E Pluribus Unum

The smugness, outdatedness and general futility of New New Labour's contortions over Britishness serve to make the problem an ideal one for debate by the Christian church - that thriving moral centre of British society which has responded to our present ethical morass by having an argument with itself about what consenting adults do in private. Dr Ian Bradley, a Church of Scotland minister and academic, has proposed a mediaeval bishop, St Aidan, as a "spiritual figurehead to unite the domains of St George of England, St Andrew of Scotland, St David of Wales and St Patrick of Ireland". The twenty-six counties which constitute the less important part of Ireland are apparently to be considered British as a gesture of Christian inclusiveness.

Aidan was an Irishman who died only slightly more than a thousand years before the Act of Union called the United Kingdom arbitrarily into being. This is certainly promising. Among his other qualifications, he "makes a good patron saint of Britain because of his character. He was particularly humble and believed in talking directly to people". According to his supporters, he succeeded "in marrying three emerging national identities (Ireland, Scotland and England) into what would become the sense of inclusiveness and diverse belief that define a key strand of Britishness". He seems to have achieved this largely thanks to a special relationship with Oswald of Northumbria, one of the most powerful kings in the country, who doubtless gained that position by loving his enemies and turning the other cheek. Also, Aidan was not a native speaker of the English language: a trait he shares with many contemporary Britons, particularly those who are not immigrants.

To his credit, Dr Bradley underlines the fatuity of the enterprise by observing that "a medieval saint cannot represent the full diversity of modern Britain. Our spiritual identity consists of many overlapping strands that goes beyond white Christianity into the black and Asian communities"; even though St George came from Anatolia, perhaps Gandhi or Martin Luther King might make still more satisfactory receptacles for those who hunger and thirst for British values. On the other hand, "it would be a more accurate reflection of English history to have one for the north, say St Cuthbert of Lindisfarne, and one for the south, such as St Augustine of Canterbury". Then again, perhaps what the south needs is a patron saint each for Kent, Mercia, Wessex, East Anglia, Cornwall, Somerset, Dorset and the Isle of Wight.