Columnists
Ancient history
Agnostics anonymous
It's long been impossible for
whoever writes the storylines of European history to devise
anything new. The main characters are all profoundly stereotyped,
buried under centuries of baggage. The same basic plots are
recycled indefinitely, generations after they became tedious
clichés.
Thus we have David Cameron's 'speech
at Bloomberg', in which he announced a referendum on Britain's
membership of the EU. He invoked history from 'Caesar's legions …
to the defeat of Nazism' to support his Vision: that Britain should
be either In, or Out. He's unsure, but he will let the people
decide. Assuming they re-elect him. Cameron described his stance,
in rather grand terms, as 'a heresy'.
This heresy has always been part of
our self-definition: We don't quite belong to the European
religion. Caesar's legions conquered, but sea-girt England emerged
as a nation distinct from Roman Europe. After the Empire,
Catholicism was the cement of Europe; Protestant England was among
the heretical nations that rejected that too.
The French once saw Britain as
'Carthage': a mercantile, maritime, infidel state that threatened
'Rome', i.e. European civilization. By the Enlightenment, France
had become Europe's dominant power, inheriting the mission to unify
the continent. In 2013 the French, still leading the European
project, were first to condemn Cameron's heresy (MP Claude
Bartalone piously hoping it was 'un propos
d'après-dîner').
People think they choose their own
beliefs, but elaborate structures of belief pass down through the
ages, irrespective of individuals. Look at European anti-semitism,
which has survived unbroken from pogrom to new obsessions with
Israel, while people and empires come and go.
English anti-Catholicism also
endures the seasons. Richard Dawkins condemned the 2010 Papal visit
in the same demonological terms as his spiritual forebears used in
1610. This is perhaps the one wellspring of English religion which
hasn't yet dried up. Cameron once asserted that the UK is 'a
Christian country'. But being Christian never defined England; all
of its rivals and competitors were Christian too. The English
religion is a peculiar heresy, the faith of a rebel
state.
Cameron's speech may fire the
ancient religio-political enthusiasm of the English, or the
British, or just UKIP voters. But even they must know that the
combatants in this ancient combfight are long since bald.
Demography suggests Islam has a greater chance than Christianity of
inheriting what's left of Europe. The important questions now are
only about China, India, and how the US will cede power to them.
World history has left European Christendom behind, leaving only
its fading echoes repeating themselves, more farcically every
time.