The recent mixture of worship songs with anti-immigrant rhetoric at a pro-Tommy Robinson rally suggests a worrying alliance is developing between far-right politics and some faith leaders. Christians must be careful not to lend legitimacy to divisive and dangerous ideologies, says Evan L John
Before singing ‘This Train is Bound for Glory’ at the ‘Unite the Kingdom’ rally, Pastor Rikki Doolan thanked God for the life of a man who, at that moment, was in a police cell.
The rally in question was not a church service nor an evangelistic event. It was a political protest in central London in support of the notorious founder of the English Defence League, Tommy Robinson.
When I first heard of a preacher with links to Britain’s most prominent far-right figure, I imagined a skinhead with swastika tattoos ranting angrily to a small congregation of neo-Nazis.
Pastor Rikki Doolan, however, is more conventional than you might think. Not only is this self-described ‘rocker’ employed by a real church with around 1,000 attendees, he’s a Christian music artist whose worship songs have achieved some modest success online. And he has a compelling testimony of how God rescued him from homelessness and drug addiction.
But Pastor Rikki is unusual. I can’t think of another worship leader who has been caught on camera offering to arrange for gold bought with the proceeds of crime to be illegally smuggled out of Zimbabwe, for example.
That story was uncovered in a sting operation run by Al-Jazeera. Incredibly, Doolan told the undercover reporter that he, and Prophet Uebert Angel (leader of Spirit Embassy church in London) could help them launder their dirty money via Dubai, describing it as a “good washing machine”.
When challenged by Byline Times, Pastor Rikki responded by stating, “[Angel] has never sold gold and the documentary has no video of him doing it and to my knowledge knows nothing about gold and I don’t run a gold business and never have – it’s a false narrative and fake news from Al Jazeera.”
Not long after Doolan’s band performed ‘One Touch from the King’ at Unite the Kingdom, the crowd were shown a Tommy Robinson documentary claiming that Britain was plagued by “rape gangs of primarily Pakistani Muslims.”
This wasn’t an isolated incident. Doolan actively promotes Robinson’s far right ideas online. On X, he recently promoted Robinson’s book about ‘the Great Replacement’ - a conspiracy theory claiming that white people are being deliberately replaced through immigration.
On the far right ‘Voice of Wales’ podcast, which has been banned from YouTube, Doolan questions whether mosques really were attacked during the riots. When one of the hosts claims that the mosques targeted were “ammunition caches”, he leaves the lie unchallenged.
Doolan sees these anti-Muslim ideas through the prism of his faith, claiming on the same podcast that “the Islamic world” and “the devil-worshippers up at the top in the globalist bodies” have taken advantage of Britain’s “lack of Christianity”.
Naturally, he rejects the claim he is far right. And his PR officer told Premier Christianity, Doolan is “certainly not a racist - most of [his] gospel group are black”.
Doolan is hardly the only Christian minister allying himself with the far right. Tommy Robinson’s protests are increasingly taking on a religious character. Alongside the Lord’s Prayer, the lineup at the last rally in July featured a speech from Bishop Cerion Dewar. Quoting the Bible and wearing an ornate crucifix, the Pentecostal preacher told the crowd: “This nation of ours is under attack. We are at war. We are not at war with just the Muslim. We are not at war with just woke ideology. We are not at war with just cancel culture. But we are at war with 412 idiots that sit on those benches just down the road [parliament]. They have forgotten one thing. That they govern by consent. And if they refuse to do what the people who have elected them have sent them to do, then we the people must withdraw that consent immediately.”
Pointing at Robinson, he said, “This country owes this man a debt we cannot imagine.” (You can watch the full speech here).
At points, the rally seemed more like an evangelistic event than a political protest. As it drew to a close, an Anglo-Catholic priest invited participants to take away a free copy of Gospel of John from stewards beside the stage.
After the benediction, it all became even weirder. Pastor Doolan took again to the stage, telling the crowd that Britain is built on the “foundation [of] Jesus Christ”, before going onto lead the crowd in both ‘I Vow to Thee My Country’ and chants of “Tommy, Tommy Robinson”.
In the eyes of a minority in our churches, the involvement of men such as Pastor Rikki Doolan and Bishop Ceirion Dewar in rallies like this might make Tommy Robinson and his hateful ideas seem more respectful, even more Christian. And that should worry all of us.
