The right is increasingly using Christianity as a political tool
Reform UK launched a new ‘interest group’ within the party last Thursday: Christians for Reform.
At the launch at St Michael’s Cornhill Church in the City of London, Reform MP Sarah Pochin declared: “Reform will always stand up for Christianity in this country, we are fundamentally a Christian country and we are proud to be Christian.”
Former Tory MP Ann Widdecombe, went as far as to say the launch marked “the day when Reform and Christianity are merged”.
On the right, Christianity is increasingly being used as a political tool. Far-right figures such as Tommy Robinson and UKIP’s Nick Tenconi firmly align themselves with Christianity. Two days after Reform’s ‘Christian fellowship’ launch, Robinson, a co-founder of anti-Islam group the English Defence League, held a carol service in Whitehall, which he claimed was about “putting Christ back into Christmas”, but featured lots of Union jacks. Tenconi calls himself a “defender of masculinity, Christianity, and conservative values”.
While right-wing figures promote Christian nationalism, they characterise Islam as a threat and push anti-Muslim and anti-migrant rhetoric. Reform spends a lot of its time railing against migrants from countries that have different cultures, values and practice different religions to Christianity.
Pochin came under fire when she recently used her first PMQ to ask if Keir Starmer would ban the burqa. Before the general election last year, Nigel Farage said former prime minister Rishi Sunak had allowed more migrants into the country who “are going to fight British values”. He said: “We have a growing number of young people in this country who do not subscribe to British values, [who] in fact loathe much of what we stand for.” Farage confirmed he was talking about British Muslims.
Farage said he stopped attending church in March last year, attributing his decision to the Church of England’s “surrender” to the “woke agenda”. “I used to believe in it. I used to attend – not every Sunday but regularly,” Farage said. His comments came after the Archdeacon of Liverpool, Miranda Threlfall-Holmes, said she had been to a conference on whiteness, and that the church should focus on being “anti-whiteness” and “anti-oppression”. Despite Farage’s boycott of the Church of England due to its “woke agenda”, the Christians for Reform launch was held at an Anglican, CoE church.
Reform MP Danny Kruger, who is an evangelical Christian, said in a controversial speech to Parliament in July that Christianity is declining, and Islam is one of the religions taking its place. He said the UK is “fundamentally a Christian country, if it is a country, and I cannot be indifferent to the extent of the growth of Islam in recent decades”.
Reform’s appeal to Christian voters mirrors strategies used by Donald Trump in the US. In the US, Christians are the bedrock of Trump’s support base and this goes hand in hand with his anti-Muslim rhetoric. At his inauguration in 2017, Trump had pastors pray for him. In the run-up to the 2024 presidential election, he made a direct appeal to Christians to vote for him, “I love you Christians. I’m a Christian. I love you, get out, you gotta get out and vote.” According to statistics from the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), the largest religious group among Trump voters in the 2024 election was white evangelical protestants, 81% of whom voted for him.
The launch, and Reform politicians’ remarks on Christianity and Islam, shows that Farage’s party is seeking to consolidate its voter base among nationalist Christians, while also using religion to advance its anti-migrant and anti-Muslim agenda.
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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