Roberto is a bit of a one off. A former boxer, he is a big man with a big heart and a big personality. I remember the first time I met him I was a bit taken aback by the huge St Benedict’s crucifix, slew of medals, scapular and rosary beads that he wears round his neck. I thought it was a bit over the top. As I got to know him better, however, I realised his wearing all this religious hardware was an important part of who he is. In his youth he told me he had been a bit of a “geezer”, involved in security and personal protection and all the dodgy doings and rackets that this kind of life can bring. Ten years ago, however, he had a profound conversion experience and he returned to the practice of his Catholic faith in a radical way. He now lives his life to serve others in whatever way he can. His crucifix is not just a fashion statement or devotional item but an expression of his Christian belief and a reminder to him of all that Jesus has personally suffered for him to save him from his sins. He is almost embarrassingly proud of his Catholic faith and isn’t afraid to show it. He told me, “I know if you are a good Catholic you are just supposed to wear a little gold cross on a chain or a lapel badge and keep your rosary in your pocket. But why? I want everyone to know about Jesus. I don’t want to keep my faith private?”

“If you are a good Catholic you are supposed to wear a little gold cross on a chain or a lapel badge and keep you rosary in your pocket.”

His attitude has challenged me on grounds of both taste and faith. I am just as committed as him. I have been working full time for the Church through the charismatic renewal for over 25 years, after all, yet I would feel embarrassed to express my faith publicly through Christian symbols in this way. Why? Initially I felt it was because I was more balanced and mature in my faith. But recently I have begun to suspect that it is maybe just middle class manners. Each culture and social background has its assumptions and sensitivities which can become our blind spots from the gospel point of view. The danger is that you can somehow begin to feel that the way you witness to your faith is the best way and when others do things differently they are the ones who are out of step and need correcting.

The bottom line is that wearing a big crucifix is not considered normal or acceptable in polite educated society in Britain today unless it is a fashion item Posh and Becks style. Even priests and religious generally seem to prefer to blend in and not wear distinguishing religious habits. The argument is that what is important is the inner faith and these overt Christians signs put people off and are a barrier to meaningful relationship and contact. Maybe they are for some people, but not for everybody as I have found observing people’s responses to Roberto, embarrassing as I have sometimes found his in your face Catholicism. Far from shunning him, complete strangers on the bus or in the shops seem to be drawn to him, especially if they are poor or outcast or old. Check-out girls in the supermarket smile and initiate conversations with him or ask him to pray for them. Children play with his crucifix and ask him questions about it. Of course this is not just because of his cross but because of his warm personality and his love of people too. But his big cross is definitely not the barrier I thought it would be.

It made me think too of the way that the teenage, unchurched boys on the estate where I live, love to wear rosary beads round their necks in a way I would never do myself. They don’t feel self-conscious about wearing them. They see them as something godly, even if it is only in a superstitious way, a way of somehow calling down the protection of a God they are not quite sure they believe in, but hope is there for them.

Prada handbags, Chelsea football scarves and Greenpeace T shirts

Yet ironically in a society of branding where everybody is keen to show where their loyalties lie, whether it is with PRADA handbags, Chelsea football scarves or Greenpeace T-shirts, we Catholics, often have a problem with identifying ourselves in a public way with our faith. The way we dress and how we spend our money and time, however, are social indicators to others of the image we want to project and what our priorities in life are. You know someone is a real Chelsea fan, for example, when he wears his football scarf all the time, not just in the Chelsea football ground. At a time of growing secularisation and falling church attendance, when we are all being called to witness to our faith, one way we can perhaps do this, is by simply wearing or carrying overt Christian/Catholic symbols (bibles, rosaries etc) in public more. In this way others who don’t know us can identify us in the street as Christians. In a Christian society maybe this is not so important, but maybe it is here where people often have few Christian contacts.

It is true that as a result some people might look down on us, particularly those who are more educated and secular and think we are a bit weird. But those who are searching, particularly in this time of stress and difficulty, will know that they can come to us with their questions because we are identifiably part of God’s squad. The challenge in doing this, of course, is we have to make sure by our actions – our driving, our drinking, our charity, we are not counter witnesses and our lives match our displayed beliefs. It surely is an irony that in former communist countries where they tried to suppress Christianity, one of the ways they did this was to forbid religious to wear habits or outward signs of their faith. Yet here in the West where we have religious freedom, Christians in the main choose to hide outer symbols of their faith under the guise of tolerance and good manners. Devout Moslems, on the other hand, are easily recognizable by the way they dress and are not afraid to stand out and to publicly express their identification with a particular value system, religion and way of life.

Christians tend to become self-censoring out of political correctness

We Christians, however, can become self-censoring out of a misguided sense of political correctness and a desire to conform. Roberto has become a victim of this recently. For the last five years he has worked for a charity, which has catholic roots but is non-denominational. He has done lots of things for them over this time, from ferrying items around to painting offices. More recently he received counselling training and was made manager of two of their offices. This work totally engaged him and he gave long hours in unpaid voluntary work.

The charity, however, is in the process of modernising and redefining its image. This has included upping the professional training of its volunteers to help them meet the challenges of the changing times. As part of this Roberto has been told that he can no longer wear his crucifix and rosary etc, unless he hide it, because it is considered “not professional” and there had been complaints. Interestingly these “complaints” hadn’t been from any of the “clients” he had dealt with, with whom he has always enjoyed excellent rapport but from a couple of fellow volunteers, and the higher management who are trying to reposition the charity’s image. Although Roberto has loved his work and is aware of the good he has been able to do, he has refused to hide or remove his cross. “It would be like denying Christ,” he says, “after all he has done for me”. So he has chosen to step down from working for the charity rather than compromise this expression of his religious beliefs.

Christian ethos seen as not professional by the secular world

The irony of it all is that most of the volunteers of this charity are Christians, mainly Catholics even, as the very nature of the charity attracts those of a religious background. Yet it seems there is a fear to acknowledge a Christian ethos overtly in any way for fear of not being considered “professional” by the secular world, as if secularism is a neutral stance rather than being a form of religious belief in itself. Taking a stance on things like this might seem petty in the face of the greater work of the charity, but religious persecution begins in these small ways. If we don’t stand up for our beliefs we may find that the freedoms we have taken for granted have gone.

As Pastor Martin Niemuller, famously wrote at the time of the Nazis “When they came for the Jews, I was not a Jew so I did not protest. When they came for the communists I was not a communist, so I did not protest. When they came for the Catholics, I was not a Catholic so I did not protest. When they came for the trade unionists, I was not a trade unionist, so I did not protest. Then when they came for me, there was no one left to protest.”

We are in a spiritual battle

It seems to me that we are living in very important times for the Christian faith in the UK. We are in a spiritual battle for the soul of the nation, which we must wage through prayer and witness and good works. There have already been gains for secularism which have resulted in the closing or re-branding of Catholic adoption agencies to make them fit in with secular guidelines, laws passed enabling the use of embryos for stem cell research and more recently murmurings from the Catholic Education Council that laws are in train which, if passed, would interfere and undermine Catholic teaching in Catholic schools.

Obviously Christian witness is about more than wearing Christian symbols in public. It is about the way we live our lives, and loving and serving those around us. But if we feel we are not free to express our Christian beliefs in this way, either through external constraints or inner fears maybe we need to reflect on what God is saying to us through this. Within us all is a desire to conform and to be socially acceptable. Where do we draw the line? What do we compromise? As the culture in Britain moves more and more away from Christianity and Christian values, we need to watch ourselves that we don’t fit in too well. If we are not being persecuted and looked down on, we need to ask ourselves why.

Kristina Cooper is the Goodnews Editor