These two erudite commentators on the events playing out in Britain must be thanked for having hit two of three nails on the head. There is however a further nail: ‘What is hope?’ Hope is a persevering optimism about what might happen. Its beneficial consequences are that it drives, sustains, fortifies and unites. All countries today need these attributes. Britain needs them as much as anyone else.
Those blessed with religious or other faith are very fortunate. Their belief is a powerful purpose for life. Their goals are clear, their values socially workable as long as they accept the possibility that their faith, however convincingly held, may be wrong. Great beliefs demand true humility. Absence of belief demands the deeper humility every seeker must have. Some of the world’s most wretched problems stem from treating faith as knowledge. Such ‘beliefs’ are used to justify hatred and conflict in order to impose their values.
I see hope as an alternative to faith, neither a denial nor a support of it.
People who hope know the importance of giving, the humbleness of receiving and the generosity of loving. Any soul who has understood those lessons is a saved soul – a soul which, if there is immortality, will enjoy it. The rewards of giving, receiving and loving are in any case the acts themselves not any reciprocity they elicit. Good souls have not always been good people. Good souls have been those who stood where they stood, made the best of what they had for others and retained a hope that was generous for someone else as well.
So why do I link hope to both politics and personal aspiration?
We have come to treat politics as some sort of disease, something to keep away from as long as possible. But politics is how we live with other people in every context. For most of us to be fulfilled we need community, engagement and assembly. Governance is the framework of combining skills rewards with credible shares. The divisions in governance politics are the result of different, sometimes simply selfish, values of ‘rewards’ and ‘credible’. Community can survive minor, local self-interests. It cannot flourish with massively powerful and ruthless selfishness.
The hope is that those who reach such control exhibit, first, control of themselves.
Woe betide those who fail to do that.
Good morning
John Bittleston
Your views would help to enlarge and clarify this didactic. I look forward to them at [email protected]. Thank you in advance.
23 June 2026
