Christianity too soft and liberal? Start your own version.

If the BNP religious ideology were a boxing ring then at any time there are two main competing religions sparring for supremacy.

In one corner of the ring there is the slippery "Reverend" West with his Christian Council of Britain (CCoB), and in the other corner there stands a motley array of BNP members and bloggers who worship at a different Valhalla.

(The "Reverend" Robert West is the BNP candidate for the North Norwich by-election.)

As Seismic Shock in an article dated May 3, 2009 suggests, the BNP often claims to represent 'real' British Christianity through Robert West and the CCoB.

Then the article then goes on to quote the following:

‘Christianity despises the planet, and that is why we are facing the ecological crisis of today’, (and that) Christianity ‘had turned the natural, organic religions of Europe based on the symbolism of the tree, a living and growing symbol of perpetual life with the dead symbol of the cross’, and to conclude that ‘Christianity is dead’.

Which is "exactly what Lee Barnes of the BNP wrote in an article last summer. Lee Barnes is the BNP legal expert, key blogger, and prominent party member. Barnes revealed his racist interpretation of Odinism:

“In Odinism the God Odin is crucified like Christ to a tree. Unlike Christ whose redemption is found only after his death, Odin SURVIVES his torment on the tree and gains the wisdom of the Runes and thereby unlocks the secrets of the universe …The roots represent our descent from the Gods and our connection to the Earth, the trunk represents our shared European racial heritage, the main branches of the tree our nations and tribes… "

Seismic Shock notes that for Barnes, Christianity represents a ‘death age’ which must be replaced by a ‘new religion’:

"The death age of christianity and liberalism has led to the age that William Blake regarded as Ulro - the lowest stage of human life possible where mans innate value has been replaced by his utility value. Just as Christianity grafted itself upon the hewn oaks of our heathen past, the new religion that is starting to sprout upon the stumps left behind by christianity and its pimp sister liberalism is a return to an organic and natural religion.”

These words echo the philosophy of BNP founder John Tyndall:

“What passes for Christianity in this country today can only be described as superstitious sociology; a bland doctrine of welfare-mongering with guilt, humility and self-abasement as its cardinal principles. We can only have contempt for a Church which, in the name of Christianity, facilitates the Islamic occupation of whole neighbourhoods, condones homosexuality, promotes multi-racialism and will forgive everything.
"Our race is our religion, and the nation is our church”.

Seismic Shock concludes:

"The BNP’s version of Christianity is incredibly warped and racist, characterised by alliances with Christian identity movements rather than any mainstream Christian groups. . . Its dealings with Christianity are shallow and superficial, lacking any constructive engagement with religious texts and instead attempting to use Christianity as a cultural identity marker to connect with white Britons in order to exclude minorities. According to the BNP’s founder, “our religion is our race.” The BNP’s “Christianity” should be recognised for what it is and rejected by all."

So there stands the "Reverend" Robert West in one corner of the small BNP boxing ring. He is wearing a purple cape of his own design, crudely painted with scenes from his own version of tough Old Testament fire-and-brimstone Christianity.

And in the other corner of the small BNP boxing ring stand the Odinists. They wear homespun garments of hemp, they hold hands, quaff mead, praise Mother Earth, and are garlanded with leaves and flowers - but they are not hippies.

Not liking 'liberal' love-thy-neighbour Christianity, the Odinists turned to the Norse Gods.

Not liking 'liberal' love-thy-neighbour Christianity, the "Reverend" Robert West started his own Christian Council of Britain.

These BNP members are of different religious beliefs, but in their flamboyant and attention-seeking extremism they are curiously alike.