Many years ago, someone told me a sociology story. A
researcher approaches three workers and asks what they are doing. The first is
a Tory and answers "a fair day’s work for a fair day's pay". The second is a Socialist
and answers "I'm having my labour exploited for profit by the capitalists". The
third is a Christian and answers "I'm building a cathedral".
I can't remember who told me this, but I woke up this
morning thinking about how it reminds me of a famous witticism of Holy Roman Emperor,
Charles V, often quoted as "I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to
men and German to my horse". He almost certainly never said it in that form. If
he did say something like it, then the order would have been to emphasize Spanish,
which he called the divine language: "... and Spanish to God". The translated
order says more about the teller than it does about Charles, betraying an
anti-Germanic prejudice by implying that only German is gruff and aggressive
enough to discipline a horse.
And so it is with the sociology story. We could equally well
put the Socialist last, to imply that the twin evils of religion and capitalism
both brainwash people into inane satisfaction with their lot. Or end with the Tory,
to suggest that the Socialist and the Christian are failing to see the wider
picture of everyone having an equally valid place within the fabric of society.
[Full disclosure: I was paid by the Conservative Party to put that bit in.]
Far from illustrating the nobility of a church stonemason,
the tale exposes the partiality of a storyteller hoodwinked by the received
traditions of a nominally Christian society.