I have sought to analyse Scotland’s ‘condition’, particularly in a social, economic and political context. In this regard I have published material which may interest you and your colleagues. This includes the book ‘Doun-Hauden: The Socio-Political Determinants of Scottish Independence’ published in 2020 which is available from Amazon, or I can send you a copy if you wish; the Scots term ‘doun-hauden’ means ‘oppressed’, reflecting findings from the research that the Scots are a colonised and exploited people, hence the urgent quest and need for independence. A summary of the book’s findings, and the theoretical framework developed, has been published as a paper in an academic journal and can be downloaded here:

https://cpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/wp.towson.edu/dist/b/55/files/2022/05/The-Socio-Political-Determinants-of-Scottish-Independence.pdf

The existence of an ‘independence movement’ in Scotland reflects this colonial condition, the basis of which is the solidarity of the oppressed group (i.e. the Scots), and the realisation that independence means ‘decolonisation’, according to the United Nations, and postcolonial theory. More recently there is the creation of a political alliance of pro-independence parties under the umbrella ‘Liberate Scotland’ (https://liberatescot.scot/) in answer to the failings of the dominant national party which has been “taken under colonialism’s wing”, as Frantz Fanon put it.

I myself am Convener of a non-political organisation which now has close to 20,000 members known as ‘Liberation Scotland’. Our purpose includes petitioning the United Nations to ensure that Scotland’s right to self-determination is respected (which it is not at present) and ultimately that Scotland, once independent, becomes a sovereign UN Member State. During 2025 Liberation Scotland held meetings at the United Nations in both Geneva and New York, and papers from the Geneva seminar may be accessed here:

https://www.jpti.ch/post/scotland-s-right-to-self-determination-under-international-law

Now, if I may, I would like to make linkages between Scotland’s ‘condition’ and the role of the National Church.

Some 35 years ago the Rev William Storrar in his book ‘Scottish Identity: A Christian Vision’, lamented the lack of vision in our nation, and noted the urgent need “to seek a worthier vision of Scotland… without which we perish as a nation”. Storrar asked, “whose vision of humanity will shape our national life and our sense of national identity”. He reminded us in this regard that “society is paramount”, in contrast to the alternative ‘vision’ of Mrs Thatcher and successive UK Government policies imposed on Scotland, including now via Holyrood. Postcolonial theory also tells us that a colonised people and nation are in the process of perishing, hence the urgency of liberation.

Rev Storrar’s view was that it seemed questionable that there can be “a constitutional recognition of a national church without such (constitutional) recognition of the nation itself”. Here he further pointed to Kurt Wittig’s perspective that a moral vision for the nation is based on the religious basis of “freedom and right” and which, in turn, brings us in Storrar’s words, directly to “Scotland’s struggle for independence from England”. But, where is the Church today on this most critical of national matters? It remains silent, perhaps mistakenly thinking liberation to be a political, not a moral matter?

We have moved a long way since the Church owned about half the national revenue. In those days, albeit a few centuries past, there would be little uncertainty between Church and nation, each undeniably interlinked, or rather “enmeshed in the structures of power and wealth” as Storrar put it. The question then is, has national image and identity, and the importance of the nation, become increasingly unacceptable or even irrelevant to Scottish Christian leaders?

Scotland has had more than its fair share of rogue elites masquerading as leaders of the people, in 1707 and now. And today we are also faced with the uncertain and changing relationship between Kirk and nation in a more secular world. What meaning, therefore, has national consciousness and national identity to our national Church?

One would think this should be an imperative, even a national imperative. National consciousness, I have found from the study of postcolonial theory, to be a critical aspect in the people of Scotland’s ongoing and lengthy quest for liberation, much as it is for all peoples struggle for independence against oppressive rule. Yet where is the Kirk on this, the most important of matters facing Scotland, i.e. its very existence as a people and nation, and the need to undo a great wrong, an injustice, a cultural and political deceit that aye hauds doun the fowk?

As long ago as 1943, in a closing address as Moderator to the General Assembly, The Baillie Commission concluded that: “To a large proportion of the men and women of Scotland the Church of Christ means nothing and plays no part in their life or thought”. That decline has continued but where is the Kirk on the most important matter facing the people? Does their liberation from oppression and that of the nation itself not matter to our national Church leaders?

Surely the Church has to help fix aright “the true condition of Scotland”, as Storrar put it. But the quandary remains for many, what is “the true condition of Scotland”? Let me say to you here and now that Scotland’s condition is most definitely a colonial one and that the understanding of the Church on this matter, as with most of Scotland’s ‘colonial’ institutions, remains rudimentary! This is therefore ‘your’ dilemma to fix, the national Church must act, must lead, and clearly must learn about what oppression of the people means in the colonial context.

The people, especially the mass of Scots forced to live in or close to poverty in what is a wealthy (but plundered) economy, far better appreciate their condition than the professional middle classes, who often, as Frantz Fanon noted, “become part of the racket” in colonial societies, the “most pampered group”. Yes, the people have mostly left the Church. Or perhaps the correct way to put it is that the Church has left the people? The Church ignores the most pressing and urgent matter – that of freeing the people. Why should the people put their faith in a Church that has only a ‘rudimentary’ understanding of their oppression and refuses to look at the reality of their ‘condition’?

I would therefore argue that the national Church no longer fights the peoples’ cause, which is to remove oppression, to end inequality, and to ensure the peoples’ rights are upheld, which are moral imperatives. If we do not appreciate or understand the ‘colonial condition’ of Scots and Scotland, which is “a scourge”, or what independence really means (i.e. decolonisation), then we will surely be unable to find the only remedy – liberation.

I shall end with a verse from MacDiarmid’s poem ‘A Drunk Man looks at the Thistle’:

As Kirks wi’ Christianity ha’e dune

Burns Clubs wi’ Burns – wi’ a’thing it’s the same

The core o’ocht is only for the few

Scorned by the mony, thrang wi’its empty name

Yours in Faith and Hope

(Professor) Alfred J. Baird

Convener, Liberation Scotland