lion&lamb: Back Issue

Introduction: Rights and Worship
Derek Poole

Comment: Religious Rights in Vietnam
Joanne Miosz

Comment2: Drumcree
Mervyn Gibson

From the Director
David Porter

Human Rights - A Critical Appropriation
Julian Rivers

Human Rights - Why Churches need to be involved
Brice Dickson

Parting Thoughts on Life and Leaving
Tucker Ball

A Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland
David Stevens

Does God always forgive his children?
Alan Wilson

Faith and Practice - Ruth Lavery
Ruth Hutchinson

The Concept of Rights
Joan Lockwood O'Donovan

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RIGHTS
The popular notion of rights, as the fulfilment of individual destinies and uninhibited freedom of expression, is the image that dominates daytime TV chat shows and evening soaps. It is expressed in language predominately individualistic and profoundly religious, as the right to have rights takes on a creedal quality in a secular age. This is not to deny the genuine empathy that human rights, in the political sphere, has nurtured in many societies but it is to suggest that not all expressions of the rights culture are unquestionably good and inevitably liberating. This edition of Lion & Lamb considers some of these issues and in particular wrestles with the meaning of personal and political rights in the context of Northern Ireland.

From a Christian perspective it is not possible to consider the meaning of human rights apart from issues of love and justice in our social relationships. The Biblical view of the individual is communitarian. Like the Trinity, humanity exists and is fulfilled in relationships of interdependence and mutuality. Although justice demands rights for the individual, these rights are only absolute in the abstract. In real communities, rights are relativised by the mutual responsibilities and obligations that make up the complex reality of life together. As David Hollenbach states, "The mutual interdependence of persons on each other in family life, in work, and in political life is viewed as the foundation and matrix for the realisation of human freedom and dignity. Respect for freedom and dignity, therefore, involves more than not interfering with the activity of persons. Obligations of justice include positive duties to aid persons in need, to participate in the maintaining of the public good and to share in efforts to create the kinds of institutions which promote genuine mutuality and reciprocal respect." Christian understanding of rights is therefore inseparable from the biblical vocation of love and service, both for the common good of society and for real people in concrete situations where advocacy for the rights of others is undoubtedly linked to experiences of genuine oppression and deprivation.

As long ago as the forth century St. Ambrose was identifying the relationship between justice love and service. "Justice," he wrote, "which assigns to each man his own, does not claim another's and disregards its own advantage, so as to guard the rights of all." Again he says, "He who is ordinarily wise is wise for temporal matters, is wise for himself as to deprive another of something and get it for himself. He who is really wise does not know how to regard his own advantage, but looks with all his desire to that which is eternal, and to that which is seemly and virtuous, seeking not what is useful for himself, but for all…The upright man must never think of depriving another of anything, nor must he wish to increase his own advantage to the disadvantage of another". In this Ambrose is building on the Old Testament's command to seek, through justice, the common good of society, and the New Testament's emphasis on the love of neighbour.

The promotion of justice in the form of human rights is for Christians an expression of love and service. It transcends the self-absorbed notion of rights as the fulfilment of raw individualism and places it in the context of mutuality and interdependence in our social relationships. It is not just agitating for one's own interests and needs, but a positive working for the legitimate claims and interests of those who need our support. For the church, this requires more than a trendy homage to 'political correctness' but a compassionate commitment to 'political virtue' seen in our ability to affirm the rights of the marginal, the powerless and even our enemies.

Derek Poole - Editor

ECONI WELCOMES the submission of unsolicited articles, but does not guarantee publication, and manuscripts cannot be returned. Opinions expressed in the magazine are those of the contributors and do not necessarily reflect the views of ECONI. Permission to reprint any original article in Lion & Lamb should be sought from the Editor.

Editor Derek Poole
Asst Editor Ruth Hutchinson
Design Colin Maguire
Cover Spring Graphics