Newsline 4 July 2014

Newsline 4 July 2014

Newsline is a weekly round-up of news and opinion from the NSS website. If you're not already a member, becoming one is the most tangible way of supporting our work. Our campaigning is wholly supported by our members, people like you who share our belief that secularism is an essential element in promoting equality between all citizens. Please join today.

News, Blogs & Opinion

Parents told faith school or no school by local council

News | Fri, 4th Jul 2014

Eleven children whose parents refused places at a Hindu faith school in the London borough of Redbridge have been left with no school place for September.

Families of children allocated places at Avanti Court Primary School in Essex refused the places, saying the school's religious ethos is at odds with their own beliefs and values.

Redbridge Council has sought to evade responsibility for the lack of suitable school places by saying that none of the children would be of statutory school age before January. Under current law children in England must be in education from the term after their fifth birthday, but the law also allows for pupils to start school earlier.

Naz Qureshi, the Muslim mother of a four-year-old daughter from South Woodford, said: "I was gobsmacked and outraged when they told me I didn't get any of my six chosen choices of schools."

"I didn't want her to go to a Hindu school so I am surprised the council would think I would accept a faith school which I didn't even apply for."

Ms Qureshi told BBC Asia Network that the family would now have to consider paying for private schooling as a last resort.

Liz Beck, whose four-year-old son was due to start school in September told the BBC: "Culturally it's quite different and even though we don't want to shelter our son from other cultures, we feel it would be difficult for him to be in that environment where it's quite different from what we believe".

"I feel really angry and just let down, you would expect your child to get into a school they can at least walk too."

Research by the Department of Education recently found primary schools in Redbridge must expand by the equivalent of eight new schools to meet demand by 2018.

Like other local authorities, Redbridge Council does not take the religious ethos of the school into consideration when allocating places to local children. This year it offered places to 21 children whose parents hadn't named the school on their list of preferences.

Parents are not requested to state their religious beliefs when applying for schools via the local authority, but in correspondence seen by the National Secular Society, Redbridge Council say if parents explain their philosophical reasons for their preferred schools when completing their admissions applications, those reasons could be considered when identifying alternative school places.

Stephen Evans, campaigns manager at the National Secular Society, said: "It should come as no surprise that schools with a specific religious ethos have limited appeal to parents who don't share that faith.

"The presence of faith schools limits choice for many parents, and in this case, has resulted in no suitable places being available at all, leaving parents and children seriously disadvantaged.

"The focus needs to be on creating places in inclusive schools that serve the whole community rather than using public money to satisfy niche demands for schools that teach religion specific beliefs and values."

School governors’ body recommends abolition of collective worship law

News | Mon, 30th Jun 2014

The National Governors' Association, which represents 300,000 school governors in England, has become the latest body to recommend that the religious element of daily school assemblies should be scrapped.

The NGA says the law that requires pupils to take part in a daily act of worship of a "broadly Christian nature" has become an anomaly in a multicultural nation. It revised its policy in June, saying:

"Few schools can or do meet the current legislative requirement for a daily act of collective worship, partly because there isn't space in most schools to gather students together, and often staff are unable or unwilling to lead a collective worship session. There is also the added issue that worship implies belief in a particular faith - if the 'act of worship' is not in your faith then it is meaningless as an act of worship."

The NGA added:

"Removing the collective worship from the remit of schools that are not faith schools would not prevent them from holding assemblies that address a whole range of topics, including faith and belief.

"In addition, it does not alter our position on religious education; it is important that students should continue to be taught a broad and balanced curriculum that encourages a knowledge and understanding of all faiths."

The NGA's policy statement says schools are not "places of worship but places of education and expecting the worship of a religion or religions in all schools should not be a compulsory part" of the timetable.

A poll by the BBC in 2010 found that 64% of adults were not in favour of maintaining the law on collective worship.

The NGA's policy statement was welcomed by the National Secular Society, which has long campaigned for an end to compulsory worship in schools.

Terry Sanderson, President of the NSS, said: "There are many problems for schools in trying to fulfil this requirement – one of them is that teachers themselves are not interested in religion and are unwilling to be coerced into foisting on to their pupils"

Mr Sanderson said that the National Secular Society receives a "steady stream" of complaints from parents who are concerned, annoyed and sometimes appalled about what their children are exposed to in religious assemblies in schools. "Sometimes they are unaware of their right to withdraw their child and even when they are they are reluctant to put them in the position of feeling 'different' to their classmates."

Mr Sanderson said that the value of a morning assembly – in which the school can talk about issues related to the school or discuss other important issues – has been hijacked for religious purposes, which children themselves often resent.

Visit our campaign page on collective worship to find out about your rights and how you can get involved.

European Court of Human Rights upholds French ban on full-face veil

News | Tue, 1st Jul 2014

The European Court of Human Rights has upheld a French law banning the wearing of the full-face veil in public, ruling that the law does not breach the European Convention on Human Rights.

A 24-year-old French woman, identified by her initials 'SAS', had argued that the ban on wearing the veil in public contravened her human rights and led to discrimination on the grounds of gender, religion and ethnic origin.

The French law, which came into effect in 2010, prohibits the concealment of one's face, which includes the wearing of the niqab, in public places. People found to be contravening this law can be fined up to €150 and be made to take a citizenship class. Anyone found to be coercing a woman into covering her face risks severe penalties and anyone who wishes to enforce the ban can legitimately ask people covering their faces to cease doing so, and can take them to the local police station or magistrate if they refuse.

The applicant had argued that the French ban contravened a number of her human rights according to the European Convention, such as her right to respect for private and family life (Article 8), her right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion (Article 9), her right to freedom of expression, assembly and association (Article 10 and 11), and her right to freedom from discrimination (Article 14).

She said that she wore the veil willingly, both in public and private, but not all the time and did not experience any coercion. She also said she was willing to remove the veil for security reasons, but other than that wished to be able to wear it when she chose to do so.

The Court rejected her arguments, instead emphasising that respect for the conditions of "living together" was a legitimate aim for the French State to pursue and that its ban fell within this remit. The Court ruled that the State had "a wide margin of appreciation" regarding it general policy on the matter.

France had argued that the ban is based on "the legitimate goals it pursues, including public security" and that full-face veils are "intrinsically discriminatory against women".

Whilst the judges, who deliberated since late last year, agreed unanimously that the woman had not been a victim of discrimination, two of the 17 judges dissented from the majority view that the ban did not breach the Convention's provisions protecting the freedom of thought, conscience and religion.

The International League of Women's Rights, founded by French feminist Simone de Beauvoir, welcomed Tuesday's ruling as a "victory for secularism and women's rights".

When the legislation came into effect, the opposition argued that former President Nicolas Sarkozy's centre-right party was using it as a means of appealing to right-wing voters tempted by the National Front.

Last year a report by a French Government committee reviewing the issue of integration in France, called for an end to the ban, arguing that such restrictions were "discriminatory" and served to justify other restrictions that had been introduced by private companies.

Five months into the ban, the Guardian newspaper said that Muslim groups had reported "a worrying increase in discrimination and verbal and physical violence against women in veils". With cases of people attempting to rip off full-face veils and "bus drivers refusing to carry women in niqab or of shop-owners trying to bar entry".

The European Court's decision comes just after France's highest court, the Cour de Cassation, upheld the dismissal of a woman working in a crèche "serious misconduct" after she arrived for work wearing a veil.

A few British politicians called for full-face covering to be banned in public buildings in the UK last year after a judge ruled that a Muslim woman would be allowed to wear a veil in court but would have to take it off while giving evidence at her trial.

Also see: The National Secular Society's position on the burka / niqab

Proposal to remove religious exemption from Irish employment equality law

News | Mon, 30th Jun 2014

The cabinet of the Irish Government will decide next week whether to approve an amendment to employment equality law that will prevent religious organisations from dismissing staff on such grounds as being a lone parent or a divorcee, or on the basis of sexual orientation.

The amendment is to be jointly brought to Cabinet by the Minister for Education Ruairí Quinn and Minister for Justice Francis Fitzgerald. If it is accepted, it will be debated by Parliament in the autumn.

Mr Quinn has already pledged to repeal Section 37 of the Employment Equality Act 1998 to eliminate legalised discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual transgender (LGBT) people in the education and healthcare sectors.

The amendment will ensure that religious-run, or controlled, schools or hospitals can no longer maintain their general opt-out from anti-discrimination laws.

At present, educational or medical institutions run by religious organisations are allowed to discriminate "in order to maintain the religious ethos of that institution".

This effectively allows for discrimination against those whose sexuality or family status, for example, is not perceived as conforming with the religious ethos.

Previous bills aimed at removing this exemption have failed in the face of strong opposition by religious interests.

Terry Sanderson, President of the National Secular Society, said: "The Irish Government is giving a real lead in removing these unjustifiable privileges that cause so much injustice to people who simply want to do their jobs."

Will the Equality Act be battered into submitting to religious exemptions?

Opinion | Mon, 30th Jun 2014

Misleading reporting of individual cases and calls for "conscience clauses" feed into a false narrative of Christian persecution aimed at undermining the Equality Act, argues Terry Sanderson.

Recently the vice president of the UK Supreme Court, Baroness Hale, threw out a crumb of hope to the evangelical Christians who are trying, through repeated legal challenges, to undermine the Equality Act so that they can have a special, privileged position in British law.

Lady Hale, having considered many of these cases from the bench (and not upheld any of them), now concludes that perhaps Parliament, or indeed, the courts, should consider introducing a "conscience clause" that would relieve religious people of the pesky duty of living by the same rules as everyone else.

This was music to the ears of the Christian Institute and the Christian Legal Centre which have been behind most of the challenges.

Despite the fact that hardly any of these cases have survived scrutiny by any court (including the European Court of Human Rights), the myth persists that Christians are being persecuted in Britain.

And now, it seems, even the vice chair of the Supreme Court has fallen for it.

How did this come about? How has the idea that Christians are being denied some kind of human right because they aren't exempt from the law, gain such a strong hold on the nation's collective consciousness?

It is because of the propaganda skills of the evangelical Christians who have created this narrative, aided and abetted by newspapers with their own right-wing agenda.

There is now a very simple formula for increasing this conviction that Christians are under attack in Britain from dark forces ("militant secularists" the "politically correct gone mad" etc).

And we saw a classic example in the Daily Telegraph on Sunday.

This story – as all the others before it - begins with the assertion that a Christian has been fired from their job simply because they wanted to practice their religion.

Because I don't want to be accused of misrepresenting this story, and because it is behind a paywall, I am going to quote extensively from it:

A Christian health worker has begun a legal challenge after being disciplined by the NHS for praying with a Muslim colleague.

Victoria Wasteney, a senior occupational therapist in one of the country's most racially diverse areas, was also accused of bullying the colleague after giving her a book about a Muslim woman who converts to Christianity.

In addition, senior managers told Miss Wasteney that it was inappropriate to invite the woman to a community sports day organised by her church.

The complaints led to Miss Wasteney being suspended on full pay for nine months.

Three charges were upheld against the 37-year-old Christian at an internal disciplinary hearing in February and five charges were found to be unsubstantiated. She had to accept a final written warning at work which will remain on her records for 12 months, as well as accept a range of other requirements designed to stop her discussing her faith and beliefs with colleagues.

Miss Wasteney said she was challenging her employers in court because political correctness in the NHS was stifling ordinary conversations about faith.

"I believe in tolerance for everyone and that is why I am challenging what has happened to me," she added.

The young Muslim woman was appointed as a newly qualified occupational therapist in a team of 30 managed by Miss Wasteney at East London NHS Foundation Trust.

"One of the earliest conversations I can recall was one in which she said she had just moved to London. She felt that God had a real plan and a purpose for her," said Miss Wasteney, from Essex. Miss Wasteney told her colleague that she went to church, but was "very cautious because our environment is such that these things can be misconstrued and, with her being from a different faith background, I was mindful of being respectful of that".

Miss Wasteney said the woman was interested in the anti-human trafficking community work being done by her church.

Over a period of time, Miss Wasteney said she invited her colleague to several church-organised events and thought no more about it. Later, when the woman was due to go off work for hospital treatment, Miss Wasteney gave her a book to read during her recuperation.

"A friend had recommended it to me, a book called I Dared to Call Him Father. I hadn't read it. I still haven't. But it is a story about a Muslim woman who converts to Christianity.

"Because we had had these conversations it did not seem abnormal. It certainly was not an attempt to convert her to Christianity, as it was put to me later."

On another occasion the woman came to Miss Wasteney's office in tears, upset about her health and problems at home.

"I said to her that she had strong faith and she should draw on that faith," said Miss Wasteney. "I said 'Pray!' She told me she could not pray, so I replied 'Maybe I can pray for you?' And she said 'OK'.

"I asked if I could put my hand on her knee, and she said yes. I don't know if I said 'Lord' or 'God' but I said what I thought was the most neutral. Then I said 'I trust that You will bring peace and You will bring healing'."

In June last year, Miss Wasteney was told that complaints had been made about bullying and harassment.

A disciplinary hearing at her work in February found her guilty of three charges of misconduct – praying with the colleague, giving her the book and inviting her to church events.

We are then told that the case is being supported by the Christian Legal Centre, which has instructed Paul Diamond, a leading human rights barrister (who is himself a rather extreme evangelical Christian).

The story goes on to quote Andrea Williams, the chief executive of the Christian Legal Centre, as saying that the case demonstrated that "the NHS is increasingly dominated by a suffocating liberal agenda that chooses to bend over backwards to accommodate certain beliefs but punishes the Christian".

But the most important part of the story comes right at the end:

"A spokesman for East London NHS Foundation Trust said it did not comment on individual cases."

And this is Andrea Williams' trump card. She has a free hand to tell the story exactly as she wants it to be heard. And the Telegraph and the Mail are willing to let her do it in their pages.

But reading the story with at least one critical eye open, doesn't it sound a tad unconvincing? Doesn't it seem that there's something that we haven't been told? Like why this woman's work colleague felt so bullied and harassed that she was forced to turn to her employer for protection? Was it really all as good natured as recorded here?

The accused party, in this case the NHS, will not contradict Ms Williams, its hands are tied by concerns for the privacy of the other person involved.

Whatever Ms Williams has decided to exaggerate or, more likely, omit from the story will not be revealed until the matter comes to court.

And by then it will have become part of the mythology, the narrative of Christian persecution that has been so assiduously created by Ms Williams and her ilk.

The Christian soldiers have been given new heart by Baroness Hale and her suggestion of a more sympathetic hearing for these cases in future. We can look forward to a plethora of new challenges as the war on equality escalates.

It may be good news for the privilege-seeking Christians, but it's bad news for the rest of us.

Commission to investigate religion’s role in society

Opinion | Thu, 3rd Jul 2014

A commission has set itself up to "take the temperature of Britain's relationship with religion". But with so many vested interests on board, Terry Sanderson questions how objective its findings will be.

A commission has set itself up with the task of "taking the temperature of Britain's relationship with religion." It will submit the results of its findings to the Government returned in the 2015 elections.

The Commission on Religion and Belief in British Public Life was launched at the House of Lords last week and says that it wants to listen to people's opinions about the role of religion in society.

It has been organised by Cambridge University's Woolf institute, whose patrons include HRH Prince Hassan of Jordan and is named after Lord Harry Woolf, former Lord Chief Justice, who is on record for his views that Christians have become oppressed by the judiciary. The Commission is headed by Baroness (Elizabeth) Butler-Sloss.

While the latest British Social Attitudes survey shows the majority in the UK to be non-religious, the vast majority of those on the 19-strong Commission are connected with religious organisations or known to be religious - with one token humanist.

Other members include the Archbishop of Canterbury's secretary for interreligious affairs, Dr Toby Howarth, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Williams, and Lord Harries of Pentregarth, Bishop Dr Joe Aldred, of Churches Together in England, Professor Gwen Griffith-Dickson, vice-principal of Heythrop College – and representatives from Islam, Hinduism, Judaism, and the Sikh community.

More than 50 academics, faith leaders, and politicians were at the launch, including the Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Antonio Mennini.

The Commission's objectives are worthy enough, to:

  • consider the place and role of religion and belief in contemporary Britain, and the significance of emerging trends and identities
  • examine how ideas of Britishness and national identity may be inclusive of a range of religions and beliefs, and may in turn influence people's self-understanding
  • explore how shared understandings of the common good may contribute to greater levels of mutual trust and collective action, and to a more harmonious society
  • make recommendations for public life and policy.

The team says its focus will be on the impact of religion on national identity, how children are taught about religion, and its connections with the law, social action, dialogue and the media. It will also examine the role and viability of an established Church in the twenty-first century.

Dr Ed Kessler, the executive director of the Woolf Institute said at the launch that the commission would consult on six different themes - the law, the media, social action, education, dialogue, and social change

"Today's UK . . . presents a more complex and diverse context than has been hitherto in existence," he said. "We have met for a year now, discussing these issues with various experts. We hope members of the public can contribute to some of these questions," Dr Kessler said.

After a tour of the UK, which aims to include "hard-to-reach communities", and which includes the cities of Glasgow, Belfast, and Leeds, the Commission will produce a report with recommendations for the next Government in 2015.

Launching the Commission, Lord Harries said "Religion is now a major player on the public stage in a way that would have taken people in the 1950s by surprise."

And of course he's right – religion certainly is a major player in world affairs, but not always in a positive way, as is all too evident from what is happening in the Middle East, for example.

A surprising member of the Commission is Sir Iqbal Sacranie as a patron, given his reported comments at the height of the Salman Rushdie affair: "Death, perhaps, is a bit too easy for him[;] his mind must be tormented for the rest of his life unless he asks for forgiveness to Almighty Allah."

Lady Butler-Sloss has stressed that the Commission is entirely independent: "The conclusions will be entirely our own and largely dependent on our consultations", she said.

But with a membership made up of so many with vested interests it is difficult to see how objective this Commission can be. I sincerely hope that the Commission's examination of "emerging trends and identities" will include an even-handed assessment of the implications of the majority of the population being non-religious. Given its composition, it is going to have its work cut out.

The Commission will submit its report to whatever new Government is elected in 2015. Submissions are invited here: www.corab.org.uk

It’s not only Islamists who have Trojan Horses

Opinion | Fri, 27th Jun 2014

Those with a vested interest in the continuation of 'faith schools' have started their fight back against the growing number of critics, says Terry Sanderson.

After the furore of the Birmingham Trojan Horse affair, a lot of commentators reached the conclusion that the problems lay not just with Islamist extremism but with the general over-emphasis on religion in schools - and in single-faith schools particularly.

Now, the apologists for 'faith schools' are coming back at them with a vengeance.

You will notice that the Archbishop of Canterbury has started to refer to "church schools" rather than "faith schools" in an attempt to distance the schools run by his brand of Christianity from those run by other religions that are in trouble.

Enthusiasts repeat endlessly that the Birmingham schools at the centre of this scandal were not "faith schools".

That is true technically, but in reality they were completely dominated by religious teaching and practice. They had been hijacked by people determined to inculcate a rather strict and conservative form of Islam into the children who were obliged to go there by law.

And the taxpayer was paying for them to do it.

Then came an Observer poll showing that two thirds of those asked thought "faith schools" should not be funded by the taxpayer.

Has this made the political establishment rethink its unswerving support for these schools?

Well, we know that Mr Gove and the Conservative party remain determined to hand more and more of the education system over to religious interests. The academy and free school systems have given religious groups almost carte blanche to pump whatever nonsense they like into children's heads (creationism must be reserved for RE classes, the DfE has ruled, but many schools under religious domination will take absolutely no notice of this until they are caught out and challenged).

The education secretary knows that many of the free schools and academies are being opportunistically used for evangelising, but seems unconcerned. He appears to think it is an appropriate – even desirable - way to educate children in state schools.

Now, according to a report in the Catholic magazine the Tablet, the Labour Party, too, has reiterated its total commitment to pushing more religion into schools and down pupils' throats.

A Labour spokesperson told the Tablet:

"The Labour Party believes faith schools make a hugely valuable contribution to our schools system. England benefits from many outstanding faith schools which offer high quality education and ensure their students take on values of respect and understanding for other faiths and communities. A future Labour government would support them to continue to play this important role in the future."

The spokesperson is unnamed, but the quote comes after the recent notorious "prayer breakfast" held in Parliament and attended by the Prime Minister and the leader of the Labour Party and self-identified atheist Ed Miliband.

Mr Miliband seems to have bought into the idea that Church of England schools are neutral in their approach to religion and give a balanced view of it in its schools.

But the 'Trojan Horse' approach to education – so rightly decried in Birmingham - is not restricted to Islamists. The Church of England has its own agenda of indoctrination which it is quite public about. When you look at this document:

"PROMOTING THE VISION

8. The diocesan bishop has responsibility for setting and leading the diocesan vision for ministry and mission. The strategy will be specific to each diocese, but the importance of the place of education and schools in that vision might be described under the following areas:

a. ... b. Church of England schools provide appropriate nurture for children of the faith whilst engaging with those of different faiths or no faith; they are a resource for mission.

c. Church of England schools offer a distinctive education rooted in the Christian narrative.

d. The purpose of education is to fulfil human potential, meet the needs of society and transmit knowledge and culture. Fulfilling human potential rightly requires a focus on progress and achievement, excellence and high quality of educational experience, but also through offering a life enhancing encounter with the Christian faith and the person of Jesus Christ. How this is done will be determined by local context but this offer should run through the life of a school like words through a stick of rock."

Doesn't this have echoes of the Trojan Horse letter that cause so much controversy in Birmingham? It may be cloaked in CofE language, but surely the aim is the same – to promote one particular view of religion over all others.

And not only that, the Church of England is now spending huge amounts of its school budgets on employing chaplains to reinforce its religious message.

As, NSS campaigns manager, Stephen Evans wrote in a recent blog:

"In the report, chaplains describe their role as "holy loitering" and say 'hanging around' is an important feature of the chaplain's role.

"When they're not "holy loitering", chaplains say they spend their time "commending the Christian faith", "maintaining relationships with the local Church", organising and leading school worship and teaching religious education (if you thought RE was objective and balanced these days, think again).

Chaplains are also there to police the school's "religious ethos". As the report states:

"The chaplain represents the Church and reminds the school that it is part of the ministry of the Church. This function brings the authority of the Bishop and also a commitment to the distinctive Anglican identity, in all its rich variety, of the worship and life of the school."

So, while Islamist extremists are rooted out of schools in Birmingham, equally determined proselytisers in the Church of England are invited in to take over more schools.

And both of the main political parties (and probably the Lib Dems, too) intend to make the job easier and easier for them.

Terry Sanderson’s speech to the Religious Freedom Conference, Chatham

Opinion | Tue, 24th Jun 2014

On 21 June 2014, NSS President Terry Sanderson spoke at the Chatham Unitarian Church, about the importance of equalities protections and secularism to religious freedom. This is a transcript of his speech.

The first problem I have is with a definition of "religious freedom".

What does it actually mean and what does it entail?

In human rights terms it means being free to hold your beliefs and practice them in communion with others. You should be free to change your religion or abandon it.

Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights which covers Freedom of thought, conscience and religion puts it this way:

"Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching, practice and observance.

Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others."

I repeat that the freedom to manifest one's religion is limited for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others. In other words, it is not absolute. This right extends only so far as it impinges on other people's rights. This is where the difficulties begin. And this is where the problems of definition arise.

If, for instance, a registrar does not want to perform civil partnership ceremonies - which is part of her job – because she says it is against her deeply held religious beliefs, should she be free to simply refuse to do it?

If a Christian hotelier objects to renting a double bedded room to a gay couple because to do so would compromise his Christian values should they be free to do so, even though it is against the law for every other hotel to behave in such a way?

Some Christians assert that cases such as these are an affront to religious freedom, but are they? Has the meaning of religious freedom been extended to the point that it means the freedom to discriminate against those of whom you don't approve – even though they are protected by the law?

The UK's Equality Act protects certain categories of people from discrimination in employment and in the receipt of goods and services.

It is the most advanced equality legislation in the world, which, as far as I am concerned, is something to be proud of. The Equality Act already includes greater protection for religion than is required by the EU's employment directive.

Nevertheless there have been continual arguments about whose rights are more important – those of gay people, who are one of the protected groups, or religious believers, who receive the same protection?

It was clear from the beginning that attempting to put religion and gay rights under one umbrella would pose problems. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to give the same rights to homosexuals and religious believers because these two groups seem to have been in constant conflict for decades. Eventually someone would have to decide whose rights should prevail when they came into conflict.

A series of court cases tried to solve the dilemma. They went all the way to the European Court of Human Rights and the answer seemed clear: gay people's right to equality and fair treatment could not be sacrificed on the basis of claims that they interfered with religious freedom.

I am proud that the NSS was given leave to intervene in these cases and our intervention is thought by some lawyers to have played a significant role in that victory.

However, the pressure from evangelical Christians to have the law reviewed and changed so that they will be permitted - through the introduction of "conscience clauses" - to legally discriminate against those who fall short of their ideals is relentless.

I say again, religious freedom is not absolute. But being gay, according to scientific opinion, is an innate characteristic, in the same way that a person's race is. Gay people cannot change their orientation and that means that it is no more acceptable to discriminate against a person's sexual orientation than it is against their race.

The other thing is that most Christian hoteliers would have no problem observing the law and accommodating gay couples. Most Christian registrars are happy to carry out civil partnerships – and don't consider it an affront to their faith. The few who do raise objections and refuse to do these things are therefore asking for special privileges that result in humiliating other people because of a characteristic over which they have no control.

If the same arguments were made by Christians about black people we would be outraged. If a registrar said that her religion meant that she could not perform a marriage for a black man and a white woman, there would rightly be uproar.

We shouldn't forget that in some Southern States of America within living memory that was the law. We have moved on, I hope, and we are not going to let the same situation arise in this country that renders gay people second class citizens, as black people were in Mississippi and Alabama.

In the United States, the Supreme Court is about to rule on a very important issue of a supposed challenge to "religious freedom" – and most think it is going to rule the wrong way.

It concerns President Obama's flagship Affordable Care Act.

The Catholic Church claims that it forces it to supply its employees with contraception, which we all know is against Catholic doctrine. The President made an exemption that permitted the Church to opt out of this provision of the act, but that was not enough.

The Church's aim is to make it impossible for any employer to supply – as part of its health insurance package – contraception.

It does this on the basis of a claim that its freedom of religion is being abused by the Affordable Care Act.

A parallel case on the same matter is being brought by a chain of shops called Hobby Lobby. This is even more interesting, and more frightening, because if the case is won, the personal religious beliefs of the owner of this nation-wide chain will be imposed on the whole of his sizeable workforce.

The executives of Hobby Lobby, and several other companies with religious executives, have complained that the requirement unduly and unlawfully burdens their religious beliefs by forcing them to endorse certain practices — like contraception — which they oppose.

But in human rights terms religious freedom belongs to the individual, not to churches or mosques – or, come to that, hobby shops.

If the Hobby Lobby wins its claim – meaning that a corporation is, in effect, a person - then human rights will have been redefined to apply not only to individual humans, but to corporate bodies. The religious freedom claims on which these cases are based will then be able to be claimed by any corporation or group that wants to impose a particular religious doctrine on its staff or its members.

Religious freedom so easily turns into religious tyranny.

And so I return to the definition of religious freedom as it stands now.

The National Secular Society has a secular charter on which we base all our campaigning. It states specifically that religious people's right to worship and believe as they will, must be protected in law.

But it does not support any religious organisation's right to take action that results in its doctrines being enacted into law in a way that impinges on the rights of people who do not share those doctrines.

We have a legal definition of religious freedom. It has been tested in court and its limits set.

It is time for those evangelical Christians who are not happy that they do not receive special privilege under the law to think again. They should be happy to live in a nation that respects and protects their religion and everybody else's religion equally.

It not only respects religious belief, but any belief that is deeply held. Court cases have made environmentalists and animal rights defenders into the equals of religious believers. And that is as it should be.

Last week, the British Social Attitudes Survey was published and it showed for the first time in any survey or poll that I've seen that there are more people in this country defining themselves as not having a religion than having one.

In the face of this it is ever more important that religion is not given a disproportionate role that can be detrimental to the rights of others. This does not mean curtailing religious freedom, because religious freedom does not include the freedom to disadvantage those of who you disapprove.

The definition of religious freedom as contained in the Human Rights Act should be sufficient. There should be no more attempts –as there are in America - to extend it to mean something else.

My speech today is less upbeat than it was to have been because of comments made in a speech in Ireland this week by Baroness Hale, the deputy president of the UK Supreme Court. These comments have been seized upon by those who believe religion should have a privileged status in our society. They have interpreted them as indicating that future legal judgments will be more pro-religious by recognising religious conscience more than hitherto.

Baroness Hale asked:

"So should we be developing, in both human rights and EU law, an explicit requirement upon the providers of employment, goods and services to make reasonable accommodation for the manifestation of religious and other beliefs?"

I was relieved that Lady Hale balanced this with:

"But the law now protects all religions equally, without discriminating between them and without attempting to determine which are forces for good and which are not. Not only that, it also protects other belief systems, such as humanism and pacifism, and we have dropped any requirement that these be "similar" to religion. It also protects the lack of a religion or belief. In other words, while it protects freedom of thought, it does not give any special protection to religion as such…"

She concluded

"So the moral of all this is that if the law is going to protect freedom of religion and belief it has to accept that all religions and beliefs and none are equal.

It cannot realistically inquire into the validity or importance of those beliefs, or any particular manifestation of them, as long as they are genuinely held. It then has to work out how far it should go in making special provisions or exceptions for particular beliefs, how far it should require the providers of employments, goods and services to accommodate them, and how far it should allow for a "conscience clause.

I am not sure that our law has yet found a reasonable accommodation of all these different strands. The story has just begun."

I believe the law already has it right. Those who want to exercise their religious freedom by excluding gay people from their private homes or places of worship are at complete liberty to do so.

But they cannot do so as providers of employment or goods or [commercial] services.

If we permitted "conscience objections" in these areas who knows where it might lead. We could find ourselves once more with the equivalent of the notorious 1960s signs that were seen outside boarding houses, "no dogs, no Irish, no blacks."

Conscience exemptions could lead to signs saying "no gays". But given that other people have conscientious objections to other things, that they could claim spring from sincerely and deeply held beliefs, who knows where it might lead.

I will continue to fight to protect freedom of religion – but the freedom of religion defined by the Human Rights Act. I will fight equally hard to prevent any further privileges and special treatment for religion – for every time we grant such a privilege or exemption there will be a commensurate diminution of rights for other people.