Latest / The Catholic Current / Britain Under Attack (Joanna Williams) 4/23/26

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Britain Under Attack (Joanna Williams) 4/23/26 · The Catholic Current

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forth your Holy Spirit upon us, a spirit of discernment, that we might hear your voice
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In the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.
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Well, friends, you may know that I lived in England for two years to study theology in
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the mid-90s.
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Britain has a special place in my heart.
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I like to follow what's going on there, and one of the reasons is that what takes place
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in the UK very often is a precursor to what's happening in the United States, and I think
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it's fair to say that British culture has been under attack from a long time, not only
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by outsiders, and not only by outsiders who moved in, but also by the curators of culture,
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and I find that disturbing.
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And then I found an article in City Journal called British Culture Under Attack by its
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curators, and I said I want to talk to the author, and she is with us now.
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She is a prolific author, journalist, commentator, and public intellectual.
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Joanna Williams, welcome to The Catholic Current.
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It's really great to be with you.
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Thank you very much for having me.
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Joanna, Phyllis, and for folks who don't know what's been taking place in Britain,
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it seems to me that being proudly British is now denounced as racist and dangerous and
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can get you driven out from social media and visited by police and so on.
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Putting up the flag of St. George is considered a hate crime in some areas.
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What's going on there?
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Yeah, indeed.
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It's a very complicated picture.
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The flags that you alluded to, this was a particular incident that started last summer
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with people simply displaying the Union Jack flag or the Cross of St. George.
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It's funny, you know, because I haven't had the good fortune to live in America for an
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extended period of time, but I've visited quite a bit.
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And I remember my very, very first trip to New York.
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This is maybe about seven or eight years ago now.
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And the very first thing I noticed when I got out at the airport was a massive Stars
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and Stripes banner flag.
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And everywhere you go around America, you see the flag displayed proudly.
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And that should be just normal.
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That shouldn't strike me as unusual.
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And yet it really did, because it's not something that you see in the UK at all.
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We are very happy, it seems, in our public buildings to display the pride flag.
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That gets flown very, very frequently.
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But the Union Jack to actually fly our national flag is, as you say, considered to be at best
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a little bit dodgy, a little bit suspect.
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Your motives, according to question, if you want to do that.
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I find that surpassing strange.
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And speaking as someone who is 50% genetically Irish, Britain has a very proud culture and
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so much of Western civilization has not only passed through Jerusalem, Athens, and Rome,
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but it's also passed through London as well.
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How did it get to the point where native Britons are asked to hang their head in shame?
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Why is that?
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Where does that come from?
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I think a lot of it comes from our understanding of history today.
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A lot of errors, really, I would say, in our understanding of history.
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But where generations of young children now have been taught through the school system
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that British history is essentially racist, that it's a history of slavery and imperialism,
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that the British Empire is something that we should be terribly guilty about.
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And the best thing we can do is to kind of atone for the sins of our past and hang our
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heads in shame.
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And I think for young people today, the accusation of racism is something worse than murder,
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to be blunt.
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They would rather be accused of having committed some heinous crime than stand accused of having
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had a racist thought.
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Like I say, I think a lot of this history is actually inaccurate and dwells overly on
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the negative.
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You know, a balanced history would recognize that, yes, there certainly were some mistakes
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and some bad things that happened in the past.
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But Britain was also at the forefront of the movement for abolition of slavery.
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And even some of the things that happened during the period of empire and colonialism
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were not the most terrible things in the world and actually brought some progress to some countries.
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So we've got this very, very negative view of history.
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And it seems that now celebrating our national pride today is a way of ignoring those bad
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things.
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And if we want to be good Britons today, we are to, like I say, exercise atonement and
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shame and guilt rather than pride.
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Friends, I'm speaking today with British author and journalist Joanna Williams.
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We're talking about British culture under attack, and especially by its own curators.
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It's certainly true that Britain spent an enormous amount of blood and treasure ending
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the worldwide slave trade.
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And I don't see other cultures being asked to hang their head in shame.
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We don't go to Latin America and tell people, say, hey, you know, those, you know, mounds
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of bodies from your, you know, child sacrifice because you worship demons can, you know,
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step up to the microphone and have your struggle session.
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It seems to be only Western cultures that are invited to do that.
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I'm also conscious of the fact that not only are the schools and the universities being
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under a great deal of pressure these days, but social discourse in general is, you know,
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Britain has a very distinguished history of emphasizing freedom of speech, you know,
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the speaker's corner and Hyde Park and so on.
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Where is free speech stand in Britain these days?
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I mean, I hate to say, but it's it's really under threat.
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I think this is one of the reason and the irony is, you know, I'm somebody who argues
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that we should be proud of being British, that we shouldn't hang our heads in shame.
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And yet, when I think about the state of free speech in Britain, then it does make me feel
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embarrassed.
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We have so many laws that are designed to essentially outlaw hate speech, but hate speech
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is a very pernicious and difficult thing to define, essentially outlawing an emotion or
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outlawing a feeling.
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And the one person's hate speech might be another person's comment.
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So we've certainly seen people arrested, questioned by the police, arrested, even imprisoned
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for social media posts, again, would really, I think, fall under the remit of a fair comment
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or just political speech or just essentially expressing, forcefully expressing an opinion,
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even opinion that they might regret, a heated opinion, an opinion that you or I might not
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choose to express.
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But I still think that they should not be imprisoned for this.
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I mean, wanting to just to give a more concrete example, perhaps gender always seems to come
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at the heart of lots of these issues.
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That's one issue that is where speech is very forcibly policed in this country.
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And there have been a number of incidents of women feminists who've argued that a woman
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is a biological reality, that a man cannot become a woman, which seems to me, apparently
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sensible, has the weight of science behind it, and is something which the vast majority
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of rational and normal people, dare I say it, actually believe.
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And yet, arguing this can see the police come and knock on your door, or certainly up until
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recent years could have led to the police coming to knock on your door to question your
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thinking and check that you haven't committed a hate crime against a transgender person.
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But also criticising migrants, high levels of migration.
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There's a very famous incident of a woman, Lucy Connolly, who was arrested after a terrible,
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horrible murder, multiple murders of very young girls took place at a dance class in
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Liverpool last summer, a couple of summers ago, sorry.
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And she tweeted that if it was migrants who were found to do this, we should burn the
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migrant hotel down.
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Not referring to a specific hotel, but just a place where migrants stay.
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It's not something, it's not a sentiment I would agree with by any stretch of the imagination.
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It's a horrible, horrible thing to have said.
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Lucy regretted saying this herself and soon deleted the post.
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But it was a post made in the heat of the moment, which wasn't referring to any group
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of people in particular.
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And there were the bodies of young children on the ground, you know, in pools of their
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own blood.
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I remember following this story.
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And it seemed to me that the authorities were very, very keen to give close attention
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to people who are unhappy about the murder of children, rather than the murder of children
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or the murder of children.
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And you certainly were not allowed to speculate or observe that the murderer, you know, where
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might he have come from?
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And why is he still here?
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Apparently, those questions were forbidden.
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Friends, we come back, we're going to continue our conversation with British author and journalist
11:01
Joanna Williams.
11:02
We're talking about British culture under attack and what we might learn from that here
11:07
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My guest today is British author and journalist Joanna Williams.
13:25
We're talking about Britain under attack and some lessons for America.
13:29
Joanna, I arrived in London for 1994.
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I stayed there for two years studying theology, and one of the big stories back then was the
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shipping of live veal calves from Britain to France, where French would do unspeakable
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things in the production of veal.
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And you know, I had seen violent protests against abortion in the United States, but
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nothing seemed to generate acrimony and drama as shipping veal calves.
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And there were people who would protest at the docks, and one young woman who was married
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and the mother of small children threw herself under the wheel of a truck driving calves
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to the dock.
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She was killed.
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She was buried with honors from Coventry Cathedral, and the guest preacher at her funeral was
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Bridget Bardot, who celebrated this woman as the Joan of Arc of veal.
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And I just saw again and again British churches being used for anything other than worship.
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There was a centenary celebration of the combustion engine.
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There was a calamity because they were driving cars down the aisle of these beautiful cathedrals
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in southern England, and there were ventilation problems.
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So this is new, but is it fair to say that the very great treasures of English Christian
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heritage are being abused, neglected, and distorted?
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Am I getting that right?
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Well, absolutely.
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I think that's absolutely the case.
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I mean, two examples of that that I touch upon in my writing in relation to Canterbury
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Cathedral.
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I feel as if I'm very lucky, incredibly privileged to live in Canterbury, obviously, the mother
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church of England, Canterbury Cathedral.
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I was quite shocked to discover, again, this is a couple of years ago now, but it's happened
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on numerous occasions since, that the cathedral, if anybody has been lucky enough to visit
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it, they'll know it's a stunningly beautiful building, that even if you are not of that
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particular faith, has a stunning architectural quality to it.
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And the very fact that people built this over generations, multiple generations, you know,
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the people who started building it had no prospect of seeing the end result, but driven
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by their faith, were determined to build something.
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So beautiful for the future that they wouldn't live to see themselves, I think just fills
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me with awe every time I think about it.
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But this beautiful historical building, a place that should be for reverence and awe,
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has been used as a disco, a venue for a silent disco in recent years.
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So people wear headphones, and there is music playing, and they remove the chairs from the
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nave, and it becomes a venue with lights and dancing, which seems to me to be an incredibly
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degraded way, let's say, to use this beautiful building.
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What troubles me is the argument for doing this.
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I mean, one is just plain money.
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They want to raise money and can't think of a better way of earning revenue.
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But the other thing is, it seems to be dressed up in arguments based on inclusion, that this
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is a good way of bringing people into the cathedral who might not normally get there.
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And I find that really, in fact, more disturbing than the argument that they need to raise
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money, because it suggests that nobody can either present the building with a sense of
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reverence and awe, or the Word of God, that they have no faith in the Word of God to inspire
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people, that they can't see any story in the Bible that might motivate people to be interested
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in visiting a cathedral.
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And this is not just regular people we're talking about.
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These are the people who are in charge of the entire structure of the Church of England.
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They see no reason why people might go to the cathedral other than, oh, let's turn it
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into a venue for a disco.
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I've said often on the air that there's a club, and membership in the club is an embarrassment.
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If I nominate you for the club, it's called the People Who Should Really Know Better Club.
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And if you're the Archbishop of Canterbury, it should not be a surprise to you that you
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really should know better.
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And there was a Broadway tune in the United States many years ago when I was a very young
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boy, and it said, you gotta have a gimmick.
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So if you have no confidence in your heritage, and you have no confidence in the gospel,
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and yet you've got a big building that you've got to pay maintenance on, then you just turn
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it into a fundraising venue, because the ordinary reasons for using a church just seem unimaginable.
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Is there any self-doubt among the people who promoted these?
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Because I know there's also been...
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Weren't they putting up, oh gosh, graffiti.
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They were putting graffiti there, basically vandalizing churches and then complimenting
18:51
themselves on how clever they are.
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Was there any reconsideration that maybe this was a bit over the top?
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This is a bridge too far.
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Has there been any hesitation or self-doubt about this at all?
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I really don't think there has.
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The graffiti was, again, it was an art exhibition.
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These are temporary stickers, but still the effect is graffiti.
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But again, it becomes political in the same way that you're talking about in relation
19:20
to the veal protests.
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It becomes dressed up as an exercise in inclusion, diversity.
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And again, what's underlying that is the assumption that there are some type of people who can't
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be reached by the word of God and need to have gimmicks in order to be inclusive.
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But a lot of this is, I think, exactly as you say, a lack of confidence in what the
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church is supposed to be for, a lack of purpose, religious purpose, I would say, ironically,
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from the people who run the institution.
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And this is not just in the way the building's used, but it strikes me that it's also in
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terms of what is preached in the church as well.
20:06
The one time I took my children to church on Christmas Eve, Midnight Mass on Christmas
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Eve.
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This is a couple of years ago now.
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And the Church of England, I'm sure people will know, has been embroiled in a child abuse
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scandal after child abuse scandal that they are now trying to make amends for.
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And midnight Christmas Eve, the person giving the sermon thought it was appropriate to talk
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about child abuse in the religious sermon and to talk about, obviously, how bad this
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was and to condemn it and to say that the church was looking to change its ways and
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make amends, which is all well and good and what you would expect, but it just seemed
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to me to be highly inappropriate for midnight on Christmas Eve.
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And it just seemed it was much more about the people who run the church doing their
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dirty laundry in public.
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It seemed very self-indulgent, if you like.
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This was the preoccupations of the church leaders, their internal matters, and they
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decided to share it with the congregation at that particular point in time.
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And I did not really need my children to be hearing that message from the Christmas Eve
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service.
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No, no, not at all, no.
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I mean, that does seem to be rather performative and clumsy.
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It's a bit of a tin ear that way.
21:33
And again, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of self-examination.
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On the other hand, it seems to me that other religions in the UK, they're kind of getting
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a favored status, a pat on the back, a wink and a nod.
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I know one of the titles of the King of England is supposed to be Defender of the Faith.
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The King seems to be rather enthusiastic about Islam these days.
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Am I reading these headlines correctly?
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I think, again, it's almost a fear.
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Maybe that's slightly too strong a way of putting it, or certainly a wariness about
22:15
appearing to be...
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I think Charles has described himself as Defender of Faith rather than Defender of the Faith
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because the faith implies Christianity, whereas faith could imply multiple different faiths.
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So there's this kind of relativism that suggests a wariness, a suspicion about appearing to
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be too linked to Christianity.
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A bit like we were saying earlier about the British flag, the idea that you would identify
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closely with Christianity as being superior, that seems like a very morally dubious word
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for me to use.
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I'm even wary about using it.
22:58
But to even say Britain is a Christian country or has a Christian heritage is seen as being
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a discriminatory and a prejudicial statement nowadays.
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It's seen as if you then are arguing that other religions are less good, are less British,
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less part of our culture.
23:24
And so in a bid to be inclusive and demonstrate that he is not discriminatory, the King does
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go out of his way to issue messages in support of Islam.
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The most recent example that upset an awful lot of people was the fact that Eid, the Muslim
23:44
festival of Eid, fell just two or three days before Easter this year.
23:49
And the King issued a message to wish Muslims a happy Eid, but did not do.
23:56
And I think that was actually on Good Friday, but did not issue an Easter message to wish
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Christians a happy Easter.
24:04
Yes, I noticed that as well.
24:08
And you know, I want to draw an analogy.
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I know when the European Union Constitution was being considered, and in the preface they
24:15
had talked about the sources of European identity, and there was no mention made of Christianity.
24:23
Now, that seems to me to be about as disingenuous, as intellectually dishonest, as saying we're
24:30
going to talk about the history of China and Chinese identity, but we're never, ever, ever
24:35
going to mention the emperor.
24:38
So it seems fundamentally dishonest to me to talk about the history of Britain and then
24:44
leave Christianity out of it.
24:48
Where did those big stone buildings come from?
24:53
They didn't just fall out of the sky.
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And so it seems to me that there is, it's not just a matter of being inclusive.
25:00
I see it as a form of cultural amnesia that's being enforced by social pressure, and unfortunately,
25:10
I think even by the weight of law as well.
25:14
And it is fundamentally dishonest, and for people who are celebrating inclusion, it doesn't
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seem very inclusive to me.
25:22
Friends, we come back to continue our conversation with British author and journalist Joanna
25:26
Williams.
25:27
We'll be talking about British culture under attack and what lessons America might learn
25:31
from that.
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After the broadcast today, go to thestationofthecross.com, get our resources list, download our audio
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My guest today is British author and journalist Joanna Williams.
27:26
We're talking about British culture under attack and what lessons Americans might learn.
27:31
Joanna, in your article, something really stood out for me.
27:35
I mean, the English countryside is the stuff of legends, you know, songs and poetry and
27:41
films and so on.
27:44
This is a great endowment in English culture.
27:47
It's a gift of God.
27:49
And apparently, you all have to hang your head in shame because the English countryside
27:55
is associated with being white and therefore bad.
28:01
Am I reading you correctly?
28:02
Is that what's being said?
28:04
Unfortunately, yes.
28:05
I mean, this is the crazy findings of researchers at a university in Britain, but academics
28:12
are always coming up with loopy ideas, it seems to me.
28:17
And I say that as somebody who was one for 12 years.
28:19
Me too.
28:20
Yeah.
28:21
I'm a recovering academic myself.
28:24
That's a good way of putting it.
28:26
But this research, alas, hasn't stayed within the confines of academia, in which case we
28:32
might just roll our eyes and ignore it.
28:34
But it's actually been picked up by civil servants and government departments within
28:41
the UK who want to put into practice some of the ideas that were suggested by the researchers
28:51
as to how the countryside can be made less white.
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So they suggest things like more outlets selling halal food, more of a signage should be in
29:05
different languages.
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And there should also be more efforts to keep dogs under control in the countryside, keep
29:12
them on a lead.
29:13
Obviously, very important to do if you're walking through a field with cattle.
29:17
But there are other areas of the countryside where traditionally British people have maybe
29:22
wanted to take their dogs for a walk.
29:24
But all of these things are now supposed to be a bit of a no, no, so that we can make
29:30
the countryside more diverse.
29:33
I mean, just to say, you know, a lot of people I know who are black or brown have absolutely
29:39
no time for this at all.
29:41
They think it's either hilarious or offensive.
29:45
They are quite happy to go for walks in the countryside, to go and have a drink in one
29:51
of our lovely country pubs.
29:55
And they are quite capable of reading English signs and choosing food that's suitable for
30:01
their own diet without wanting everything to be changed.
30:05
Right.
30:06
You know, I've done missionary work in Southeast Asia, and it never occurred to me to complain
30:11
to the locals.
30:13
There's too much rice here.
30:14
Cut it out.
30:15
You know, or don't tell me to remove my shoes.
30:19
You know, I'm a guest, first of all.
30:23
And even if I were a transplant, I'd say, you know, I've moved to a place that has a
30:28
very rich and wonderful natural heritage.
30:32
It would seem ungracious to me.
30:35
See, you know what you guys need to do?
30:37
You need to make yourselves less English for me.
30:41
It just wouldn't occur to me.
30:43
But I also don't understand the mindset of people who say, yes, you're right, we are
30:49
horrible.
30:50
Please help us erase ourselves.
30:52
How does that happen?
30:54
Have you given thought to that?
30:55
Because it puzzles me.
30:58
I mean, one thing that really strikes me is where the driving force for this is coming
31:04
from, if you like, because it really does seem to me that it's actually not coming from
31:09
black or brown people.
31:11
But these are white academics who are sitting there almost looking for problems where no
31:16
problems exist.
31:19
You know, it's not the case that Britain is not an apartheid regime.
31:25
You know, there are no barriers in place, no checkpoints keeping people out of the countryside,
31:32
depending upon the color of their skin.
31:34
The countryside is a welcoming place to many different people.
31:38
So this is not something where black people are saying, you know, we insist that you change
31:44
for to bend to our will.
31:48
But it's more the case that you've got overeducated, overly woke academics who are sitting there
31:56
inventing problems and then looking for solutions to problems that they have invented.
32:03
And again, I think it really ties in with a lot of the things that we've been talking
32:07
about already.
32:08
It's this sense of shame, of guilt, of bending over backwards to be inclusive, but in the
32:16
process of being inclusive, doing away with what's special, whether that's about a cathedral
32:22
or about the countryside, as if everything English is something to be ashamed of.
32:29
Right.
32:30
And I just find that surpassing strange.
32:33
I know that now in academia, one of the buzz phrases is, you know, we have to decolonize
32:40
the curriculum.
32:42
And there is a movement to kind of hide Shakespeare from his birthplace and also from the from
32:50
the curriculum as as well.
32:52
Again, I said I can't be reading that right.
32:56
But is that really what's going on?
32:58
Unfortunately, yes.
33:00
And again, it's something which I find very strange, because when I go to other countries,
33:05
I see statues of Shakespeare.
33:08
And people talk to me as if Shakespeare should be something with which British people are
33:13
familiar with, whose work we are familiar with and who with whom we are proud of.
33:19
But in Britain, it seems very different that that Shakespeare.
33:25
Academics argue that because he is a symbol, not just as kind of one individual playwright,
33:31
but becomes a symbol of the best, if you like, a model which has gone out to the world, which
33:38
I have to say, I think is the beauty of Shakespeare.
33:41
I think that's that's precisely what is so wonderful about his work, that it can speak
33:46
to people in all kinds of cultural content, context or linguistic context, that that there's
33:52
something human and eternal about the kind of things that he points to, whether that's
33:59
love or grief or jealousy, anger.
34:04
You know, these emotions hold true across cultural contexts and across centuries.
34:12
But it's precisely that that these academics don't like.
34:17
They say that the work of a white man is being held up as a model of universal values that
34:26
people should aspire to in all different cultural contexts.
34:30
And that's what's bad about him.
34:34
So we need to point out the bad things that were happening at the time that Shakespeare
34:39
was writing, the bad things he did in his own life and basically knock him off his pedestal
34:46
and take him down a peg or two.
34:50
And I think that's I think so much of these things, whether it's with the cathedrals,
34:55
the countryside or Shakespeare's work, is cultural vandalism.
35:00
It's taking what's beautiful, what's wonderful achievements of people or creation and taking
35:10
them down and saying we're not allowed to enjoy these things, we're not allowed to admire
35:17
this work.
35:18
Well, you know, even if and no one has produced it, but let's just say, you know, somewhere
35:22
out in the world is some other author whose work was buried in a field somewhere precisely
35:29
because he wasn't white or wasn't British or wasn't Christian.
35:33
And his work or her work or their work, you know, trying to be inclusive, transcends everything
35:40
ever written in the history of the world.
35:43
Even if that were acknowledged, you still could not deny that for centuries, Shakespeare
35:51
was appreciated around the world and gave us images and metaphors and tropes and themes
35:58
that are part of just the transmission of Western civilization.
36:03
And even if there were some superior author who's been buried in the backyard for centuries
36:09
or millennia, it's undeniable that Shakespeare was writing about things that most people
36:16
in the world could appreciate and value.
36:22
Is there any pushback from ordinary folks who just say, wait a minute, leave my Shakespeare
36:28
alone?
36:29
Thank you very much.
36:30
Is there any pushback at all?
36:31
Or is that considered hate speech?
36:33
No, I think there is, if not overt pushback, then I think there are certainly and I'm really,
36:39
really pleased to say this, people who are keeping Shakespeare alive in the very way
36:45
in the true spirit, if you like, of Shakespeare's plays.
36:49
So again, living in Canterbury, we have a Canterbury Shakespeare Festival, which is
36:54
completely run by amateurs, but they put on performances of Shakespeare's plays often
37:00
out in the open air, which is not always a good thing in the British summertime, we don't
37:05
always have the weather for it.
37:07
But that's very, very good.
37:09
But, you know, just going back to what you were just saying, I think exactly what you
37:14
were saying is good about Shakespeare's work and why it should be celebrated is the reason
37:19
why academics want us to not focus on his work at all, which is this idea of Shakespeare
37:26
as being a way of central to the transmission of Western civilisation.
37:33
You know, that's the problem that they have with his work.
37:37
They don't want it to be seen.
37:39
They don't want to transmit Western civilisation, to put it bluntly.
37:45
They think Western civilisation is a terrible, terrible thing.
37:50
And Shakespeare as a vessel for transmitting Western civilisation must then be again degraded,
37:59
must be taken off his pedestal and relativised and trivialised so that we don't have any
38:06
idea that Western civilisation is in any way better than any other form of civilisation.
38:13
I hope it's not churlish of me to observe that many of the severest critics of Western
38:19
civilisation benefit from Western science, Western technology, Western rule of law.
38:27
I don't see them unplugging and I don't see them riding four-legged beasts.
38:33
They're flying on airplanes.
38:35
It strikes me as a bit disingenuous.
38:40
And I do know that there are some people who are saying, hang on, I want to keep on reading
38:43
Shakespeare.
38:44
I want my churches to be beautiful.
38:46
I want the English countryside to be beautiful.
38:51
Are there any, and again, I don't know British popular culture, are there analogues to, I
38:56
mean, in America everybody has a podcast and everybody has a blog and people are hawking
39:03
the wares of their ideas.
39:05
Is there a public commons analogous in Britain where people can have the conversations that
39:10
you and I are having?
39:11
I think, unfortunately rare, but I think there are a few different arenas around, perhaps
39:19
around Substack.
39:22
And I think there is a growing sense of people, some people anyway, wanting more than this
39:29
and wanting to have respect for British literature and culture.
39:36
And as you say, there are podcasts and blogs where people can go to explore those ideas.
39:43
And I think those things are very, very important to almost keep the flame of Western civilization
39:49
alive at a time when so many people are intent on blowing it out.
39:55
I think even if we can keep it alive a little bit, it will be there for the next generation.
39:59
No, I agree.
40:01
I'm a raging introvert who'd rather sit quietly in his cell and write with his fountain pen.
40:07
And I show up at a microphone every day because I think we're putting messages in bottles
40:12
and letting people know there is hope, we can rebuild, and we don't have to concede
40:20
to our own erasure and we don't have to participate in the lies that are being thrown at us today.
40:27
Friends, we come back.
40:28
We continue our conversation with British author and journalist Joanna Williams.
40:32
We're talking about British culture under attack and what lessons we might have for
40:36
the United States.
40:37
Part of the conversation, follow what we're following by following us on Gab, that's G-A-B.com.
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Praise be Jesus Christ.
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This is Fr.
41:52
Robert McTigge of The Society of Jesus, your daily host for The Catholic Current, where
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42:21
My guest today is British author and journalist Joanna Williams.
42:25
We're talking about British culture under attack and some lessons for America.
42:30
Joanna, when I was a boy, and there really was such a time, the Bicentennial of the United
42:38
States in 1976 just absolutely preoccupied the nation every single day for a couple of
42:47
years.
42:48
This was a major event.
42:50
Sixty years later, the 250th anniversary is coming up, and it seems to me by comparison
42:57
barely a ripple.
42:59
I think that just as you all in the UK, here in the United States, we're being asked to
43:04
hang our head in shame about our national heritage and our Christian heritage as well.
43:10
Can you give us Americans some advice?
43:13
What lessons can we learn from what's been taking place in your country in recent years?
43:19
Yeah, it's a good question, and I've struggled a little bit to come up with answers, but
43:24
I can think of three things.
43:26
I guess one thing I would say is use it or lose it.
43:30
So we see examples in the UK of churches being turned into mosques.
43:36
We've talked about cathedrals being used as silent disco venues.
43:41
We could have also talked about museums being turned into, I would describe as playgrounds
43:47
for little children rather than serious places for study of ancient artifacts.
43:54
And you know, it's easy to sit around and complain about these things, and I think we
43:59
should.
44:00
We should complain when these things happen, but I think we would have a much firmer ground
44:06
for complaining if we used these buildings and these facilities ourselves.
44:14
If churches were full of Christian worshippers every weekend, it would be a lot more difficult
44:22
to make the argument that it should be turned into a mosque.
44:26
If the cathedral was raising so much money from worshippers, it would be a lot more difficult
44:31
to make the argument that it should be turned into a venue for a silent disco.
44:36
If a museum was full of people wanting to study ancient artifacts, it would be a lot
44:42
more difficult to transform it into a children's playground.
44:46
So I think rather than just sitting back complaining after change has happened, we've got to be
44:51
proactive and get out there and use the things that we value and appreciate ourselves.
44:58
No, I'm in full agreement.
45:01
And I think we, you know, the truth, let's start with the truth.
45:08
Christian civilization, which is rooted in Christian civilization, make no mistake, has
45:13
been a net gain for things like the rule of law and technology and science, the sacredness
45:18
of individuals.
45:19
You know, certainly it is the case historically that wherever Christian missionaries went,
45:27
child sacrifice ended, polygamy ended, and the education of women began in earnest.
45:34
And those sorts of things need to be said, and they need to be said proudly, and they
45:40
need to be said without apology and without hesitation.
45:45
So get to know your history, get to know your language, and, you know, live not by lies.
45:52
And there are times when you have to clear your throat and say, I can't be silent anymore.
45:59
I also think there is a wisdom to forming communities, even if it's to sit together
46:06
and read great English literature.
46:09
Is there any movement in schools or, I don't know, in housing units and in communities
46:15
to say it really is okay for us to talk about being British and we have a heritage worth
46:21
handing on?
46:23
Is there anything, are there any communal efforts in that direction?
46:27
Well, we did have, as we talked about right at the beginning, this Operation Raise the
46:32
Colours, it was called, where people in communities up and down the length of the UK started displaying
46:39
the national flag, either the Scottish Saltire or the flag of St George in England or the
46:45
Union Jack across the country.
46:47
And that was a really important challenge, I think, to the dominance of the pride flag,
46:52
which I say has been flown from all kinds of public institutions, but also increasingly
46:57
over the past couple of years, I'm embarrassed to say, it's been the Palestinian flag, which
47:03
has been flying in many public places of many street lampposts in protest at the war in
47:10
Gaza on the streets of London.
47:14
So I think that was a very much a grassroots movement.
47:18
But I think just in terms of what you were saying, you know, I completely agree.
47:22
And I think two other ways of defending Western civilization and pushing back against current
47:28
trends are fundamentally important to our education and free speech.
47:34
We need to look at what's going on in our schools and how we educate our children to
47:40
make sure that they are not just taught to feel shame and embarrassed, don't just have
47:44
a decolonized curriculum, but actually learns the positive things about Western civilization
47:52
and the good and important lessons and the beauty, I think, most importantly, the beauty
47:58
that there is to be learnt in that.
48:01
And obviously, we need free speech to be able to make these arguments and to be able to
48:07
push back against the woke agenda that some in the elite would like to foist upon us.
48:14
Well, I can't help but notice that for all the people are talking about the horrors of
48:18
civilization, it seems that everyone wants to live here.
48:21
And this is where I'd ask my students, you know, what might what might a reasonable man
48:27
infer?
48:28
We just got about two minutes left.
48:30
Are there any national figures, either politically or culturally in the UK who are talking about
48:36
these things?
48:37
Yeah, I think so.
48:38
I mean, we are going through a period of quite radical political upheaval in the UK right
48:45
now for my entire lifetime.
48:48
I mean, I'm 51, 52.
48:50
My entire lifetime, really, Britain has been a two party state with the Labour Party and
48:55
the Conservative Party.
48:57
I think those days are well and truly over now.
49:01
And this has been quite a big upheaval, which we haven't yet seen reflected in Parliament,
49:06
but we're certainly seeing reflected in opinion polls.
49:10
We've got a populist challenger to the two party system with the Reform Party led by
49:19
Nigel Farage, but also with the Green Party, which I have to say I'm a lot less sympathetic
49:26
to and don't find anything particularly compelling in what they're arguing.
49:31
I think this political upheaval does make some conversations possible that weren't possible
49:38
before, for example, questioning the state of our universities.
49:42
And I think there are individuals who you can point to as well.
49:46
I mean, I'm very, very proud of the fact that I live in the same country as JK Rowling.
49:53
Whatever you think of the Harry Potter books, I think she has done far more to bring the
49:59
reality of human biology, a woman's body.
50:04
There was a clarity.
50:05
I mean, just sometimes it is a thought crime to state the obvious in public.
50:12
And I have to give her a round of applause because there was a social cost for her to
50:16
do that.
50:17
Joanna Williams, thank you for a fascinating conversation.
50:21
God bless you.
50:22
Very good work.
50:23
And I do look forward to next time.
50:24
Thank you very much.
50:25
It's been a real pleasure speaking with you.
50:26
I'm Jesuit Father Robert McTague, your host every day of the Catholic Current.
50:29
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51:28
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