BRITAIN's general election campaign is fast assuming the appearance of a religious crusade.
The Catholic bishops have been, at their work this week, causing much angst among recent converts like the Home Office minister, Ann Widdecombe, by publishing a detailed policy statement widely regarded as a sympathetic nod in favour of "New Labour".
It was, in fact, the late John Smith who opened the way for the apparent ascendancy of Tony Blair's Christian Socialists. Following a speech by him in 1993 it is reported the ranks of the Christian Socialist Movement began swelling, from 1,200 to the present 5,000.
After the relative agnosticism of the 1980s, under Michael Foot and Neil Kinnock, the religious revival, and the ready linkage between Christian belief and democratic socialism, have been pronounced under Mr Blair. Long before he became leader, Mr Blair wrote of Christianity as "a powerful compass" for the direction Britain should take.
Tories have been inclined to mock Mr Blair's perceived piety. And their reticence has been understandable. Memories of the ridicule which greeted their own "Back to Basics" campaign are still painful.
Moreover, the Conservative approach has been to some extent influenced by the knowledge that the British people are suspicious of, and uneasy about, great moral crusades.
Even so, Mr Blair appears to have struck a chord. For, after years of suitable silence on the subject, Mr Major has finally spoken of his own "simple faith" letting it be known that he, too, prays in all circumstances. And challenging the assumptions of the new left, the Prime Minister said Conservatism was rooted in Christian faith and practice.
One survey on London's streets this week found voters divided, with some suspecting God favoured Labour, and others insistent the politicians should steer clear of religion.
Meanwhile the scramble for the moral, if not theological, high ground continued, with all three main parties competing to show themselves closest to the agenda for moral renewal set out by the widow of Philip Lawrence, the murdered head teacher.
Mrs Lawrence's "manifesto" called for a nationwide movement to banish violence and encourage civic values; a ban on the sale of combat knives and closure of shops that stock them; primary school lessons in citizenship; higher status for police and teachers; emphasis on the teaching of the three Es, effort, earnestness and excellence; and an end to government "neutrality" towards the family.
In terms of the aspirational, and even some of the practical, there is no doubt Mrs Lawrence like the Dunblane campaigners, is pushing at an open door.
Ministers were left struggling to combat problems framing and defining Labour's Jack Straw insisted issue of parenting must be "brought out of the privacy people's homes into the public arena". And the Education Secretary, Gillian Shepherd, announced an initiative to put moral development on the school curriculum.
The convergence of the main parties means that some measures to curb the nuisance of noisy neighbours and curtail the activities of under-age drinkers, are common ground. The party conference season showed Labour and Conservative in competition to devise the most effective form of "curfew" to deal with young trouble-makers and offenders. But this week's Crime Bill will show that many areas, as on sentencing policy, remain the matter of deep dispute.
And if the debate is to continue until polling day, one of the most bitter will rage around the question of "the family". For the politicians appear to be raising expectations and fears in equal measure.
One commentator this week said Mrs Lawrence was wrong to suggest government policy was "neutral" toward traditional families: it positively discriminated against them, and any step to genuine neutrality would actually be a moral step forward.
Tearing into Mr Blair's contradictions, she said he could not encourage family life" without discouraging other things: precisely the kind of sentiment worrying leader-writers at the London Independent.
Raising a slightly heretical banner (at least in the present climate) the paper said uniting all those who already believed their children should be inculcated with a sense of social responsibility would have no impact on teenagers like Learco Chindamo, who stabbed Mr Lawrence.
Likewise a campaign to remoralise society would be pointless if it failed to include those already alienated from mainstream society. More troubling still: "When this growing moral majority realises that its handwringing is ineffective, it is likely to become increasingly intolerant of the people it failed to help and failed to reach."
In his grand speech at last month's conference. Mr Blair promised to lead the country into a new Age of Achievement. But as the politicians vie to make the high moral ground their own, many have the uneasy feeling it is a new age of intolerance that beckons.