By AC GRAYLING - GUARDIAN.CO.UK
Added: Sun, 05 Jul 2009 23:00:00 UTC

Thanks to LWS for the link.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jul/01/religion-euthanasia

News that the archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Westminster, Vincent Nichols and the chief rabbi, Sir Jonathan Sacks, have joined forces in a campaign to prolong the sufferings of those incurably or terminally ill – by opposing a change in the law that would decriminalise those who accompany anyone who goes to Switzerland in search of help to die – comes as no surprise. A preference for dogma over kindness, for superstition-based moralism over humaneness, is standard fare for religion, as history too loudly attests.

Nevertheless it obliges one, wearily and with distaste, to return to the question of religion in the public domain. One would of course like to see humankind wake up from the sleep of reason that enables religious beliefs and the institutions built on them to persist. One would like a remark like Sir Harry Kroto's "the only mistake Bernie Madoff made was to promise returns in this life" to startle everyone into a great shout of laughter that would strip away the pretensions of religion and lay bare its absurdity and poverty. But while the man-made curse of religion exists, the question of what archbishops and rabbis do in the way of trying to subvert the ethical maturation of humankind has to be addressed.

So I repeat: in a free society people must be allowed to believe what they like, even stupid, ignorant and absurd things, provided they do no harm to others. Religious organisations have every right to exist and have their say, just as any other self-selected, self-constituted interest group does, such as trade unions and political parties. But religious organisations have to recognise that they are such groups, and nothing more than such groups – that they are civil society organisations like trade unions, existing to protect and promote their own interests – and although they have the same rights, they do not have any greater rights.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jul/01/religion-euthanasia

TAGGED: LAW, MORALITY, RELIGION