THE Archbishop of Canterbury today warns politicians not to interfere with a Muslim woman’s right to wear the veil in public and cautions against a march towards secularism in British society.

In a dramatic intervention Dr Rowan Williams, who is backed by other senior church leaders, said that the Government must not become a “licensing authority” that decides which religious symbols are acceptable.

Writing in The Times he adds that any ban on the veil would be “politically dangerous”. His comments reflect concern within the Church that some members of the Government want to see Britain follow the same route as France, where secularism is close to being a national religion.

“The ideal of a society where no visible public signs of religion would be seen — no crosses round necks, no sidelocks, turbans or veils — is a politically dangerous one,” he writes. “It assumes that what comes first in society is the central political ‘licensing authority’, which has all the resource it needs to create a workable public morality.”

His comments came as the Education Secretary Alan Johnson dropped plans to force all new faith schools to take non-faith pupils after pressure from Catholics, Jews and Muslims.

Mr Johnson made the concession after receiving assurances from both the Church of England and the Catholic Church that they would accept non-faith pupils. Many in the Church regarded the move as a first step towards secularisation.

Bishops in the Church of England have long regarded their role in public life, and their privilege of having 26 seats in the House of Lords, as giving them an obligation to speak out in defence of other faiths as well as their own. The Archbishop’s comments have been made with the backing of at least two senior diocesan bishops.

The Bishop of Southwark, the Right Rev Tom Butler, said: “The Archbishop brings a helpful perspective to recent disputes concerning religious symbols. Religious symbols add to the richness of our society and we should not be too influenced by those who push such symbols to excess.”

The Right Rev Colin Buchanan, the retired Bishop of Woolwich, who is now an assistant bishop in the Bradford diocese, which has one of the highest proportions of Muslims of any diocese, added that any attempt to ban religious symbols would open “not just a can but an entire barrel of worms”.

Dr Williams, who has just returned from a controversial two-week visit China, the world’s largest atheist state, said that a “proverbial visitor from Mars” might have imagined from recent events that “the greatest immediate threat to British society was religious war”.

He said that this appeared to have led some to question whether Britain should “become a secular society”. He added that this would be a mistake.

He also said: “Up to now, we have taken for granted that the State is not the source of morality and legitimacy but a system that brokers, mediates and attempts to co-ordinate the moral resources of specific communities which make up the national unit.

“This is a ‘secular’ system in the sense that it does not impose legal and civil disabilities on any one religious body; but it is not secular in the sense of giving some kind of privilege to a non-religious or anti-religious set of commitments or policies.

“Moving towards the latter would change our political culture more radically than we imagine.”

But secularists said that the Archbishop was misguided. Terry Sanderson, of the National Secular Society, said: “The way we are going in this country with the rise of Islam, the churches should look at secularism as their best friend.

“Otherwise we are in danger of going down the same road as Northern Ireland or Iraq. Secularism is one of the best things that can happen to protect religions from being persecuted or persecuting each other.”

But leading Muslims echoed Dr William’s position. Tariq Ramadan, a visiting professor at Oxford University, said: “Some politicians are using this [issue] because they have an agenda to push. In Britain wearing the veil and the niqab is legal. But both here and across Europe there is a movement to try and change the law by nurturing fears.”

He added: “Many Muslims do not realise that by reacting emotionally to the politicians they are alienating citizens.”

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