To the following: Rt Revd. Philip Mounstephen, Bishop of Winchester, Gavin Calver, CEO, Evangelical Alliance, Bishop Mike Royal, General Secretary, Churches Together in England Revd. Richard Andrew, President, Methodist Conference 2025/26 Jude Levermore, Head of Mission, Methodist Church Matt Forsyth, Vice-President, Methodist Conference 2025/26 Commissioners Jenine and Paul Main, Territorial Leaders, The Salvation Army United Kingdom and Ireland Revd. Lynn Green, General Secretary, The Baptist Union of Great Britain, Bishop Tedroy M. Powell, National Presiding Bishop, Church of God of Prophecy Trust. (U.K.), Rev Fiona Smith, Principal Clerk of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland Rt Revd. Dr Rowan Williams, Honorary Assistant Bishop, Llandaff Rt Revd. Dr David Walker, Bishop of Manchester, Rt Revd. Christopher Chessun, Bishop of Southwark, Rt Revd. Toby Howarth, Bishop of Bradford, Chine McDonald, Director, Theos Revd. Lucy Winkett, Rector, St James’s Piccadilly, Dr Christopher Baker, Professor of Religion and Public Life, Goldsmiths, University of London, Debra Green OBE, Executive Director, Redeeming Our Communities, Revd. Canon Dr Jennifer Smith, Wesley’s Chapel and Leysian Mission. Rt Revd. Dr Rosemarie Mallett, Bishop of Croydon, Dr Anthony Reddie, Professor of Black Theology, University of Oxford Dr. Robert Beckford, Professor of Black Theology, Queen’s Foundation, Kat Osborn, Co-CEO, Safe Families and Home for Good, Dr. Krish Kandiah OBE, Director, Sanctuary Foundation, Tania Bright, Co-CEO, Safe Families and Home for Good, Very Revd. Dr Mark Oakley, Dean of Southwark Paul S Williams, Chief Executive, Bible Society, Ven. Dr Rachel Mann, Archdeacon of Salford and Bolton, Raymond Friel OBE, CEO, Caritas, the Catholic Social Action Network, Lord Rees of Easton, Rt Revd. Rob Wickham, Group CEO, Church Urban Fund, Rt Revd. Alastair Cutting, Bishop of Woolwich, Ross Hendry, CEO of CARE (Christian Action Research and Education), Revd. Dr Sam Wells, Vicar, St Martin-in-the-Fields, Rt Revd. Dr Martin Gainsborough, Bishop of Kingston, Revd. Canon Steve Chalke MBE, Founder of Oasis Charitable Trust
To those it concerns, this is a response in toto to your recently published letter; which, to most of us who attended the march and who are Christians, strike us as nothing but mere virtue signalling of otherwise irrelevant Church leaders whose failed leaderships, failed evangelism, and failed witness has meant that your words sound like ‘clanging symbols,’ so much noise signifying nothing.
We begin with your opening line:
“We are deeply concerned about the co-opting of Christian symbols, particularly the cross, during Saturday’s ‘Unite the Kingdom’ rally. Many individuals and communities felt anxious, unsettled, and even threatened by aspects of the march.”
May I ask, along with many others, why you have not written about the pro-Hamas marches that have darkened our streets with their incessant Jew hatred, calls for genocide, and violence against anyone who counter-protests? Do you not think that such behaviour causes many ‘individuals and communities’ feelings of anxiety, leaving them ‘unsettled and even threatened by aspects of’ these marches? Why are you only vexed in your social concerns when it is the right-of-politics who march? I would suggest to you that much of this anxiety and lack of peace is caused by the likes of you and your ilk, who whip up unfounded and unfair characterisations of ‘white supremacists and racists,’ which, of course, would be irksome to anyone of good conscience. However, this characterisation is a lie, proven by the many ‘patriots’ who joined the ranks of the march from ethnic backgrounds. We, in the patriot movement, cannot be blamed for how the lies of the left cause anxiety and feelings of being threatened and unsettled. The selectivity of your concern is also shown; in that you have yet to condemn, ideological movements like the LGBTQ+ from hijacking the cross to push their politics, including sacrilegious and profane use of the cross to desecrate mock and insult the sensitivities of the Christian community! Why no letter then? Quite frankly, your concerns show you to be far from Church leaders as more the sheep of the Liberal elite that are clearly more your shepherd than Christ, our Good Shepherd.
You continue…
“There were undoubtedly diverse motivations for those engaged in the event. We respect the right to free speech, to hold different views on issues such as immigration, the importance of healthy debate between religious communities, and the need to disagree well when consensus is difficult.”
Here, you show your argument to be baseless – you admit that the ones of the march had every right to do so, and that the actions of the few cannot tarnish the whole. Indeed, the marchers were expressing legitimate points in a legitimate way about legitimate concerns; so why do you attack them? I venture, it is because, in your own snivelling ways, you wish to appeal to your true Lord, the progressive elites, and give an offering to your true god, progressive politics. This is your real audience, to virtue signal to your progressive friends, and to think to yourselves that you have done something meaningful to fight the good fight. I am sorry to tell you that in every measure (apart from your idolatry) you have failed. You seek on one hand to smear the people of the patriot movement, but then attempt to dress it up in patronising platitudes, as we shall see from your next line, designed to show faux concern for people whom you seem actually to hold in contempt.
“We also understand that for many of those involved in the rally there is a deep sense of frustration at feeling unheard and forgotten in the democratic process. We know that we cannot heal this wound unless the Church, and society as a whole rises to do more to address the issues of poverty, inequality and exclusion.”
This line demonstrates completely how patronising and conceited you are. You only wish to ‘hear’ what you want to ‘hear’ whilst ignoring the voices you don’t want to engage with in ‘healthy debate’ on issues such as the Muslim rape gangs that have plagued working class communities, the elites like yourselves looking away, the uncontrolled immigration, which was undemocratically foisted onto us by an international elite, the abandonment of our homeless including many servicemen who are left onto the streets, whilst criminals (all illegal migrants of de jour criminals) are housed in hotels. You want to talk about poverty, inequality, and exclusion, not because I suspect you really care or understand, but rather because you want to virtue signal. These are the right catchphrases to use. Please show us, or at the very least, show me where you have spoken out for the working classes of the United Kingdom on the issues I have just listed, or on the two-tier policing and judiciary that is now so openly on display. The reality, I suspect, is that you do not even believe the working classes when they raise these issues as problems, but look upon them as ignorant people who cannot diagnose their own problems and need your benevolent hand as a guide. Why is it that you can find oceans of sympathy to hear the pains of the LGBTQ+ community, but seem always so tone deaf and ignorant of the working classes of the United Kingdom? If you want to show sympathy, try really listening. If you want to show concern, try actually engaging with what is said by us, rather than waving dismissive hands at us and telling us to ‘stop’ but then at your campaign parties bleeding over our plight like you actually care! Why have you not engaged with us on issues of identity? Worst of all, as if to show that you are indeed a ‘brood of vipers’ and ‘whitewashed tombs,’ when we ache to rediscover our Christian heritage and faith, you attack us at the first attempt to lay hold of it!
The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ is not yours, but the treasure of the whole Church catholic. You who prostitute it and are silent when it is attacked and desecrated have no right at all to try and deny us the use of it! We are Christians as much as any other baptised believer, and this march was filled with Christians who have real concerns about issues of integration and identity. We are doing the work of evangelising communities you have failed to reach for generations, precisely because of your priggish attitudes.
You continue:
“However, this rally included racist, anti-Muslim and far right elements. As Christians from different theological and political backgrounds we stand together against the misuse of Christianity. The cross is the ultimate sign of sacrifice for the other. Jesus calls us to love both our neighbours and our enemies and to welcome the stranger. Any co-opting or corrupting of the Christian faith to exclude others is unacceptable.”
…and yet is this not exactly what you do, all the time, to anyone who does not hold your political views? ‘Woe to you hypocrites’ because you lecture on inclusivity whilst at every turn seek to exclude from the Church those who do not fall in line with your views on immigration, Islamisation, abortion, and sexuality. You are not fooling anyone. Let us take and address your points in turn: (1) Were there racists at the march? Yes – and the mainstream of the march pretty much condemned them. Still, there were also many ethnicities at the march, and not a few foreigners, legal migrants, who also feel begrudged that they have been duped by a system that made them jump through hoops, but who are soft on clearly lawbreaking illegal migrants. No! These are not refugees when they have passed through countless safe countries to get here. However, these racists that were present are by no means representative of the movement. We once again draw to your attention the fact that Islamist terrorists have marched in the pro-Hamas marches in London for over a year without once drawing a word from you! Does the presence of these Islamists mean that the whole march is invalid, or that religious symbols of Islam should not be displayed on such marches? Your double standards are apparent to all. (2) Were there people there who are ‘anti-Muslim’? Probably! However, I did not meet one. I met people with legitimate concerns about Islamisation. I asked you directly, each of you, do you consider Islamisation and Sharia law a threat to the Mother Church? The chant ‘Allah, Allah who the F – is Allah’ is not anti-Muslim; it is a theological challenge. Allah is an unknown GOD on these islands. Whilst I might wish for a different set of chants, most of the attendees bring a ‘football’ chant milieu to the festivities (and yes, it really was festive-like, but working class, which is why you do not understand or appreciate it). Anyone who knows football culture knows that the chants given out at such events are often designed as either praise or ridicule, and that is what was happening here, ridicule of Islam, which is completely legitimate in a free society. What the patriot movement wants is integration, genuine and real integration; what they do not want is the insult of being rejected by communities that do not want to integrate, who combine that with a missionary zeal of saying their way of life is better. You miss this because you do not understand the working classes of the United Kingdom, and nor do you want to, as you prefer your ivory towers. Finally, you mention ‘far right’ elements; what exactly do you mean by that precisely? This term now is meaningless, as it has been used against everyone who does not have alt-left opinions and agrees with trans ideology. Have you attacked any protest at all that contained ‘far left’? No! We did not think so! This selectivity of outrage is scandalous and would cause many who are young in the faith to stumble; and there are many fates that would be better for you than to cause one of these little ones to stumble as they try to enter the Kingdom of GOD. Could you please tell us where Christianity has been misused?
We would like to know, as so-called ‘Christian leaders’ educate us, be specific in what way Christianity was misused? Provide us with the timestamps on the videos or photos; we want to see the evidence. I am a witness to a march that you have only received through filtered alt-left media. I saw no misuse of Christianity; I saw lots of faithful Christians evangelising and standing in solidarity with others from working-class communities about issues of great local and national concern. I saw appeals to the Christian faith as part of the national heritage, prayer, blessing, evangelism, and lots and lots of patriots, some more comfortable than others, engaging with the Christian faith in meaningful ways, but all open to it; something that your leadership did not achieve, but something that the organisers of the march have achieved. The uncomfortable fact you have not recognised is that many lay Christians have supported Tommy Robinson’s fight for justice for the raped and abused, whilst you sat silent, not wanting to upset your middle-class dinner party hosts and guests. Many of the organisers of the march are believing Christians – can you show they are not? That means the Patriotic Movement is, in no small measure, a Christian movement. It is a response of the lay Church in the absence of real Church leadership on any of the questions that mattered to the hearts of the masses. Over a million attended, not as you have lied about a mere hundred thousand. In this section of your letter, you have sought to co-opt the cross of Christ for your own left-wing political narrative. You speak as if Christianity teaches naïve Liberal multiculturalism; it does not! Nothing of our current approach is rooted in Christianity; it is rooted in internationalist ideas originating in socialism. Yes, without a doubt, we should treat the alien with dignity, and yes, give them the same rights as ourselves. However, those rights should be defined by laws framed within the Christian worldview, and never at the expense of the liberties of the Church or the Christian faith. Churches are being attacked, now, burned now, because of this kind of unthinking virtue signalling. The march took place coincidentally on the feast of the exaltation of the cross, and how wonderful it was to see the image of our faith in such public display on a march connected to matters of utmost concern; primarily the increasing loss of the freedom of our speech in this land; a sure omen that our democracy is ill.
You said:
“As Christian leaders we are proud of our country and commit ourselves to work with others building a more United Kingdom where the values of love, humility and compassion shine through in every community; and we do so unapologetically in the name of Jesus Christ.”
It is truly laughable that you think of yourselves as leaders at all; you lead no one, your churches are all dying because of your leadership, filled mainly with the elderly and the busybody, and with little love or knowledge of Christ or the kingdom of the gospel. If you had been leaders, Tommy Robinson would never have existed, because you would have been tackling the issues he has. He would be in the crowds of your marches and one of your followers. It is precisely because you are not leaders that he exists, and many Christians like me look more to him than we do to you! He is a Christian, and he wants the Christian faith to grow in the land. He wants Christian values to be at the basis of our nation (though, to be honest, I think he mistakes classical liberal values for Christian ones, not much difference from you mistaking progressive Liberal values for Christian). The truth is, the rediscovery of a Christian political narrative has only just started; but chants that “Christ is King” are far closer to the truths of Christianity than your multicultural and limp wristed appeals for ‘love, humility, and compassion.’ Let me help everyone here: the values of the Kingdom of God are found in the Sermon on the Mount, and the characteristics of its citizens are described in all parts of the New Testament, which describe the people of GOD, the holy Church, particularly in the Beatitudes sprinkled across the New Testament; especially in the Sermon on the Mount. Your appeal for ‘love, humility, and compassion’ is the enlightenment’s watered-down version of Christianity; what of justice, courage, GOD, Christ, His Church, family (man and woman), the preservation of life, the importance of the Spirit? Please spare us your Liberal discount Christianity; we want the real thing, and when Tommy speaks up for persecuted Christians and the idea of brotherhood based on Christian values (even if he is mistaken to some degree about what they are), that is better than your insipid progressive Liberalism, which unjustly pits groups against one another and panders to victimhood. Christians do not build a United Kingdom of the progressive or classically Liberal type; we build the Kingdom of GOD in these islands, so that Christ might be King over all. You are naïve not to think that the Church does not have real enemies, both amongst the racist right and the general left of the spectrum; but the patriotic movement is not one of them, and you would do well to recognise, as Christ instructed you, ‘the signs of the times.’ You are missing a great opportunity for the Kingdom and the Church to reach the very people least represented in our fellowships. Meanwhile, you ignore the plight of the persecuted Church across the Islamic world, even here in the UK and America, where Islamist and alt-left activists target your brethren, whilst you do not attempt to organise any kind of response.
Content yourself with your letter; I am sure all your champagne socialist friends will say well done. However, you have not represented the Church, nor do you, and you have instead exposed yourself as the failed ‘leadership’ you are, irrelevant to the conversation. The great movements shaking our nation, we – the Church – in the patriotic movement, will proudly continue to proclaim ‘Christ is King’ until He truly is, until His enemies are his ‘footstool’ and He rules in ‘the midst of His enemies’ and that at His name ‘every knee should bow.’ You were not here to help our community, and you have not helped the Christians in the working-class areas. We have done this without you, and we will continue to build the Kingdom of our GOD without your guidance, for you have none to offer! The cross does not belong to you, nor does the Church, the term Christian, or any claim to be the custodian of the Christian faith. Please go back to your meaningless tea parties, whilst we try and repair a nation in desperate need of Christ and His Kingdom!
