodile tears on behalf of destitute flooded homeowners, playing at advocate against the very local councils he has made cash-strapped, it is his fault that large swathes of the nation have been afflicted by storms and floods. He has arrogantly acted against the Gospel that once made Britain “great” and the lesson surely to be learned is that no man or men, however powerful, can mess with Almighty God with impunity and get away with it for everything a nation does is weighed on the scaled of divine approval or disapproval. Since the passage of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act, the nation has been beset by serious storms and floods. One recent one caused the worst flooding for 60 years. The Christmas floods were the worst for 127 years. Is this just global warming or is there something more serious at work?”

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Now whether you think Silvester is right, wrong, or maybe is just a little bit onto something is not the point. A person should be able to express opinion, including its religious motivation without fear of retribution from the political parties with which they are affiliated.. The top rated religious blogger Archbishop Cranmer puts it this way:

“Mr Silvester's letter is being widely trailed as a 'homophobic rant', but his target is not gays and lesbians but David Cameron who, he says, has acted "arrogantly against the Gospel". It is the Prime Minister who is to blame for the bad weather; not the LGBT communities whom God was perfectly happy to tolerate until Mr Cameron allowed them to marry.”

Indeed, had Silvester’s letter stuck to a) criticizing Cameron on Biblical grounds for gay-marriage and b) criticizing him for poor management of the flooding, without tying them together, it is likely the letter would have drawn no more attention than a few responses to the Editor. But especially in Britain you can’t talk about God and judgments and still be taken seriously. And when it comes to UKIP the long knives are out from across the establishment board. The New Statesman wrote a scathing piece on Nigel Farage in response, trying to make the case that UKIP was full of bigots. But it is the British establishment, from its three traditional political parties to its print and TV media that are prepared to move heaven and earth to highlight every shortcoming by every UKIP member in order to discredit the party that is coming close to forcing a permanent political re-alignment. This affair is highlighted while Nick Clegg, Deputy Prime Minister plays dodge and weave over the repeated allegations of sexual harassment against young female party workers by his election guru Lord Rennard. After months of investigations and Rennard’s defiant refusal to apologize, he was suspended from the party. Clegg was rightly accused of cowardice by the victims for essentially protecting who some people see as a pervert. Yet there is no call for Clegg’s head from anywhere in the political or media establishment. UKIP, though must be careful. The atheist section of the party gleefully ejects Silvester and calls for more vetting of defectors from other parties. In this case that means Christians should not apply. While the party does outreach to eastern religions (Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism) it runs into the same trap as the British left by exhibiting bigoted behavior towards Christianity. In this they run the danger of becoming as hypocritical as the American Democrats who attend a church on Sunday to listen to a sermon on the value of the traditional family, vote for gay-marriage as legislators on Monday, and then collect campaign contributions from both sides on Tuesday. But Farage is feeling the heat from upcoming Euro elections in four months time. So he made the premature and unnecessary decision to suspend Silvester. It is a decision he will come to regret. Media types will sniff for more examples of UKIP non-conformity, highlight it, and then demand precedent be invoked.