Christians must reject Tommy Robinson’s movement - you can’t be ‘just a bit’ racist

Rev George Pitcher argues that while you can be ‘a bit of a Christian’ when exploring faith, there’s no such thing as being ‘a bit racist’ when it comes to political movements - and warns Christians about dangerous alliances with extremist groups

One of the annoyances of being an Anglican priest is being told I believe in things that I don’t.

Some smartypants humanist at a drinks party will come up and tell me of incontrovertible evidence that the world wasn’t made in seven days some 6,000 years ago or how Lot’s wife couldn’t have been turned into a pillar of salt, or something, and ergo my faith is null and void. 

I think it points to the idea that you can’t be just a bit of a Christian. It’s in the Bible, you see, and you priests swallow it all whole. Actually I think you can be a bit Christian. Plenty of people I meet at church, particularly the young, are engaged by the wonder and mystery of it all and its possibilities, but aren’t yet buying into it all. The gospels are full of this sort passing curiosity. But the drinks-party bores – and disappointingly a lot of other people besides – are only interested in disproving creationism.

I mention all this because I’m interested in those who marched behind Tommy Robinson’s Unite the Kingdom banner last weekend. There seems to be an idea developing that you can be a reasonable sort of patriot who supports this movement and turns up with them to wave a flag. In other words…