The passing of a law allowing the vilification of religion is on the agenda of this Government. No doubt this law is being introduced to please a minority, many of whom are disillusioned Communists who see in atheism the continuation of their creed. Ironically, disillusioned Communists have found in Liberalism a natural ally. This is the greatest irony of history. Communism developed in total opposition to Liberalism. It was a direct reaction to the savage Capitalism as professed by the Liberal policies of the nineteenth century. I am sure that this new law, which will allow vilification, is being introduced to make possible for a fringe group of people to belittle Catholicism.

Those in favour of this new law are arguing that this is being done to strengthen artistic freedom in Malta. If that is so, Government is not doing a service to culture. It is merely doing a disservice to the Arts. The Arts should not be used or become a platform from where individuals can express their hatred towards religion for whatever reason. On the one hand, Government is campaigning against bullying. On the other, it is making it possible for a new form of bullying under the aegis of the Arts.

The Cambridge Dictionary defines the verb vilify – from which vilification comes - as “to say or write unpleasant things about someone or something, in order to cause others to have a bad opinion of that person or thing”. Therefore according to this definition, vilification has an ulterior motive which confirms my reasoning that this law is not being removed by Parliament in the name of artistic liberty but to allow individuals to use art and theatre as a medium from where they can inculcate their hatred and shallowness towards religion. Clearly, this is being aimed against Catholic Priests and the Catholic Christian Religion. But in the long run, it can be used against any other religion or denomination.

This is how the extermination of the Jews began. Let’s stop saying that the holocaust was the result of Europe’s centuries of Christian heritage. The answer needs to be found in the political theories of Nietzsche and the new concepts of atheism.

The great French historian, Pierre Chaunu, whom I knew personally during my studies at the Sorbonne, wrote that the French Revolution alone, in the name of atheism, created more deaths in the space of a month than the Inquisition in the name of God, throughout the whole Middle Ages and throughout Europe. "La Révolution Française a fait plus de morts en un seul mois, au nom de l’athéisme, que l’inquisition, au nom de Dieu, pendant tout le Moyen-Age et dans toute l’Europe”. In the Vendée alone, the anti-religious repression of the French Revolution killed around 200.000 individuals. These historical truths denounced by Pierre Chaunu, who wrote extensively on French and European history during Early Modern times, are now starting to take hold in the Anglo-Saxon world. Eminent scholars in religious and social history are now dating the genesis of genocides in Europe back to the French Revolution. This revolution ushered Europe into a new age of Imperialism. But that is another story.

Those who want to attack Christians today are stating that Catholics in Malta are now a minority. If this is correct then this should be one good reason why this law against vilification should remain in place albeit updated, as the fines therein are discriminatory by favouring one faith over another. Nonetheless, the State should defend minorities and not allow the majority to slander other persons’ beliefs.

History demonstrates that minorities win over the majority, when the majority starts to express arrogant behaviour.  Catholics were a small minority among the Christian denominations in the first century. They quickly became a majority. The same nostalgic Communists, who are pushing for this law to allow the vilification of Catholics, should remember that the Bolsheviks (which in Russian means the majority) won over the Mensheviks or the minority faction within the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party with disastrous effects for Russian history.

It is those who want to introduce the tools for the vilification of religion who want to take Malta back to the time of the Absolute Regime and not vice versa. A few examples will suffice.

A man who went about with a placard on his car, criticising MEPA, was sent directly to Mount Carmel Hospital. In another case, a man who went into a police station and expressed disparaging words on seeing a photo of the President of the Republic was given a suspended sentence. So we have now reached the absurd situation where one may vilify religion, the religious et al but ‘defaming’ the Representative of the  State  or State Agency sees one slammed straight to a mental asylum or before a Magistrate’s court.

Government wants to make it legal to instigate hatred against a section of the local population or its religion, through the medium of the Arts. But then, the same Government disallows using the same language when politicians are targeted. They are the new sacred cows of the secular state: ipso facto, they are our new gods.

Basically, Government and its cronies are interplaying with words. This is extremely dangerous and politically diabolical. Already, we have seen the Minister of Culture at St. Lawrence Church, sitting with the Knights of Malta, celebrating the triumph of the Faith. The Culture Minister must decide where he belongs; either with the faithful or against them. It is high time that our politicians start making their choices, honest and clear.

Instead of learning from the mistakes committed by religion, our Secular State is turning the democratic principle into an autocratic machine, where democratic power is used to subvert those Maltese citizens who have other values including belief in their faith. If this is the intent of this Government, I state loud and clear I do not want to live under such a new demagogic regime.