In the Name of the Referendum...

At the beginning of each day’s session in the House of Commons, the work of the day is commenced with prayers led by the Speakers Chaplain.

This blog post is tagged with:

Referendum Parliamentary Prayers Alternative Facts Will of the People

That prayer states: “Lord, the God of righteousness and truth, grant to our Queen and her government...

...to Members of Parliament and all in positions of responsibility, the guidance of your Spirit.

May they never lead the nation wrongly through love of power, desire to please, or unworthy ideals but laying aside all private interests and prejudices keep in mind their responsibility to seek to improve the condition of all mankind; so may your kingdom come and your name be hallowed. Amen”.

This worthy invocation expresses all our hopes that leadership will not be motivated purely by power, the desire to say what any listener hopes to hear - playing to their fears or irrational concerns, ‘unworthy ideals’, profit or prejudice, with the hope that our politicians will improve all our lives. Attendance at prayers is not compulsory but it is perhaps safe to assume that all our Members of Parliament are aware of the noble pleas of this prayer.

During my visits to Westminster you become a witness to frenetic activity, hushed tones and the paintings and statutes that capture a moment in time; a reverence of past debate and democracy. Religion however has been replaced by the personality of power and in my more whimsical moments, these parliamentary experiences or icons remind me of the ceremony or artwork found in many Catholic Churches, with the purification of incense being replaced by Chanel or Hugo Boss.

In the rarified air of this Political Religiosity there lurks an absolute belief in unchallenged power! In pursuit of that unbridled power, ’post-truth’ and ‘alternative facts’ are to be now accepted as the norm; the goodness of our institutions, of our societal goals are to be deconstructed, replaced with a revelatory purity that is for the good of all. Haven’t we heard of all of this before? On this World Holocaust Memorial Day, not only should there be remembrance of the Jewish Holocaust, but for every crime against humanity. Importantly we should consider how such crimes took root; clearly by the deconstruction of societies by false persuasion or by a breaking of confidence in its institutions?

Is this the destiny of debate and logic following the EU Referendum, extending its rigid false promise beyond the Gothic home of our politicians? Social media, mainstream news and pundits repeat the convenient mantra that the ‘will of the people’ must be respected suggesting that the referendum has achieved a higher status than any other election. The columnist Jonathan Steele offers insight to the sanctity of the referendum that has split the country, divided families and is about to unleash an attack on personal, social, industrial, consumer and working rights, leading us into the glory of an unregulated paradise?

Whilst the country bathes itself in the aqua pura of a conditional sacrament, we should perhaps reflect and act upon the structure of words, symbolism, society, institutions and history, failing which, we could always suggest that the Speakers Chaplain introduces a newer shorter version of the Commons prayer:

“In the Name of The Referendum, and of The Referendum and of The Holy Referendum, Amen!”