Aye, and (wrongly) conchies were convicted of breaking the law.

Conscience and morals are perhaps built into us, in the same way that pack animals look out for each other. Religion however is a man made abstract designed for plenty of reasons, but trying to explain what you don't yet understand and having power over others are two of the main reasons we have to put up with religion.

It is not a matter of being smug, (temper temper little pillock) more a matter of differentiating between conscience and religion. As I see it, one is weighing up the circumstances and coming to your own conclusion whereas the other is having somebody make your decision for you. Whatever floats your boat, but the law seems to have come down on the case for the former, not the latter. And that makes me just a little bit happier.

However, whilst it makes me happy, it doesn't make me smile more than is strictly necessary, and doesn't make me knock on peoples' doors asking if they would like to be told what to do.

God is not conscience. God may be what some people use as a proxy for conscience, but I can't help it if they are either tooo shallow or too thick to use their own judgement. Some people can't you know, and that is why the situation with priests buggering children is so tragic. Many people look up to religious leaders for their moral compass and prod towards conscience. Look where it gets them... No wonder the law is increasingly seeing religion as irrelevant.

After all, what is the difference between wanting a court to respect Christian values and people wanting sharia law to be used? Answer - none. If Christians want to be tried using the bible as a guide and Muslims want sharia law to apply to them, we would have a multi tier system for justice and that doesn't seem satisfactory on any level.

Therefore secular law is not anti religion, more recognising the irrelevance of it, and especially to the millions of rational people who don't have any belief whatsoever.