Can there be civil society without faith?

It usually takes a terrorist attack for Britain to discuss seriously the role of religion in civil society. And when the conversation happens, it tends to flow into two channels. One is about what motivates Islamist violence: the role of mosques, the responsibility of the Muslim community, the sources of radicalisation, the effectiveness of security and counter-extremism measures.

The second conversation will emphasise the contribution which the great majority of Muslims make to their communities. In the wake of the Manchester Arena bombing in May, for instance, journalists told the stories of individuals like Sam Arshad, a taxi-company owner whose drivers took survivors home for free, and Muslim charities like Human Appeal, which raised thousands for the victims and their families.

It usually takes a terrorist attack for Britain to discuss seriously the role of religion in civil society. And when the conversation happens, it tends to flow into two channels. One is about what motivates Islamist violence: the role of mosques, the responsibility of the Muslim community, the sources of radicalisation, the effectiveness of security and counter-extremism measures.

The second conversation will emphasise the contribution which the great majority of Muslims make to their communities. In the wake of the Manchester Arena bombing in May, for instance, journalists told the stories of individuals like Sam Arshad, a taxi-company owner whose drivers took survivors home for free, and Muslim charities like Human Appeal, which raised thousands for the victims and their families.

The first conversation, about Islamist violence, is well worn, and too complex for me to do it justice here. But the conversation about Muslim social action, though it usually stays at the level of heart-warming anecdote, raises critical questions: what makes religious communities effective sources of social action? And how can local and national government help those communities to make the best possible contribution?

These are not marginal questions. Of the UK’s 190,000 or so registered charities, 50,000 are religion-based, according to New Philanthropy Capital, and the proportion has been rising. This is not to mention how many others rely on religious individuals or networks. The think-tank Theos estimates that 10 million Britons per year access some kind of community service through a church. And this is not to mention the more intangible, and vast, effects of religious communities as sources of solidarity, friendship, and so on.

It is not just that believers feel obliged by their creeds to house the homeless, feed the hungry and listen to the miserable; religious groups also have a way of building and maintaining connections which national and local government struggle to match.

Take Kisharon, the Jewish charity in Barnet which offers training and employment opportunities to those with learning disabilities. Beverley Jacobson, its chief executive, told the Jewish Chronicle in 2015: “We’ve even had a guy from Jobcentre Plus asking how we do it. They are so impressed with how we have got people into work and built relationships with local business.”

Or take the Trussell Trust, which began in 2000 when Paddy and Carol Henderson, a Christian couple in Salisbury, set up a foodbank at their local church. The idea caught on with other congregations; they began to share ideas. Now the Trust gives out a million three-day food parcels per year, while exerting a considerable political influence.

Much of the religious contribution to civil society is out of view, in, for example, the disproportionate amount given to charity. The Charity Commission’s Nick Donaldson has praised the “sheer scale” of financial generosity from British Muslims, which during Ramadan last year worked out at £38 per second.

So the disenfranchisement of at least parts of some communities is troubling. It is Muslim integration which makes the headlines, but Britain’s largest religious groups sometimes send out warning signs, too. Most Christians voted to leave the EU: 62% of Anglicans and Episcopalians, 53% of non-conformists, 51% of Catholics. If the vote was a referendum on the status quo, then many Christians are plainly uneasy with it.

Whatever the causes of this – and the most obvious, the increasing secularisation of public life and the rising number of Britons who call themselves ‘non-religious’, might also be the most important – they should concern anyone who hopes for a strong civil society.

I have two suggestions. The first is that the authorities can demand more from religious communities. That partly means clearing the way for institutions to do good work: Theos’s Paul Bickley observes that: ‘Religious social change agents report a struggle to engage with secular grant funders, and feel that they can still be regarded with suspicion.’

For instance, charities are asked to show that they are collaborating with non-religious groups, or that they are not seeking to proselytise.

But it also means asking religious communities to go into action. For instance, last year the government made a general appeal for groups to sponsor refugee families – to make arrangements for housing, English lessons, training and other necessities for integration.

Only two groups came forward: the Archbishop of Canterbury’s official residence, and the Catholic parish of St Monica’s in Salford. At St Monica’s, different members of the parish quickly came forward to help a newly-arrived Syrian family of five. Within weeks, the father had found work as a chef, as well as volunteering to do the catering for a night shelter run by Manchester churches, and the kids were settling in well at school. Such are the feats which religious communities can perform, when called upon. That only two institutions came forward to help refugees says less about churches than about the government’s effectiveness at enlisting them.

My second suggestion is that the authorities demand less from religious communities, in terms of asking believers to compromise on articles of belief. There are inevitable clashes between religious people and the state on such matters as school curriculums, wearing headscarves or crucifixes, conscientious objection and free speech (especially about marriage and sexuality), employment law, Sunday opening hours, faith schools and so on. At the very least, it should be part of any cost-benefit analysis that driving believers away from the public square may have serious knock-on effects for the rest of civil society.

As Rowan Williams has written: “People who have a sense that the deepest roots of their motivation can be stated and respected in public are more likely to want to engage in civic and civil labour. Tell them that their contributions are welcome but only if they rigorously censor the expression of their most serious commitments, and some will not be eager to close on the bargain.”

The ‘Big Society’ or ‘Shared Society’ – the ideal held up by the last two Prime Ministers – needs the contribution of religious believers, if it is ever to be more than an aspiration. And maximising that contribution will need a delicate touch, as well as the confidence to ask religious communities to show they really mean it about loving their neighbours.

Dan Hitchens is Deputy Editor of The Catholic Herald

This article first appeared in Localis’s essay collection ‘Neo-localism: rediscovering the nation’