Young people and religion

This is, no doubt, in part to profile his own foundation dedicated to this purpose. Some have found this passion and commitment rather strange — even if Blair converted to Catholicism after leaving Downing Street — given that while in office (for 10 years) he seemed to maintain, implicitly, that religion has no place in politics.

Of course religion has a place in politics. We only have to look around the world — Ireland, the former Yugoslavia, the Middle East, Kashmir, Tibet — to find religion shaping the nature of political affiliation and, sadly, often human conflict. Blair's position is that young people in particular need to discover what is shared between the great religions of the world so that they see that this outweighs what divides them.

So often, however, the discussion is about the big institutions of religion: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism and Hinduism. Yet many young people would claim that they do not belong to any religion. When pressed, however, many of those would concede that they believe in something. They have some sort of faith. We need to think about how we promote discussion about that: how the faith and belief they hold helps or hinders their willingness and capacity to get along with others who have different views.

My own youth centre welcomed all-comers but it was attached to a church. The vicar chaired the centre's committee. He knew I was not a churchgoer. When a visiting bishop asked me where I worshipped, the vicar stepped in swiftly with the observation: "Howard may not have found God yet, but his heart's in the right place". Finding out where young people's hearts lie has to be our starting point in relation to the beliefs they hold.

Howard Williamson is professor of European youth policy at the University of Glamorgan