The latest edition of Evangelicals Now contains a story with the following headline: Christians launch legal challenge on VAT for private schools. You can read the full post here (paywall). Particularly worthy of note is the claim within the article that the moves are ‘unjust and discriminatory’ for Christians.

I don’t quite know why Christians would seek to do this. I appreciate that different people will have a range of views on the extent to which the state should be permitted to dictate to parents how to raise and educate their children. But almost nobody believes the state cannot and should not stop parents from, for example, abusing their children (even in the name of religion). Almost nobody thinks the state should not stop parents sexually abusing their children in the name of weird cultic practice or carrying out Female Genital Mutilation. And rightly so! Likewise, few think it would be acceptable for the government to dictate what political views might be uttered in one’s own home. All of which is to say, nobody believes in untrammelled freedom within the family home and nobody believes in total intervention either. It is not a question of principles, but of degrees.

Nevertheless, the bigger point here is that the specific line one might take on this is not explicitly Christian at any rate. No Christian Church worthy of its salt would argue such things are first, or even second, order matters that are intrinsic to Christianity. Indeed, Christians will exist across the spectrum in relation to these questions. As soon as you accept any right of the state to limit utter freedom in the home (e.g. if you think the state can legitimately limit abuse and neglect, even when done in the name of religion), all we are really talking about is specifically where to draw the line. A line the Bible doesn’t expressly lay down.

This means at least one thing so far as claiming discrimination regarding the Christian faith when it comes to VAT on schools. Specifically, given that the vast majority of Christians send their children to ordinary state schools, not Christian schools, and no Christian church insists it is biblically necessary to send your children to Christian schools (at least none I am aware of), it is difficult to argue that this is some sort of necessary article of faith. The vast majority of Christians in the country are numbered among the 94% of people who send their children to ordinary state schools. Perfectly happily, perfectly reasonably, with no concern that this in some way interferes with their Christian practice.

The article itself insists that the government is painting a false view of rich, wealthy parents. But we can’t escape the basic reality: if you can afford to pay school fees, you are wealthy. Even if you are making what feel like significant sacrifices to do so, it must be recognised that you are making choices that only those with a requisite amount of money are able to make at all! That necessarily makes you wealthy. One school, arguing against such a view, stated ‘we have a number of single parent families receiving Universal Credit’ not stopping to note the irony of receiving government financial intervention whilst bemoaning government financial intervention.

I can entirely understand people not wanting to pay more for the choices they wish to make. I don’t like it when inflation, or company profit margins, makes the stuff I want to buy more dear. I understand the general feeling. I also recognise – just as some price increases put certain things I might once have bought beyond my reach – so too will there be some who can no longer afford to go the school they would most prefer. I recognise and understand this; I have a little more time for those who simply say as much. However, what we absolutely ought not to be doing is suggesting this is some sort of discrimination. It flatly is not.

For one, the VAT rise is going on all private schools. That is, Christian schools, schools of other religious persuasions and schools that don’t camp out on faith grounds at all. The VAT rise is across the board. The only independent schools unaffected are those that serve exclusively SEND pupils (SEND pupils within other Independent Schools are also unaffected). There is nothing specifically anti-Christian or anti-religious about the move.

Second, it isn’t discriminatory because (as noted above) private Christian education is not an article of faith for any Christian church. Individuals may have their preferences. They may have their preferred schools. They may even have their particular view about how they believe government and family should interact in an ideal world. But none of these things are central articles of the faith nor even essental to the faith. Let’s put it this way: you don’t read of any Christian schools in the New Testament nor are there any specific instructions to educate our children at private Christian schools. It simply is not an article of faith or fundamental to Christian practice. The majority of Christians belong to the 94% of people who send their children to ordinary state schools and see no issue here.

Third, it isn’t discrimination because it isn’t stopping anybody from making the choice if they can afford it. It is certainly no more discriminatory than putting VAT on chocolate bars and alcohol. Someone might argue that they really like those things and it is part and parcel of their week. They might insist that it is limiting their freedom. But in the end, they are as free as they ever were. They just have to decide whether they can afford it and then whether the extra money is worth the benefit they get from it. Putting VAT on things is not discrimination. Things costing more money is not discrimination. All it does is bring a cost-benefit analysis into sharper focus.

But there are two particularly important reasons why this matters. First, it makes the gospel look foolish. It doesn’t take much probing to see that there is clearly no real discrimination going on. Christians standing up and crying foul on this simply make the gospel look foolish. They make Christians look foolish. Even if they think they’re right (and I definitely do not), I can’t imagine a clearer example of Paul’s exhortation in 1 Corinthians 6: ‘Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated?’ If they are adamant this is wrong (for the avoidance of any doubt, I don’t think there is anything wrong with it), I still can’t see how making this a major issue – a Christian issue and a gospel issue – isn’t doing exactly what Paul warns us against; namely, bringing the gospel into disrepute and making Christ look foolish.

Second, the even bigger issue here is that claiming we are being discriminated against, claiming this is some sort of Christian persecution in the face of all the evidence, not only makes the gospel look foolish but belittles and demeans the very real examples of discrimination and persecution that do go on across the world. If we want people to take us seriously when we highlight real issues of persecution around the world, even real issues that might amount to discrimination in the UK, how can we expect them to do so when we bleat about matters that are neither exclusively Christian nor actual matters of persecution? Not only does it make us look foolish, it belittles and undermines the very real persecution that is taking place against Christians across the world.

I hope that those bringing this case will see sense and desist. Apart from being unlikely to be successful, it will do more damage to the cause of the gospel. It is unlikely to achieve anything positive and would be best simply put to bed.