Church of England Report Emphases to Counter Anti-Christian Attempts

In its report Challenges for the New Quinquennium - A report from the House of Bishops and the Archbishops’ Council, the Church of England speaks about the marginalisation of Christianity: 

23. The first is to be explicit about the need to counter attempts to marginalise Christianity and to treat religious faith more generally as a social problem. This is partly about taking on the ‘new atheism’. Bishops have a key role here both as public apologists and as teachers of the faith. Church members look to their leaders to speak out on their behalf and to help them in their own understanding and witness.

24. It is also partly about challenging public bodies to understand that the proper avoidance of religious discrimination does not mean being suspicious of or hostile towards churches and other faith groups.

25. There is still work to be done to counter the prevailing tendency of treating faith as a private matter which should not impact on what happens in the public realm. This is a challenge for all churches and faiths but especially for the Church of England. While this country ceased to be a confessional state in the early nineteenth century it remains one where the Church of England has a special place within the constitution and continues to have a special contribution to make to the life of the nation.

Read the entire report

Interesting coverage in the Guardian