Ordinary Eve
One woman one vote
Did you know that if you are not registered to vote by 11th March and an election is called for May 5th you will not be eligible to vote?
I am not telling you must vote you notice. I'm just telling you that if you aren't registered you won't be able to vote.
Why would you care though? Society seems to ignore the wishes of Christians - you only have to look at recent incidents in the media to know that even if thousands of people write to complain about a broadcast it will go ahead regardless. You might feel expressing your opinion in a vote is equally pointless.
Alternatively you might feel that there is no party that deserves your vote. None of them seem particularly Christian in outlook and then they start getting on the band wagon misappropriating our beliefs and using them to gain power.
To make matters worse n many ways the whole political process is alien to the Christian life. We are taught to be humble, to shun power unless given by God, we do not tow party political lines but often find ourselves in the middle ground, holding together views that seem to be politically opposed. For instance a Christian may believe firmly in the right to life of an unborn child (classified in the political world as Right Wing) and also work passionately for the rights of workers (classically a Left Wing view).
It makes voting difficult when there isn't anyone who completely represents your views.But perhaps there are a few facts th at can put registering to vote into perspective.
Being able to vote is not a right - it's a privellege. We take the society we live in for granted - its freedoms and its failures.One our freedoms is being able to vote and strangely it is a freedom that safeguards many of our other rights.
There is a good example of how important our vote can be going through the Commons and the Lords right now. Blair's government is pushing through reforms to our laws that will enable us to keep terror suspects under house arrest without evidence. This goes against everything that our legal system has been based on for 800 years. This is the cabinet, the inner circle of the party in power that we voted in, deciding on the law of the land and not allowing legal process to decide. At election time you have the power to keep a prime minster and ruling party in power or to vote them out. If you marched on Whitehall however to protest your disapproval (if you do disapprove of course!) then what do you think would happen? That's right - nothing.
It is the one time when you can actually change the course of events in a country's history and you shouldn't take it lightly. But you can only do it if you are registered.
You may still feel reluctant to vote but even not voting is an option. It sends a statement of no confidence in the whole apparatus of governance. Everyone is complaining about voter turn out, how terrible it is and wondering how it can be changed. What they don't seem to realise is that people aren't voting because they have no faith in the system. If they felt the government cared about our views beyond the next opinion poll I bet people would vote more. It's the system that needs to change not the people. The more people who actively register and then refuse to vote the more likely this message is to be highlighted.
No one can tell you how to vote - they can only present their arguments and hope that you choose them. But to be able to make that choice you have to register.
God has allowed us freedom of choice and a brain. It would be irresponsible to throw that freedom away when it could concern something as important as the freedom of an individual to leave their own house, a child's right to live or even a country to go to war.
