Further to last week’s article and interesting reactions received in the comments section of the online version, Facebook and other messages, I felt the need to clarify some issues and explain why a democratic society still needs a Christian Democratic force. I will ignore the uncivilized comments, made by people unable to make an argument when they legitimately disagree. Social media is one place where a dose of Christianity needs to come in.
Upon hearing the word Christianity, some people seem to go into hysterics. Phrases like “taking us back to medieval times, backward-thinking, back to the past and the return of Spanish Inquisition” are used.
Hysteria born from the lack of knowledge of what being a Christian Democrat is, and the value of experiencing God and living a Christian life.
Allow me to say Malta has had some giants in Christian Democracy, and I worked proudly with those of my time, like Eddie Fenech Adami and Lawrence Gonzi. Then, the Nationalist Party was not medieval, it did not introduce the inquisition and was definitely not backward thinking. The PN was actually the force of change that gave vision and aspiration that kept it in power for a stint of practically 27 years. Why what we believed in, did and stood for became irrelevant because we lost the 2013 election, baffles me.
Before I go to the core issue, allow me some house-keeping. I am not considering contesting the leadership of the Nationalist Party. I have retired from active politics but love the Nationalist Party, and for the concerned commentator I am busy engaged in the private sector.
I gav the reasons for my decision to retire from front line politics in a letter I addressed to Simon. We agreed that, in the interest of the Nationalist Party, it would have been ill-timed to be publish the letter a few months before an election, stirring a debate that would distract from the real focus: seeing a change in Government. I stood loyally by the Nationalist Party then as I stand now. Out of loyalty I accepted to take the back seat during the past four years and allow the for fresh ideas, but now is a time for serious evaluation, and loyalty requires that I share my views in a responsible manner.
An interesting comment I received from a declared atheist said: “I never thought that being a Christian makes you close minded at all, indeed as an atheist, I will be the first to say that with Christianity’s humanist values the bedrock of Europe could not have been born.” So true. Our society would have been so much different if its foundation was Hindu, Muslim, or whatever religion or philosophy prevailed. Our freedoms, human rights, the concept of solidarity, justice, the value of human life and so on, are Christian values. The European Union’s founding fathers where Christian Democrats and they did not take Europe back into the Middle Ages, they propelled it to the future we live today.
A society founded on Christian principles is one that is tolerant towards citizens with different views, beliefs or orientations. However, it is a society that appreciates its core values and adapts to change within the confines of those values, which are there, after all, to protect us and not hinder us.
Christian Democracy is not about faith imposition but about putting the priorities right in the policies we design, to ensure that society has a social order that protects the vulnerable, addresses poverty, integrates the marginalized and so on.
It is not about reversing a divorce law that came about through a legitimate referendum, but about having initiatives that support families and promote the importance of strong marriages in a healthy society. On the more recent Gay Marriage debate. The State has already recognized Civil Union, conferring all the rights of a married couple, but a distinction is still valid. In a natural sense a gay couple and a heterosexual couple are not the same, there is something related to procreation that is different, so why do we insist in calling them the same thing? In the case of the adoption of children by gay couples, the rights that have to be put first are those of the children and not the couple, be it heterosexual or gay. In fact, heterosexual couples do not have a right to adopt, as adoption is about whether the couple can provide the environment a child deserves. What this country really needs is to give our many children in institutional homes and foster care the right to be adopted if their natural parents neglect and abandon them. That would be a bold move.
A Christian Democratic Party does not fear a debate on civil liberties, but the debate should not be simply about what new rights we give, but also what responsibilities we carry individually and as a society.
A politician’s mission is to strike the right balance between the individual and the common good. The individual is not absolute but a member of society where freedoms carry responsibilities. When we lose sight of our Christian values many lose sight of their responsibilities. I fear the consequences of a valueless society based on relativism and egoism, concerned only with economic affluence and doing only what it likes.
Such a society is doomed to fail, as principles such as taxation are seen as something bad rather than an instrument of social justice and equality, where laws that restrict certain perceived liberties are seen as a hindrance to progress rather than the need to protect the vulnerable and ensure social order, where education is seen as a tool to indoctrinate one’s beliefs on others rather than an instrument of sound formation and empowerment, where heath care becomes accessible only to those who can afford it rather than a right to everyone who needs it, where social welfare becomes solely a fight against its abuse rather than society’s hand of solidarity.
If the country loses its values and moral compass, are we surprised that people are not bothered about corruption as long as their pockets are full? Corruption becomes simply a commission. If morality is out of our political system, why is honesty a value and having a Panama company wrong? It is only because the values of our society are born from our Christian heritage that we perceive such acts wrongful. If we throw our moral values out of the window, we have no measurement, no moral judgement, no sense of what is right and wrong, and we create a void that exults the individual and his liberties (or excesses) to the detriment of the common good, social order and the protection of the vulnerable.
A Christian Democratic Party is not an outdated force; it is the force of change with reason. This was what I always saw in the Nationalist Party, and that is why I urged the Party in last week’s article to rediscover our values and be proud of them. Our values are the instruments that can make our country better for all.
Tonio Fenech is a former Nationalist Minister