LAST Monday in Oran Mor, the entertainment venue that has come to define Glasgow’s West End almost as much as herbal infusions, I watched as the Free Church of Scotland endured another routine kicking. Around 150 of the city’s retired ponytail and red corduroy brigade snorted and brayed as a musical play called Wee Free unfolded on stage in what had once been the basement of Kelvinside Parish Church.

The play was the latest in Oran Mor’s enchanting A Play, A Pie and a Pint lunchtime drama series, which has been one of the most exhilarating recent developments in Scottish live theatre. It was the first time I’d attended in several years. Sadly, it was not a happy return. Wee Free was a grotesque and distorted view of the Free Church of Scotland (the Wee Frees), a community of Christian believers who have become the favourite subject of scorn for Scotland’s self-styled liberal elite.

The drama was entirely devoid of subtlety or irony and long before the end of a leaden and cliché-laden hour you hoped that something, anything, approaching an original thought might emerge. It had no merit at all, though the four accomplished actors gave of their best in a squalid little production. The Free Church was depicted lazily as a medieval inquisition complete with a joyless minister and his brow-beaten wife, whose femininity had been thrashed out of her by a judgmental and domineering male church. And just in case anyone was in any doubt about the intention of the writers (I use the term under protest), the Christ-child was described as “the bastard baby Jesus”. Yet, you can hardly blame the pair who penned this drama. They were, after all, merely reflecting what has come to be accepted as the default position on the Free Church of Scotland by those who consider themselves to be liberal, free-thinkers. These people, though, are about as liberal as a firing squad. In their dictatorship of ideas only a state-approved Christianity can be permitted in public life; one that has been shorn of anything that they deem to be out of kilter with smart, enlightened and diverse Scotland.

Tim Farron was the latest high-profile casualty to fall victim to Britain’s thought-police. It wasn’t enough that this clever and smart politician had been forced to recant some of his Christian beliefs; he also had to account for thinking them in the first place. He was challenged on his attitude to gay sex and abortion and found guilty of not falling into line quickly enough. His resignation from the leadership of the party he loves was a personal tragedy for him and a dark day for those of us who believe in a true liberal society where all manner of ideas, creeds and philosophies can co-exist peacefully in a sophisticated marketplace.

Farron was accused of harbouring bigoted homophobic sentiments because he had previously stated that gay sex was "sinful" and he didn’t agree with same-sex marriage in accordance with his Christian beliefs. He has since been assailed by an ignorant posse of so-called enlightened commentators who have effectively accused him of being a hate preacher. Very few of them have the faintest idea of what they are talking about.

The Catholic Church and many adherents of Evangelical and Pentecostal churches sincerely believe that artificial contraception, sexual activity outside of marriage and abortion are sinful. The Church believes that gay sex is sinful for the same reasons that it thinks artificial contraception is sinful: that it is not open to bringing forth human life. You can criticise such teachings as fanciful or unrealistic or superstitious twaddle (and in an enlightened, liberal society I would defend your right to do so) but they are not homophobic. To claim that they are merely detracts from the seriousness of real homophobia, where discrimination and hate can lead to violence and injustice.

Alongside this, if you dare to try to uphold the right to life of unborn children (the most vulnerable scraps of humanity) you are immediately howled down as misogynist bigot. You are simply not even allowed to think such a thought or to attempt to debate it.

Many Christians encounter lifelong challenges in reconciling their personal lives with the tenets of their faith regarding sexual morality and relationship choices. I suppose we entertain a hope that on the last day our deeds and actions in other sectors of our existences might be taken into consideration and that we will scrape into the presence of the Almighty on the celestial away-goals rule. We do not seek to impose our Christian beliefs on anyone else and ask merely that we be left to struggle with them in peace.

Tim Farron, as I do, believed in the separation of church and state, for the church is an unlovely thing when it is allowed to wield political power. That though does not exclude a Christian’s right to be heard in the secular marketplace, especially if it’s simply to appeal for the space to worship as they see fit.

In the wake of Farron’s forced resignation, what are we saying to Christians who stand for public office? Are we really demanding that all men and women of religious faith be cross-examined on their beliefs and be forced to ditch those which a Sanhedrin of the liberal elite do not deem to be sufficiently harmless? This is what happens in communist China. There, Christians are only allowed to worship in peace if they first renounce any edgy beliefs and accept the state-approved model. In the Middle East Christians are being slaughtered in their thousands for refusing to renounce their faith. Yet, in 21st-century, enlightened and progressive Britain Tim Farron had his political career terminated because he wanted to remain true to his faith.

Last week the Scottish Government, following two years of consultation on the future of a Catholic primary school in Milngavie, finally gave it the thumbs down. You can hold a valid political position on either side of this issue, yet two nights ago on social media the usual suspects came howling in the night celebrating the fact that a CATHOLIC school was facing closure. In their vision of a mature, diverse and enlightened Scotland, we are all equal but somehow Christians and their troublesome beliefs are far less equal than others.