The Scottish Bishops have described nuclear weapons as a “grave threat to the human family” while rebuking those politicians who profess a Catholic faith but “remain silent – or even surrender – in the face of grave ethical injustice”.
In a pre-general election pastoral letter, read in all 500 Scottish parishes last weekend, the bishops set out priorities for what was described as the “most unpredictable general election for generations” and reminded parishioners of “a duty to inform ourselves of the moral values our candidates”.
The letter – set out under the five main categories of “Life”, “The Family”, “The Economy”, “Human Freedom” and “Peace and Evangelisation” – reaffirmed opposition to abortion, assisted suicide and same-sex marriage.
Unlike the 2010 election guidance, the bishops made specific reference to nuclear weapons, arguing that an upgraded defence programme was “in the face of persistent moral objections, to say nothing of international agreements we have entered into which commit us to work against the proliferation of such weapons”.
The bishops’ comments seemed particularly directed towards Catholic politicians who have nevertheless supported, or declined to comment on, these issues.
The Scottish National Party (SNP) is opposed to renewing Britain’s Trident nuclear deterrent while Jim Murphy, the leader of the Labour Party in Scotland and a Catholic, has publicly defended nuclear weapons.
The letter is widely seen as signalling a new political alertness and willingness to intervene on the part of a younger and refreshed bishops’ conference, which has seen seven new bishops installed or translated since the last election.
The lack of any reference to the United Kingdom as an entity may be a sign that the Church in Scotland is increasingly sympathetic to, or accepting of, the independence agenda.
Professor Tom Gallagher, a Catholic academic, said of the letter: “it is composed of a string of pious generalisations in which there is no acknowledgement of just how badly split the country is on political grounds.”
He added: “the tenor of the document and the barely disguised hostile reference to Labour's Jim Murphy leaves open the possibility that some in the hierarchy would be relaxed about becoming paid officials in a dominant party system.”
But Fr Thomas Boyle, Assistant General Secretary of the Bishops’ Conference of Scotland, said on twitter that the pastoral letter “is not an endorsement of any political party” and “was written by the bishops themselves, no one else”.
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