The Church of England is to consider banning clergy from joining the British National party amid fears the far-right party is promoting its image as Christian.Next month's General Synod, the church's national assembly, will debate a motion calling on Anglican bishops to formulate a similar policy to that of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) on the BNP.
The Acpo policy states that no member of the police service may be a member of an organisation whose constitution, aims, objectives or pronouncements contradict the "general duty" to promote race equality. This specifically includes the BNP, the policy states.
General Synod member Vasantha Gnanadoss, who works for the Metropolitan police service, will call for a similar ban to apply to all clergy, ordinands and employed lay persons who speak on behalf of the Church of England.
In a background paper to her private members motion, Gnanadoss said such action would make it "much more difficult" for the BNP or other similar organisations to exploit the claim that there are Anglican clergy or church representatives who support them.
"Of specific relevance to this motion are some of the tactics adopted by the BNP, which in recent years has sought to identify itself as Christian and sometimes specifically with the Church of England, in order to further its agenda," she said.
The motion comes after a list of 12,000 names and addresses of BNP membership was posted on the internet in November.
Five "Reverends" were identified on the list, but the Church of England said none were licensed or serving Anglican clergy although one was a retired priest.
The call from Gnanadoss, who is from the south London diocese of Southwark, comes after several denunciations of the BNP by senior church figures.
The Archbishop of York, the Right Rev John Sentamu, took out an advertisement in the local newspaper in 2007 urging voters in the local elections to come out against the BNP and warning that they risked sleepwalking into a "wall of hate".
The General Synod has backed a motion brought by the Rev Simon Bessant condemning voting for or supporting a political party that offers racist policies as "incompatible" with Christian discipleship.
William Fittall, the secretary general of the General Synod, said it was church policy that people should not enter ordained ministry if they held racist views.
But he said if the church were to vote for an identical policy to that of Acpo this would mean amending the recently passed clergy discipline measure.
Fittall said: "The Synod has discussed organisations that promote views that are highly contentious on racial issues and Synod has expressed very clear principles … but this motion raises slightly different questions.
"It is whether the church should have formal policies that make it impossible for a member of the clergy or indeed a member of the lay staff to be a member of these parties.
"That is of course, a trickier question, not least because not long ago the Synod passed the clergy discipline measure which specifically said you could not discipline a member of the clergy for political views or membership of a political party."
A spokesman for the BNP denied it was racist or had racist policies. He said: "I am aware of this, we were told by a member of the General Synod. There are members of the General Synod who are sympathetic towards us and we were made aware of this a long time ago.
"This is a disgraceful way to politicise the church. The church has got far more important things we feel to worry about regarding the collapse of morality and the collapse of attendance at Church and the advance of Islam rather than a vindictive campaign against a perfectly legitimate political party."
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(Source: GUK)