God's Crusade

Part Four

Kieran Radcliffe stared at the report without emotion, not surprised by its conclusion but not at all dismayed either. Reformism was a project. It was quite possible to force the pace with regards to public behaviour but it was harder to change attitudes behind closed doors to embrace the doctrine. Michael Winstanley might still get excited about that but the pragmatic politician and strategist thought it inevitable. Their modern renaissance had happened in the name of God but it was not intrinsically a religious crusade. In his wisdom, more by luck than design as far as Radcliffe could tell, Charles Buckingham had struck on the idea of using the bible and the moral certainties of Christianity as a political ideology. It had been a brilliant move offering an obvious solution to the failure of both socialism and capitalism. Christianity was familiar to all, even if they were not religious in any accepted sense. Do unto others, turn the other cheek and even an eye for an eye were ideas instilled into children in infant school and the basic tenets of the Christian church, in all its forms, were known and understood by billions of people around the world.

Buckingham had not really attempted to convert anyone. He had managed to significantly increase church attendance simply by making the parents of children at church schools go to regular services, and he had thus returned the relevance of the church to many communities to centre stage, but even fourteen years on no one had to go to a church service. But they had to live Christian lives, hemmed in on all sides by the famous 'Buckingham boundaries' which demanded decency, morality, chastity and honesty of everyone. In public. Behind closed doors it was logical that people would carry on much as they had before. Most people were not Reformists in their front rooms, even if they appeared to be in the world outside.

Radcliffe knew that the renaissance was really about social change. No one had bothered to hide that fact because back in 2020 Buckingham won a huge majority on the argument that the country had to change. And in fourteen years many fundamentals of daily life outside of the home had changed, possibly forever. Firstly and most fundamentally, women had been largely removed from the workforce. Some still worked but only because they could not be replaced, and special dispensation was required for both the employer and the employee which made quite sure that everyone tried very hard to find a replacement. Secondly, the idea of National Service, of investing a few years at the start of adult life to help the country and others, had become ingrained in the very fabric of society, because it was clearly seen as delivering affordable healthcare and education for all.

"Church officials are concerned, Sir..." Radcliffe's private secretary, Guy Wilson, pointed out, which was again no surprise. The Christian Reformist movement had become a huge powerhouse since the merger with the Church of England, and its officers wanted more. The objective had always been to place the church at the centre of everyday life again, as it had been before the ravages of the twentieth century, and there were far too many clerics who felt that the politicians were moving too slowly. Radcliffe disagreed, although he did think that Charles Buckingham was essentially a cautious leader. Charles preferred to take little steps and let time change attitudes. Which it would, of course. In just fourteen years they had seen what time could do. There were already teenagers, young women, who could not imagine wearing a bikini, or working for a living. And every year there would be more. Radcliffe thought that he would have pushed a little harder, but probably not hard enough for the true fanatics. Luckily the two major church figures, Winstanley and Sebastian Osborne, were less impatient and rather more reasonable, the majority of the time.

"Ultimately piety is between a man and his God...a government can only encourage and divert...but get the research department to consider our options, Guy." Radcliffe sighed as he tossed the report to one side. "How about things in America? Surely we have had something from Florida, and how is our candidate looking?"