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Christian Concern - More Essential Than Ever

2012-01-04T16:17:00.002Z

Difficult Tan

2011-12-14T14:55:00.000Z

If you have a cafe/bar situated next door to a tanning centre naemd Easy Tan what do you call your business?

I’m Not Religious, I’m a Christian?

2011-12-07T14:47:00.001Z

There was a fascinating discussion this week on Andrew Marr's BBC Radio 4 broadcast Start the Week in which the always interesting if controversial Baroness Mary Warnock spoke about morality in a “post religious world.” If you want to listen to her contribution follow the link and it can be found at around the thirty minute mark. She said that we assume, in a culture so heavily influenced by Judeo-Christian thinking, that morality is the product of religion. Her central assertion was that, “Being morally good is desirable but doesn't necessarily come from religion. Otherwise children brought up without religion may be in danger of casting off morality.”

In certain circles she would be met with the response, “But I am not religious. I am a Christian!” this designed to provoke the question – what is the difference? The answer comes back, “Religion is man's feeble and ultimately futile attempt to reach up to God while Christianity is God's reaching down to man in Jesus.” It is a point well enough made, if a little trite. I have never felt entirely comfortable with it myself. The issue, I suggest, is more to do with the correct use of the word 'religion' in Christian circles, rather than that 'religion' is something other than Christianity.

Baroness Warnock suggests that religion is one of a number of social influences that make us moral creatures; others might be parents, teachers, public figures and role models, etc. True, it doesn't necessarily follow that the absence of religion leads to moral decline (although it does lead to moral relativism, which may be decline by another name). But I do have to question where the moral lights of the non-religious person come from. To wonder about the the general influence of religion in a secular society nevertheless built on religious foundations. In other words, does religion have a subliminal influence even though it is overtly rejected?

The Bible takes a different view of both morality and religion. Where Mary Warnock sees religion as one root of morality among many, the Bible sees religion as an outworking of morality. Where she might speak of the religious man's morality, the Bible would speak of the moral man's religion. In one a man might be influenced to moral good by religion, in the other his morality would find its clearest and best outworking in religion.

God Made Man A Moral Creature

If man's moral instinct precedes religion where does that instinct come from? The Bible tells us that man was created a moral creature. In Genesis man, made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26), is described as a moral agent. God commanded him, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die” (Genesis 2:16-17) Here we have the three elements of moral responsibility: an injunction to obey; an agency with which to choose and a penalty for disobedience. Man's moral instinct, whether he is religious or not, is ultimately inherent rather than instilled. Teaching and example can enhance or blunt it but does not create it.

His failure to choose obedience has made man ever after inclined to the grossest immorality, while simultaneously capable of the noblest acts of moral service and sacrifice. It is not that man is incapable of acts of kindness and service. Rather, it is that his inclination always is to go against his inherent sense of moral good. The image of God is broken in man yet not entirely, his morality is no longer intact yet remains. Paul describes people who, without knowledge of the law, nevertheless, “do by nature things required by the law...they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them” (Romans 2:14-15)

This is the confusion of fallen man. He knows right from wrong because he is a moral creature yet his own conscience so often condemns him because he is a fallen creature. Paul later describes perfectly the problem: “I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do – this I keep on doing” (Romans 7:18-19) Even in his best moments man is aware of his failing to be all his moral instinct tells him he should be. The prayer book speaks of those things we should have done but have failed to do, of those things we have done that should have been left undone. It speaks of our sinning in thought, word and deed. Paul sums it up, “There is no one righteous, not one” (Romans 3:10)

Fallen man is yet culpable for his choices before a just God and will stand before his Maker at the final day. “I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done which was recorded in the books” (Revelation 20:12) The gospel is the good news that Jesus has paid the price for our sins and that, by putting our trust in him, entering into a saving relationship with him we may be saved from our sins. That relationship is key to what describes the religious man in Scripture.

The Religion of a Godly Man

We tend to think of a godly man as pious, devout, church-going – deeply 'religious'. In Scripture 'godly' translates the Greek eusébeia which denotes, not a life of religious observances, but a true and living relationship with God. This is described in one of Peter's letters. “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness (eusébeia) through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness” (1 Peter 1:3) In the first instance 'godliness' does not describe the man that has chosen a 'religious' life so much as a man that has chosen a daily life lived out of a new and vital relationship with the living God.

Dr Spiros Zodhiates of AMG International said, “When eusébeia is applied to the Christian life, it denotes a life that is acceptable to Christ, indicating the proper attitude of the believer toward Christ who has saved him. It is both an attitude and a manner of life.” What form does this godly manner of life take in the Christian?

In his letter James writes:“If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight reign on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world” (James 1:26-27)

The word translated 'religion' here is thrēskeia. While eusébeia translates as godly and relates, in Christian terms, to our relationship with God in Christ, thrēskeia describes outward forms of worship. James makes clear that a Christian's outward acts of worship are to do with the conduct of his life rather than any overtly 'religious' observances or ceremonies. Indeed, the New Testament is almost entirely silent about gathered worship. There are fragments of hymns (1 Timothy 3:16), doxologies (Ephesians 3:20-21) but an indifference to forms of worship. Rather, the New Testament emphasises what John Piper calls whole of life worship.

The writer to the Hebrews urges, “Let us consider how to stir one another up in love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another ...” (Hebrews 10:24-25) In meeting together to encourage one another Christians follow certain forms which become traditions involving hymns of praise, liturgical worship, prayer, doxologies etc. These may vary widely in different cultures and times simply accomodating how a particular group expresses gospel truth in prayer and confession. But in any legitimate form it is the people of God, gathered around the Word of God, ready to do the will of God.

This reflects the description found in Acts: “They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers...And all who believed were together and had all things in common” (Acts 2:42,44) It fulfils the imperative to meet together (Hebrews 10:24-25), pray always (1 Thessalonians 5:17; James 5:16) and to be devoted “to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching” (1 Timothy 4:13) These of themselves neither make us godly nor religious. We know that “going to church” doesn't make you a Christian. Rather, these are one outward expression of a godliness (relationship with God) expressed in a whole of life worship (a life lived for God).

We are, then, made moral creatures, created in God's image, but our fallen nature has broken that image and ended the relationship with God we had in the beginning. We are still moral creatures but now our moral sense condemns us as sinners. Christ came to mend our relationship with God, making us godly, and it is in that relationship that we find the strength to change our mind and change our ways – repent. The outworking of that new life – born again in Christ – is what, to a Christian, is religion. In this way a Christian seeks to be evermore religious, being salt and light in a world of morally compromised people - sinners.

If Your Easily Offended…

2011-11-29T15:46:00.001Z

Last night my wife and I enjoyed the Swansea visit of the Seriously Funny Tour featuring the music of Nicki Rogers (You really must hear her new single I Bless the Day. No, I insist. No, really, you’ll kick yourself if you don’t, all your teeth will fall out and people will point and laugh) and the wit and wisdom of Adrian Plass and Jeff Lucas. It was mostly location humour and I doubt Christians have ever laughed so much in church – mostly at ourselves. There was blessing in abundance as we walked out with permission to take the gospel seriously while not take ourselves too seriously.

Some think humour doesn’t belong in church but I have a high doctrine of humour. Indeed, if humour is essential anywhere it is in church. Having worked for many years in ministry to the cults I have found humour one essential marker in the progress of the former cultist/new Christian in their journey out of the cult and into the church. It is when someone stops being precious or fearful about their cult past, can look back and chuckle at themselves and where they came from, that we begin to see real progress.

That said, there are pitfalls. It is the case that, especially among men, jokes can become very competitive. As each one-liner or shaggy dog story is told and the laughter rises to a pitch of hysteria (or so we like to think) things can get out of control. In the race to be the funniest someone tells an off-colour joke which gives permission to others to become more risqué. Soon the contest seems to override all sense of propriety until you are stopped short by the sudden realisation that you are laughing at the a dirty joke, or worse, telling one.

If we can see where the joke is going we might have the courage to object or, failing that, make excuses and go to the toilet or something but sometimes an inappropriate joke can be upon us before we know it. Years ago someone uttered a one-liner in our company at work and before I knew it I had heard a grubby little joke (a pretty lame one at that) that comes unbidden to my mind every time a particular Christian teaching is preached or discussed. Wild horses would not induce me to tell it and I deal with it by giving it to God and asking for his grace, but it does spoil things.

Perhaps like me you have learned the hard way to guard yourself against these things. People who maintain a standard whose value is so hard-earned can find themselves the object of mocking and derision, described as prudish and judgemental. A meaningless nod is sometimes given to our sensibilities as we are warned that what is imminent is not for people who are easily offended. I get angered by this misrepresentation of people with values as somehow milksop weak and old-womanly and want to say, “I am not easily offended. You are simply offensive!”

Comedy, it has been said, is the new rock and roll. Given the drive to shock, the rise in irreverence and sometimes downright insolence and cruelty in that field I can see the parallels. I find myself sometimes asking whether anything is sacred to people and that, I suppose, is my point. There are some things in life altogether too sacred to be mocked. Adrian Plass and Jeff Lucas demonstrated that nothing need be out of bounds for well- handled good humour but they also demonstrated that, while it is good to laugh, even then some things are simply sacred and even our humour should revere the sacred.

If nothing is sacred to us I suggest our lives are impoverished, even as they are colourless without a good sense of humour. Without a good sense of the ridiculous we risk becoming far too self-regarding and serious. Without a sense of the sacred our sense of humour becomes a vehicle for bitterness and snide cynicism. I thank God for the lessons and laughs of the Seriously Funny Tour and hope we can find more and more inventive ways to laugh at ourselves while holding the sacred in the highest place in our thinking and living.

Halloween – Counting all Things Loss

2011-10-29T19:15:00.001Z

Happy New Year!

These Islands (UK) are rich with history, moments and events of great significance. Among our many customs and traditions we have had, at different times, three New Years. The current New Year with which we are all familiar dates back to the days of the Roman Republic. January is named for Janus the Roman god of endings and transitions, of doorways and entrances. This was the time when two consuls were elected to lead the Republic for the year ahead. This is a metropolitan new year.

Another New Year, marked in England until the adoption of the modern calendar, is 25 March, which coincides roughly with the Vernal Equinox when day and night are of equal length. This is an agricultural new year. It marked the end of winter and it was a time when taxes were paid, contracts ended, were renewed, or first entered into.

If you have ever wondered why our tax year ends on April 5th it is because in 1752 the new, Gregorian calendar was introduced and the following Spring people woke up to find that March 25th had suddenly and mysteriously become April 5 because of an 11 day disparity between the old, Julian, and new, Gregorian calendar.

We might think history is dry and academic but we are influenced by it more than we can imagine. So often what we do today is dictated by what they did then.

Samhain

In the ancient world 1 November marked the Celtic New Year's Day which, when you think of it, has its own logic. Another agricultural new year, it too was related to the seasons. By this time the crops should be harvested and stored in barns and animals brought in from distant fields.

In Wales November 1st was Calan Gaeaf, Winter Season, and October 31st was known as Nos Calan Gaeaf, Winter Night, and sometimes Ysbrydnos , Spirit Night. It was also the Winter Eve Massacre, when prime stock was prepared to be wintered ready for the next season while other animals were slaughtered to supply the meat over the coming winter.

In the Celtic world this time was known as Samhain (pronounced sow-in). While the New Year was “born” on 1 November, the old year “died” on October 31^st – Halloween. This was seen as an appropriate time to honour the dead. The Celts believed it was a time when the barrier between our world and the spirit world was at its weakest, a time when evil spirits roamed the land. It was considered a time of the wandering dead, when the dead revisited their homes. The tradition of putting pumpkin candles in windows goes back to a time when folk would light candles to guide their departed loved ones home.

It was felt appropriate to placate supernatural powers abroad on this day, especially those controlling nature. Folk left offerings of food and drink for masked and costumed revellers representing evil spirits to keep the spirits out. Bonfires were lit and a combination of fire and noise were said to frighten away evil spirits. In England bonfires were moved to 5^th November after Guy Fawkes but retain their pagan roots.

Druids were concerned with making contact with the dead, who were seen as sources of guidance and inspiration, guardians of the root wisdom of the tribe. Others thought this a good time to seek the Devil's help concerning marriages, health and various enterprises.

The Devil was thought to be a master builder and anyone facing a building project, especially bridges, that seemed beyond the skill of man might enter into a contract with the devil in which he would build the structure in exchange for a soul. Stories abound of how he was usually cheated out of his reward. There are at least forty nine places in the UK called Devil’s Bridge.

People tended graves to honour the dead but avoided grave yards after dark, journeys had to end before dusk. Folk believed they would encounter ghosts if they left their homes on this night and so they wore masks and dressed up so that the ghosts would mistake them for fellow spirits. Trick-or-Treat originated in the fact that this was also Mischief Night when children would knock on doors demanding treats – a sort of early-medieval protection racket.

So am I saying that the children who will be knocking our doors at Halloween are in the service of the Devil? Are they in thrall to evil forces? Of course not. But I am suggesting that this is not simply the harmless fun they so obviously have as they dress up for the occasion..

The challenge and influence of Culture

Our culture and history have a profound influence on how we live our lives today of which we are often unaware. As Christians we are as much a product of our culture as of our faith and thoughtful Christians find themselves challenged about where we can compromise and where we cannot.

Consider Daniel who co-operated with Nebuchadnezzar the Babylonian king when he and his companions had their names changed and were given a Babylonian education but who stood firm and refused to eat meat from the king's table because it was forbidden in the Law.

We too compromise on some things and not on others. Any JW will tell you that Christmas and Easter are originally Pagan festivals on which the church has painted a Christian gloss but then our days of the week and months of the year are named after Pagan gods but we don't insist on giving them Christian names. To do so might make us not of the world but it would make being in the world impractical, impossible. Some things we compromise on.

spiritual forces of evil

The Bible tells us that we struggle against “the rulers, authorities and powers of this dark world and against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realm.” (Eph.6:12) We are told that Christ ascended far above these powers, conquering and ruling over them (Eph.4:8; Col.2:15) We might ask then whether we should be “celebrating” those things from which Christ died to free us.

You see, this is a time of year that is taken very seriously by pagans, witches and Satanists (three very different groups). It is a time when ancient rituals are recited, gods and spirits are worshipped, some worshipping the Devil, others repudiating Satanism but conjuring the dead to help them in life and love. It is a time for divination and spirit worship.

The ironically named Christian Day, a “modern day warlock”, has written The Witches Book of the Dead. In it he claims to help you “summon the spirits of our beloved to help you discover hidden opportunities, influence the minds of others, seduce the object of your affection, and even reach into the dreams of the unwary.”

As someone who has ministered to the cults for many years I know people who have been wonderfully saved out of witchcraft, Satanism, the occult – occult meaning hidden. They tell stories to make your eyes water and cause you to thank God for his power and grace in salvation. They have seen the powers of darkness at work. Halloween for them, far from being the fun event it might be to others is a time to lock their doors, ignore the persistent knocking and pray for it to be over.

It is not that they haven't faith in Christ so much as that they know first hand what this night means to millions around the world who are trapped by principalities and powers, spiritual forces of evil.

Come Out of Her

When Abraham was called by God he was called out of such a Pagan society (Genesis 12), in which gods were worshipped, the help of spirits sought and in which men sought to become gods themselves. In the Bible’s last book God’s people were urged to, come out her my people,” Rev.18:5) meaning pagan Babylon. This has been the pattern throughout the history of God's people, a people set apart by God.The Bible tells us, to be a nation of kings and priests to God. (Rev.1:6) A people so different that in the Old Testament even what they ate and what they wore marked them out from all other nations.

With Daniel we are challenged to consider carefully our choices, where we can safely and reasonably compromise to continue being in the world and where we must stand and not compromise to avoid being of the world.

Like Paul we are to weigh what the world values and counts gain, what we once valued and counted gain, against what we now hold dear above all things, counting everything else loss compared to this one thing – knowing Christ Jesus as Lord, for whose sake we are surely prepared to lose all things (Philip.3:7-11)

So, when spooks, ghouls and witches come knocking on Halloween by all means smile on them, have a treat and an appropriate look of horror ready to make them giggle at having shocked you. But think soberly also about what this time of year is all about. Remember the most innocent of fun can blind us to dangers that others know first hand and warn us about Remember, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.” (Ps.1:7)

Just Something People Say

2011-07-30T13:06:00.001Z

We have the builders in and I hope and pray the outcome will be a nice new bathroom. A situation like this does not fill a person with confidence and I am sure I’m not the only one who finds it all very stressful.

It took weeks – even months - to get to this point with the first plumber mysteriously disappearing, then the second plumber not being available the same time as the plasterer then the roles were reversed and the plasterer couldn’t make it the same time as the plumber. Finally it was sorted out (we thought) when the plasterer said he couldn’t come after all because he “had a big job on but will ring when he’s free.” I am still waiting for the call and the term “hell will freeze over first” springs to mind

Another plasterer has turned up and things are actually happening but not without a few more problems with scheduling. I didn’t know for sure the plumber would make it until the morning he turned up to take out the old bathroom and so I couldn’t give the plasterer the notice he would have liked but, hero that he is, he turned up anyway and fitted us in somehow. If anyone in Swansea and environs needs a good plasterer I can recommend this one. The plumber has turned out alright too – in the end.

In all this what was interesting was the way the conversations went as we tried to negotiate this nightmare and smooth over the frustrations and misunderstandings that seem inevitable in these circumstances.

As I told my sorry tale to the plumber his response was, “Plasterers! They are a nightmare. You can’t depend on them.”

When I apologised to the plasterer for giving such short notice and explained about the plumber he said, “Oh, you know what plumbers are like.”

These two men are not going to meet, at least not on this job, but if they did I am confident they would close ranks, share horror stories and say, “Oh, you know what customers are like. They’re a nightmare to deal with.”

It has nothing, or little to do with the facts and my experience is that there are good tradesmen and bad, as I am sure there are good customers and bad. Its just what people say in those awkward moments when they need to move on from an unfortunate conflict of schedules and ideas to a place where they can be comfortable with each other again and get the job done.

When two parties have fallen out, had a misunderstanding we must find some common ground on which to stand and to start all over again if we are going to move on. At such times what we agree we are against is an easier option than what we agree upon. This may have started with a misunderstanding between us but we are very good at redirecting our frustrations by reference to an absent “other” which we can all agree is the real fly in the ointment (Eccl.10:1) Having laid the blame elsewhere, we can mend fences, build bridges, on the basis that “its not me and its not you – its them!”

When we are talking about plasterers and plumbers no real harm is done and it is, after all, just something people say. We just need to remember that and take it all with a pinch of salt saying, “One day we will look back on this and laugh.” But talking this way about the “other” can be harmful when it becomes gossip and the character and reputation of the absent “other” can receive real damage. Then it becomes personal and the “other” becomes a real victim and not just the butt of your fleeting frustrations.

I hope the talk behind my back is no more than run of the mill “something people say” and maybe I should remember when speaking of others that the things I say can cause real damage. The New Testament leader James wrote:

“The tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire…no man can tame the tongue, it is a restless evil, full of deadly poison…(James 3:3-12)

But what good we can do with our speech if we just realise it. Just “something we say” can encourage, inspire, lift up, strengthen resolve, contribute to building good character in ourselves and others. What potential for good God has given us in this gift of speech – if we consider carefully how we use it.

Gay Marriage; Redefining Reality

2011-06-29T10:17:00.001Z

An excellent comment from George Weigel in the National Review on the recent decision to legalise same-sex marriage in New York.

“Marriage, as both religious and secular thinkers have acknowledged for millennia, is a social institution that is older than the state and that precedes the state. The task of a just state is to recognize and support this older, prior social institution; it is not to attempt its redefinition. To do the latter involves indulging the totalitarian temptation that lurks within all modern states: the temptation to remanufacture reality. The American civil-rights movement was a call to recognize moral reality; the call for gay marriage is a call to reinvent reality to fit an agenda of personal willfulness.”

Read the article here.

William Lane-Craig Refutes Dawkins - The Teapot in Orbit Analogy

2011-05-14T16:01:00.000Z

Actions Have Consequences Pastor Jones

2011-04-01T21:03:00.001Z

They like to appear rebellious, contrary and generally careless about rules and regulations but about the most conservative, reactionary people in the world have to be teenagers. They dress different to be like all their friends because the last thing they want is to stand out in a crowd. They are the best recruits to causes because they know exactly what is right and wrong and will go to any lengths to express their righteous indignation – except maybe get up early.

We forgive them their naivety, understand that they haven’t the maturity that comes from experience. Experience that tells us our first instincts are not always our best.That any fool can have an opinion but it takes wisdom to understand. That not every battle is worth fighting and not every hill is worth dying on. That a soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger (Proverbs 15:1) We encourage our children to grow and learn and time and experience bring them nearer that maturity written about in Scripture, and we hope and pray that what we have done as parents has prepared them for the grown up world.

Unfortunately it is a truism that some people grow up while others just grow older. Such is the case with Pastors Wayne Sapp and Terry Jones who, after a ludicrous mock trial, proceeded with a mock execution in which the Koran was burned. Wayne Sapp described this act as an effort to incite tension between religions. Most people would describe it as an immature act of vandalism designed to provoke a response; the kind of thing kids do when they don’t feel they are getting enough attention. They have effectively stamped their little feet and screamed, “Its not fair!” Well, we all know what is and isn’t fair but do we know what is wise?

Actions do have consequences however and to date as many as twenty people have lost their lives, including two who were beheaded, as Muslims stormed a UN compound in protest at this act of provocation. But Terry Jones sees no connection between the burning and the rioting, declaring that these people would have found some other excuse to riot if the Koran hadn’t been burned. This is childish too.

On the other side of the equation we are surely increasingly aware of the immature responses in the Muslim world to any sleight, real or imagined. It is astonishing and very worrying to see vast numbers of people kept in a state of social, emotional and psychological immaturity by their leaders and one wonders if this is deliberate. Certainly, it seems easy enough for Muslim leaders to stir up anger and violence when deemed necessary. Books are burned, people riot and some get killed as a consequence, and each party insists their response to the other is proportional and right.

I remember my father teaching me to hold doors open for ladies and other such gentlemanly characteristics. Of course, that was before women’s lib came along and swept away the qualities of chivalry. On one occasion I proudly held open a door and a woman swept through it never giving a backward glance. I remarked to my father that she wasn’t much of a lady if she couldn’t even say a civil thank you. I have never forgotten his reply.

“You didn’t hold the door open because she was a lady,” he said, “You held it open because you are gentleman.”

Surely, as Christians, it is our Christ-like qualities that are the measure of who we are and not our ability to be indignant in the face of provocation. And didn’t Jesus say, “Love your enemies”? Actions have consequences and someone’s indignation has caused people to die horribly. Surely it is not a question of whether a link can be identified between our actions and the consequences in others’ lives. Surely the test is whether, regardless of the actions of others, we have been Christ-like in our walk, mature in our response to a world that is increasingly immature and lost in sin.

The role of the pastor is not to incite tensions between religions but to speak a message of peace to a world where war is common and familiar, of salvation to a world headed to a lost eternity. These men have failed spectacularly and, to the shame of all Christians, very publicly. It is frightening when such immaturity finds its way to the pulpit and the public square and does such things in the name of Christ. We can excuse such behaviour in our teenagers, they are still learning and growing, but in men who insist they are men, and men of God? Shame on both of them.

Alternative Votes And the Three-Legged Race

2011-03-31T16:03:00.001Z

As a child I was energetic enough, wiry and fit, but team and competitive sports didn't, and still don't particularly interest me. Sitting on the side-lines watching a cricket match in the comfortingly warm sun of a late summer's afternoon was activity enough for me, even though I didn't understand cricket. Alternatively, perhaps a sauntering walk to a favourite spot beneath the shade of an old oak where I could sit with a book and sense the evening creeping up on the world to envelope us all in night-time’s comforting blanket.

Come sports day, of course, every effort would be made to ensure no one felt left out, it never occurring to anyone that a person might simply dream of being left out. Consequently, we timid touchline layabouts were drafted into some games considered so easy that anyone could play. Quoits, the sack race, different versions of the egg-and-spoon race, throwing bean bags about and, of course, the three-legged race.

Two children would be tethered together at the ankle and, incredible as it may seem, were expected to run towards a finish line such that they would prove the acme of triumph in co-operation. Of course, the true intent of those into whose charge our innocent parents had entrusted us soon became apparent as a series of stumbles, falls and tearful cross words met with peals of uncontrollable laughter from the side of the track where, if there was any justice, I would have been sitting during this three-legged farce.

You never saw the much celebrated top athletes of the school taking part in this absurd buffoonery and for good reason. Athletes are fiercely competitive and the last thing one needs is to be hobbled by some spotty Herbert with a flare for sonnets and coming in last. The school athletes would compete on their own terms and just as well or who would play the games at whose side-lines I might sit and dream?

On May 5^th UK citizens are being asked to vote on electoral reform, on whether to replace the first past the post system currently used in general elections with the alternative voting system. Make no mistake, this is important because it will determine the method and outcomes of all future elections; You can find out more from the Electoral Reform Society.

Who gains from this reform? We are led to believe that the voter will benefit because his or her vote will have a greater chance to count but I have serious doubts. Do we really want a three-legged government, with two (or, heaven forfend, maybe more) parties tethered together in a forced marriage hobbling down the track, stumbling, falling and uttering increasingly louder complaints about how unfair it all is that this or that party's agenda is being subsumed by the other?

What would that look like? Well, you only have to look at the growing resentments at the grass roots of the current coalition government. There is a sense that the Tory party is being hobbled by its farcical partnership with the bookish Liberal milksops while the liberals hear this government routinely referred to as Tory because no one believes the Liberal party is in any way setting the agenda for change and governance.

There is no illusion about which party in this three-legged race is the athlete and which dragged from the touchline to run a race in which they never expected to be entered. The liberals have not been in government for almost 100 years and I can't help think this is because not that many people want a Liberal government and perhaps we should consider the possibility that the current system works very well in that it has recognised that fact. Maybe the alternative voting system is going to give us what we have consistently rejected for almost a century, a Liberal government.

Back on my schools sports fields if anyone had suggested reforming sport so that someone who came in behind the winner, the first past the post, might still take the trophy would have been laughed to derision. If anyone had suggested the athlete coming in first, having trained long and hard all year, should share the glory with another who has been consistently rejected for the team would have been considered mad. The also rans and the three-legged hobbledehoys were expected to be good losers and if it didn't suit them to lose urged to make a greater effort next year.

In the race of life there are winners and losers and coming in last is a mighty clue to the fact that you didn't try hard enough. Maybe the Liberal school report should read, “Must try harder next time.”

Michael Nazir-Ali - John 3:16

2011-03-16T20:03:00.001Z

The Not Ashamed campaign provides an opportunity for Christians across the UK to stand together and speak up for the Christian foundation of our nation, motivated by the conviction that Jesus Christ is good news not just for individuals or for the church but for society as a whole. Indeed, He is the only true hope for our nation.

I am not ashamed of Jesus Christ and want everyone to know that this short message on John 3:16 by Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali is what I believe about God's purpose.

BBC News - All-white Midsomer Murders defended by creator True-May

2011-03-15T09:11:00.001Z

This has to be the biggest load of nonsense the PC brigade has come up with in a very long time. Midsomer Murders is the product of the writer’s and producer’s imaginations. Insisting on ethnic minorities being “represented” in the show is rather like insisting landscape artists put more people in their paintings, that historical novelists tackle more contemporary issues, or that rap artists sing more ballads.

Midsomer Murders represents archetypal English village life as conceived by the writer. That world doesn’t actually exist, or at least we all hope so since this sleepy village has witnessed 251 deaths since 1997. There are no ethnics in the Vicar of Dibley, Last of the Summer Wine ran for almost forty years with an all-white cast.

Asking why there are no ethnic minorities in Midsomer Murders is rather like asking why the majority of people in The No 1 Ladies Detective Agency are black. The great majority of people in Africa are not white just as the great majority of people in the UK are white. There are almost 3 million Welsh people in the UK so should the Welsh insist they are better represented in Eastenders, or maybe the Geordies should complain that they are under-represented in the Welsh language drama Pobol Y Cwm (People of the valley).

Some people seem to spend their lives skulking around our world looking for things to complain about. They want to be offended in almost a Munchausen Syndrome like attention-seeking mania. Maybe that is the answer. Well, some people are put in this world as a warning to the rest and it seems to me that this is a classic example.

BBC News - All-white Midsomer Murders defended by creator True-May

BBC News - Clegg defiant despite Lib Dems' slump in Barnsley poll

2011-03-04T15:53:00.002Z

Your going to fall out of bed in a minute Nick Clegg.

Nick Clegg has said people should not "write off" the Lib Dems despite the party slumping to sixth place in the Barnsley Central by-election.
The party finished behind UKIP, the BNP and an independent as its share of the vote dropped to just over 4%.
Labour, which won the poll on a 36% turnout, said voters had sent a "very clear message" to Mr Clegg about their dislike of his role in the coalition.

Think about it for a moment. This by-election was triggered because the Labour incumbent was convicted of expenses fraud. Yet the Liberals couldn’t do better than the Nazis (BNP) and someone who was practically a passer-by (an independent candidate did better). Meanwhile, the Labour Party, despite being under a cloud over the corruption charges, increased their majority.
People have already written you off Nick. I am no expert but maybe its the lies and broken promises. Or maybe it was that puppy dog look on your face as you followed David Cameron into Downing Street on a promise. Wake up Nick! They’ve stamped “MUG on your forehead while you weren’t looking; and you made it so easy for them.
BBC News - Clegg defiant despite Lib Dems' slump in Barnsley poll

BBC News - Insurance and pension costs hit by ECJ gender ruling

2011-03-01T23:15:00.001Z

Insurance companies don’t discriminate on the basis of gender but on that of risk. This latest development is absolute madness. Who are these people that they can’t understand the basic principles of insurance?

An insurance policy is fundamentally a gamble, a bet. You bet the insurance company so much a month that you will have an accident and claim on the policy and they bet you a lump sum that you won’t. No matter how sophisticated it becomes that is what it is.

Taking the betting analogy to its natural home, if you bet on a horse the odds you get depend on the likelihood of that horse winning. The greater the chance of a win the shorter the odds based on the degree of risk to the bookmaker. The bookie doesn’t “discriminate” on the basis that the favourite is a mare but on the basis that it is a horse with a better chance of winning on current form.

Going back to insurance, actuaries working for insurance companies are basically bookies who calculate the odds on who will be more likely to win the bet and have the accident. Women are less likely to have accidents than men and more mature women much less likely to have accidents than young men under 25 years. IT ISN’T ROCKET SCIENCE!

Who will gain from this latest wacky European dictat? Not men drivers whose risk to insurers is already established and won’t change and whose premiums will therefore not go down. Not women drivers who are reckoned to constitute less of a gamble to the insurance companies but whose premiums are bound to go up to achieve this unnatural parity with men. Who always gains when insurance premiums go up?

‘Nuff said!

BBC News - Insurance and pension costs hit by ECJ gender ruling

Marriage makes us all richer – not poorer - Telegraph

2011-02-18T20:55:00.002Z

Excellent comment on the delusion of modern attitudes to marriage. Like lemmings people are rushing to leap over the cliff of liberty into the abyss of anarchic immorality.

“There is a popular assumption that this is a natural process of social evolution – that couples living together are replicating marriage without the formality, so that the label attached to their relationship is irrelevant. This, though, is a myth.”

Marriage makes us all richer – not poorer - Telegraph

Jon Gomm - Hey Child: The Solo at 3 Minutes is spectacular!

2011-02-17T16:44:00.000Z

BBC News - Donor 'influenced by guru centre'

2011-02-13T19:14:00.001Z

"We didn't seek legal advice, because we were enraptured," said Mr Curtis.

"We had a guru working with us and for us who had a direct link to god. What she said was good enough at the time."

There is such a thing as spiritual abuse and it can have a devastating effect on people’s lives. The answer to bad faith is not no faith but good faith. That is why Jesus said, “Go into all the world telling the Good News”

BBC News - Donor 'influenced by guru centre'

BBC News - Councils defeat government over school buildings

2011-02-11T16:30:00.002Z

A Tory turns out to be a law-breaker; well who would have thought. Of course, this is typical of the party that considers itself the natural party of government. Just as Mubarak is driven from office after 30 years of emergency laws and phony elections the Tories are shown to be pressing ahead with their idealism-based reform without consulting anyone. The arrogance and flagrant disregard for people is to be expected but surely not to be tolerated.

“The education secretary's decision to axe Buildings Schools for the Future (BSF) projects in six local authority areas was ruled unlawful as he failed to consult on it.”

BBC News - Councils defeat government over school buildings

BBC News - Michael Sheen's Port Talbot passion play to be filmed

2011-02-01T21:52:00.002Z

A play directed by Michael Sheen to be performed on the streets, beaches and hills of Port Talbot at Easter is also to become a film.

BBC News - Michael Sheen's Port Talbot passion play to be filmed

BBC News - UK economy suffers 0.5% contraction

2011-01-25T11:27:00.001Z

At a time when the IMF are forecasting better than expected growth in the world economy the UK economy has suffered a 0.5% contraction. The Office for national Statistics reports that, even allowing for the atrocious weather in December, the economy has still experienced a 0% growth.

The figures have been described as “horrendous” and “disastrous” but when he was interviewed today on the BBC News Channel the Chancellor, George (Oik) Osborne, could only talk about the weather. It is a dreadfully awkward and obvious piece of political ducking and diving, depressing to watch, but to every question (and there were some good ones) he responded with talk about the weather.

People across industry are describing this government’s strategy as regressive and lacking imagination and direction yet the only thing on George’s mind is the weather and the question, “How can I get away from this intelligent and probing interview?” He has to be the most cack-handed Chancellor in many a long year, a political operative of mediocre qualities at best and his arrogance is matched only by his callous incompetence.

BBC News - UK economy suffers 0.5% contraction

Tom Jones sings Bob Dylan: What Good Am I?

2011-01-22T22:10:00.000Z

This is from Tom Jones' new album Praise and Blame and, not being a fan, I am blown away with the whole album.

Male Beauty Contest in Niger

2011-01-20T16:46:00.001Z

That's different. Think of the men you know and imagine them doing this in front of the women of the - church? :)

Right Turn - What about religious freedom in Muslim countries?

2011-01-16T22:06:00.001Z

A stark warning and a wake-up call.

“I think what's taking place is nothing less than the religious and ethnic cleansing of the Muslim world.

Christians are being particularly targeted -- churches attacked in Egypt, Iraq, Nigeria, Indonesia, the Philippines; the assassination in Pakistan of a Muslim politician who dared defend a Christian woman sentenced to death for "insulting" Islam.

Other religious and ethnic minorities are also suffering intense persecution -- the black Muslims of Darfur, the Bahai of Iran, the Kurds, Sufis and Ahmadis in Pakistan, and of course the vicious anti-Israelism and anti-Semitism one finds throughout the region.

I think this is the most important issue not being reported by the mainstream media, not being studied by academics, not being taken up at the UN or made a priority by the large human rights groups.”

Right Turn - What about religious freedom in Muslim countries?

BBC News - Salman Taseer: Thousands mourn Pakistan governor

2011-01-05T17:47:00.001Z

When are people going to face up to what is before their eyes? Islam is a religion of violence and death, that eschews mercy, celebrates vengeance and advances by oppression and subjugation. History shows it, current affairs demonstrate it.

The governor - a senior member of the governing Pakistan People's Party (PPP) - had recently angered Islamists by appealing for a Christian woman, sentenced to death for blasphemy, to be pardoned.

Mr Gilani has declared three days of national mourning and appealed for calm.

The bodyguard, Malik Mumtaz Hussein Qadri, 26, was showered with rose petals by supporters as he appeared in court in Islamabad on Wednesday.

News reports carefully avoid naming Islam when reporting these things by speaking of “religious extremists” but this is inaccurate and misleading; indeed, these are weasel words. Whenever we see these reports they are Muslim Extremists. Muslims blowing up Christian churches, Muslims blowing up mosques and killing each other, Muslims bombing our cities and killing our fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters.

When a Muslim leader stands up for what are called “liberal values” but what are actually “civilised values” Muslims far and wide go into their usual screaming fit of hysteria and he gets killed by his own bodyguard who, in turn, gets lauded and showered with rose petals as he appears in court.

There is no maturity, no reason, no civilised outlook and no mercy in Islam and it is time we demanded that Muslim Pakistan step up to the mark and prove itself capable of civilised involvement with the wider world. Time we stopped making excuses for a nuclear power with the mind and emotional maturity of a petulant child.

BBC News - Salman Taseer: Thousands mourn Pakistan governor

Gerald Warner: Weathering the true lies of global warming Newspeak - Scotsman.com News

2010-12-28T20:58:00.001Z

A really great piece of journalism from Gerald Warner writing in The Scotsman on Boxing day 2010. There is so much cutting and satirical commentary on the now discredited Climate Change lobby it is hard to find a favourite part and you should read the whole article. But if I had to pick one it would be:

“Of the fragile construct of global warming mythology there is hardly a domino left standing. Declining polar bear population? Since 1970 the world population of polar bears has 'declined' from 5,000 to 25,000.”

Isn’t that wonderful? There is also an insight into the bias of the Met Office:

“Last week the Met Office was forced to issue a press release stating it "categorically denies forecasting a 'mild winter' ". In fact, in October, its long-range probability map predicted an 80 per cent probability of warmer than average temperatures from November to January in Scotland. It claimed Scotland, along with Northern Ireland, the eastern half of England and Cornwall, would experience temperatures above the 3.7°C average, more than 2°C higher than last winter.”

And this picture of the so-called melting ice-caps:

“The suggestion of a connection between "man-made" global warming and hurricanes has now been rejected by the scientist who first advanced it, Professor Kerry Emanuel, after further research. Melting ice-caps? When Lewis Pugh tried to paddle a kayak to the "ice-free" North Pole he had to stop 600 miles south of his destination and 100 miles short of where a canoeist had reached a century before. Even the IPCC has been forced to revise its forecasts of rises in sea level dramatically downwards. Global average temperatures reached a peak in 1998 and have been declining since.”

Maybe we should make a New-Year’s Resolution to find the facts and follow the evidence and perhaps insist governments stop wasting our taxes on impractical and unworkable “solutions” to a problem that doesn’t exist according to the man who first suggested it might.

Gerald Warner: Weathering the true lies of global warming Newspeak - Scotsman.com News

BBC News - Ministers accused of free book funding 'partial U-turn'

2010-12-26T19:30:00.001Z

Happy Christmas kids. Don’t worry, we’ll get you later.

Love

Dave and Nick

“The government has been accused of performing a partial U-turn over funding for a charity that gives free books to children.

Booktrust had been told it would lose all £13m funding for its bookgifting programmes in England, but ministers now say funding will continue.”

BBC News - Ministers accused of free book funding 'partial U-turn'

BBC News - Why US exceptionalism is not exceptional

2010-12-24T22:43:00.001Z

A thoughtful and insightful commentary on American exceptionalism by an American. Worth a read.

“When I moved to London a quarter of a century ago I certainly felt "exceptional". I could see what the problems facing British society were and thought, like many fellow American expats, that we could fix up Britain in about a month with a combination of American pragmatism and work ethic.

Get a written constitution in, abolish the House of Lords, pry the executive function of government out of the legislature - so that the prime minister was more like a president. Then do away with the symbols of the old class system and inherited privilege so that everyone felt that no matter how humble their circumstances at birth, they could become, if not the monarch, at least the prime minister.

Then embrace immigration, refresh the society with incomers who wanted to work hard and better themselves. In other words, make Britain more like America and Bob's your uncle.”

BBC News - Why US exceptionalism is not exceptional

Warning of anarchy if death row Christian woman is pardoned | Christian News on Christian Today

2010-12-03T20:50:00.001Z

“In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful...” Isn’t that how Muslims pray? So where is the benefit, where is the mercy when a rabid crowd seeks bloodthirsty revenge against a woman who is reported to have said something blasphemous? Why is vengeance and not mercy an instinct in Muslims? Why is death and not life the focus of their days? Why is killing and not charity the driving force of their lives?

Why, when some of the richest countries in the world are Muslim oil states, are so many Muslims living in poverty and ignorance, superstitious and driven by a sense of anger and vengefulness? The injustices of their lives are of their own religion and culture’s making so why blame Christians?

If they assuage their blood-lust it will be a momentary relief, for them and for the rest of us who must share this world with them. If they succeed in killing another Christian because of some imagined sleight their lives will be not one iota better. Lives are improved and enriched by the very mercy and charity they eschew with their empty prayers.

Hundreds of Muslims took to the streets of Lahore on Friday to demonstrate their anger as the Pakistani government makes its mind up over whether or not to pardon a Christian woman sentenced to death for blasphemy.

Muslims in the country are outraged at the prospect of Asia Bibi’s death sentence being overturned. According to Agence France Presse, the rally was organised by a subsidiary of Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), a banned charity that the UN believes has terrorist links.

Warning of anarchy if death row Christian woman is pardoned | Christian News on Christian Today

BBC News - Saudi school lessons in UK concern government

2010-11-22T12:36:00.001Z

This barbaric stuff is being taught to children in the UK. This is what they learn about the world at their mother’s knee, at the mosque and in their schools. Summary, violent solutions to life’s problems and grotesque caricatures of the “other.” Do you think it is just the Jews, just the gay community they despise and demonise?

Even while they benefit from our civilised, Christian-based, liberal democracy they despise our culture and our “Western ways.” A so-called moderate Muslim is one who has been influenced by those ways and a fundamentalist Muslim, who regards the moderate as apostate, is one who has been influenced by the teachings of Islam through schools like this.

“One of the text books asks children to list the "reprehensible" qualities of Jewish people. A text for younger children asks what happens to someone who dies who is not a believer in Islam - the answer given in the text book is "hellfire".

Another text describes the punishment for gay sex as death and states a difference of opinion about whether it should be carried out by stoning, burning with fire or throwing the person over a cliff.

In a book for 14-year-olds, Sharia law and its punishment for theft are explained, including detailed diagrams about how hands and feet of thieves are amputated.”

This is not a radical twisting of Islam – it is Islam. It is not, as the Saudis insist, shocking because it is taken out of context. The acceptable face if Islam we too readily buy into in the UK is out of context and this is Islam. It is ironic that the Saudis, who maintain oversight in these schools, should be anxious to distance themselves from this since they enforce and export Whahhabism, one of the most extreme, fundamentalist expressions of Islam.

BBC News - Saudi school lessons in UK concern government

Fire brigade cuts Christian references from Remembrance service - Telegraph

2010-11-13T21:58:00.001Z

I am so sorry that those big, butch brave boys in the Norfolk fire service are so sensitive and tender-hearted that the very idea of religion offends their little sensibilities.

"A fire brigade has removed all religious references from its remembrance service after complaints from staff.

The Church said it was “a big step” to take but the decision was welcomed by the National Secular Society, which said religion had no place in the annual commemorations.

Norfolk’s fire service said it had taken the decision because some staff felt excluded in previous years by the Christian references during Remembrance Day.”

Although, it has to be said, their aversion to religion seems incredibly selective. Isn’t this the same fire service that sent a great big, kissy-kissy “Happy Eid” greeting to Muslims on September 10th?

They eschew the Christian faith that gave us the values for which those we remember fought so bravely and send good wishes to the faith that burns a giant poppy on the stroke of eleven to coincide with the two minutes silence to mark the Armistice. Of course, the National Secular Society is doing its usual high-minded gloating. Does this mindless ingratitude and rank hypocrisy take your breath away? It does mine.

Fire brigade cuts Christian references from Remembrance service - Telegraph

Proclaiming Jesus from the Roof Tops | Christian Concern

2010-11-11T21:08:00.001Z

An excellent comment on the increasing restrictions on Christian activity in the UK and the difference between freedom to worship and freedom of religion.

“What kind of freedom of religion do we want to see in the UK? The freedom to worship in private, unseen and behind closed doors - or the freedom to practice and boldly proclaim our faith in public?”

Proclaiming Jesus from the Roof Tops | Christian Concern

BBC News - Cameron hails 'revolutionary' Whitehall data website

2010-11-08T22:19:00.001Z

Following plans to make the unemployed work at menial tasks for £1 an hour the government is now planning to hand over the auditing of the civil service to – well, you and me. Ironically, it is the unemployed who might be best placed for time to do this job.

Funny, but when I put my cross next to my candidate of choice at the last election I was convinced I was helping to build a government that would do the job. It seems that while they are dead keen that all the people they are planning to put out of work should find a job, even if it is for £1 an hour, they themselves seem curiously workshy.

David Cameron announced a new age of transparency, when ordinary people will be able to check on whether the government is keeping to the pledges it has made. Maybe he should look closer to home. He is already in government with Nick Clegg and the LibDems who have broken almost every pledge they made before the election.

BBC News - Cameron hails 'revolutionary' Whitehall data website

BBC News - Ministers defend plan to force jobless to do work

2010-11-07T20:02:00.001Z

Last time the Tories were in power the joke was that they had plans to shorten the dole queues; get people to stand closer together. Is it just like last time? Listen to their rhetoric, they are vilifying the weak and vulnerable, creating unemployment and then blaming people for being out of work; just like last time.

They are dividing us by setting us against each other. Calling working people superfluous backroom staff and making them unemployed in the name of economy then making working people think that those out of work are not workless but work shy; making the able-bodied think the disabled are cheating the system, making every blue-badge holder the object of suspicion; making the unemployed, made so by the Tories, work for nothing more than benefits and expecting them to be grateful to eat today.

Why this sustained and indefensible attack on ordinary people who are the victims and not the instigators of the current crisis? What is this designed to distract us from? What are they doing behind our backs while we worry about our futures and that of our children? They are putting us all in our place, making us accept their presumed natural right to govern. They are looking after their own and ensuring their own are well provided for. Do you doubt it?

They are creating an educated elite by burdening future graduates with unsustainable levels of debt so that our universities will be filled, not with the gifted who will contribute to the future wealth of the nation, but the privileged who will contribute to the future wealth of the privileged.

Ian Duncan-Smith, during the Tory conference, was challenged about his plans to withdraw child benefit and he gave a response that I am surprised no one has made more of. “I wish I didn’t have to do it,” he said, “I wish we were elected in 1997. The treasury was awash with money then.”

Indeed, the Labour government inherited a strong exchequer, along with crumbling schools, people dying on hospital waiting lists and on trolleys in hospital corridors, the old were dying from cold in the winter and the young despairing of any hope. When the Tories were last kicked out the country threw a party and the only thing we have to look forward too now is the next party, when the country comes to its senses and throws them out again. Let’s hope we don’t take so long this time to see this lying, cheating rabble of chinless wonders for what they are.

As for the LibDems, well, at least the Tories are true to their nature when they take the country back to the big house, the poorhouse and the tugged forelock. The LibDems declare themselves progressive then betray themselves as Quislings. They should remember that “coalition” only has meaning and significance for LibDems. Everyone knows this is a Tory government and all the talk of coalition won’t change the fact that we have a Tory future until we take back what is ours.

BBC News - Ministers defend plan to force jobless to do work

Public/Private Enterprise on Speed in Swansea

2010-11-04T17:03:00.001Z

It’s as neat a piece of public sector/private sector co-operation as you will ever see; PFI on speed – literally. Doing a little business in the city centre this afternoon I parked my car close to the recently opened, £2m Swansea Drugs Project building. It offers a range of essential services on top of the usual substance abuse therapies; a gym, kitchens, crèche, IT suite.

But I noted a service that I believe has not been so widely publicised. Parked neatly outside in an expensive people carrier was the local drug dealer and a couple of heavies, smoking joints and providing those bits and pieces that visitors to the centre might have forgotten, or thought they might do without but...

It is, as I say, as ingenious a piece of enterprise as you will see. Where would you go to sell drugs? Where would you find a lot of addicts in one place? Conversely, where would an addict go to score, or to earn a little extra for the rent this week? Before today, frankly, I wouldn’t have had a clue. I am sure our wise city fathers, when they were discussing how to attract business to the city, didn’t either. But with a record £52.6m being spent in Wales on dealing with substance abuse maybe they should get their fingers out and tax this burgeoning sector.

Either that or police properly this much needed and valuable service so those who take their addictions seriously and are determined to beat them get more than a fair chance to do that.

Drug abuse in England and Wales is the worse in Europe, according to a new survey. Drug-related deaths in Wales are up by 67% and the pain and misery caused by this pernicious trade is apparent on our streets every day. Swansea High Street is almost a no-go area with discarded syringes a common sight, drunken and abusive behaviour and foul language as commonplace. But this is a city-wide problem and a nightmare for descent people going about their daily lives.

I am in favour of whatever works but whatever is being done now clearly doesn’t. Isn’t it time we had a zero tolerance approach to drug abuse? Isn’t it time we stopped telling people they are victims as though drugs creep up on them, mug them and drag them into an alleyway to jack them up? We are the victims, the people whose streets are not safe to walk, whose property is not secure from drug-related crime, whose lives might be at risk and who don’t know any more who can be trusted and where might be safe.

Isn’t it time we set a few examples and dealt a blow to the wicked drug trade? Time we established a few ground rules based on absolutes and certainties. Time justice got meted out alongside these programmes that are in serious danger of becoming an end in themselves. Time we took back our streets, our districts, our city and made them safe again, for ourselves and for the millions of visitors, tourists and students alike, who visit us every year and must wonder sometimes, walking down from High Street station, what on earth they have walked into?

Let’s help by all means but let’s remember that kindness can kill and love must sometimes be tough.

Blair 'to do God' in debate with Hitchens - News, People - The Independent

2010-10-16T15:32:00.001Z

Is this perhaps the blind leading the blind? In anticipation of this non-event – Tony Blair v Christopher Hitchens – let me sum up the overblown New Atheists:

Richard Dawkins - “I can explain stuff therefore there is no God”

Derren Brown – “I can pull a rabbit out of a hat therefore there is no God”

Christopher Hitchens and Sam Brown - “Life’s a bitch therefore there’s no God”

As you can see, the intellectual standard in this ongoing circus of non-ideas is mind-numbingly mediocre. But that would explain their popularity with the great unwashed who never want to go to that much trouble in pursuit of the truth.

Blair 'to do God' in debate with Hitchens - News, People - The Independent

US physics professor: 'Global warming is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life' – Telegraph Blogs

2010-10-13T22:32:00.001Z

Is anyone really surprised now the truth about the IPCC and the Great Global Warming Scam is finally coming out? This is a letter of resignation from Harold Lewis is Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara to Curtis G. Callan Jr, Princeton University, President of the American Physical Society. Below are a couple of highlights but please read the whole thing and understand that we are all being taken for a ride by a scientific world that has been taken over by Green activists, alarmists and moneymen.

The giants no longer walk the earth, and the money flood has become the raison d’être of much physics research, the vital sustenance of much more, and it provides the support for untold numbers of professional jobs. For reasons that will soon become clear my former pride at being an APS Fellow all these years has been turned into shame, and I am forced, with no pleasure at all, to offer you my resignation from the Society.

It is of course, the global warming scam, with the (literally) trillions of dollars driving it, that has corrupted so many scientists, and has carried APS before it like a rogue wave. It is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist. Anyone who has the faintest doubt that this is so should force himself to read the ClimateGate documents, which lay it bare. (Montford’s book organizes the facts very well.) I don’t believe that any real physicist, nay scientist, can read that stuff without revulsion. I would almost make that revulsion a definition of the word scientist…

…It was a fraud on a scale I have never seen, and I lack the words to describe its enormity. Effect on the APS position: none. None at all. This is not science; other forces are at work.

You can find the ClimateGate site here I also recommend Christopher Booker’s excellent work of investigative journalism The Real Global Warming Disaster

US physics professor: 'Global warming is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life' – Telegraph Blogs

Melanie Phillips’s Articles » I think, therefore I’m guilty

2010-10-07T12:05:00.001Z

I am not her biggest fan but here is a superb commentary on the parlous state of UK society today, where freedom of speech is the preserve only of those approved by the thought police.

“It is difficult to say when, exactly, the priorities of the British police shifted from the prevention of criminal offences towards criminalising people for causing offence. The police have become the thin blue line against the Wrong Opinion. Instead of protecting society against oppression, British police officers have become the agents of oppression…

…if you are a white Christian man upholding traditional family values and expressing a desire to stop immigration and leave the EU, while being sceptical of man-made global warming and believing that Darwinian evolution does not explain the origin of life on earth, Britain is no longer your country.

But don’t worry. Utopia is taking its place. The police are on their way to tell you.”

Melanie Phillips’s Articles » I think, therefore I’m guilty

An Open Letter from the Afghan Christian Community to the Body of Christ Worldwide

2010-10-01T18:56:00.001Z

Christians in Afghanistan have written an 'Open Letter' to believers around the world calling for help in defending those who are being persecuted for their faith. You can read the letter below and read more about the plight of Afghan Christians here.

"To the Body of Christ:

"This letter is written by the Afghan Christian Community in India which is a small community of 150 Afghan Christian refugees and asylum seekers.

"We left our country because we were sentenced to death on the account of our Christian faith (conversion), as Afghanistan is a Muslim Country, the Afghan Government is an Islamic government, and Islam is the only formal religion of the country, and according to the Constitutional law of the Afghan Islamic Republic, conversion is considered as a big crime, Christian are called pagans and infidels and are sentenced to death by the Afghan Government. Christians are considered criminals. Death penalty is waiting for all those who want to leave the darkness and come to the true light, repent from their sins, and put their faith on the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Lord and Savior of all human being.

"We believe that you (the Body of Christ) have already heard that some pictures and movies of the Afghan believers (from Delhi and Kabul) were shown by an Afghan Private TV (Noorin TV), this TV channel showed these picture in a especial program (Sarzameen Man), and the Government and people were encouraged and provoked to think about the issue of conversion, to make a stand against it and to take serious and practical measures and actions to destroy Afghan Converted Christians (Sons of God) and those who share the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the Lost.

"The Afghan Parliament, Senate, Religious Council and Islamic Parties and leaders made statements that the Afghan Government has to search, find, arrest, deliver to courts and executes all Afghan Christians, and the Christian NGOs and Organization have to be stopped too. University students protested against Afghan Christians in Kabul and Herat Provinces, and the Afghan Government also made a statement that all Afghan Christians will be arrested and executed, and the Christian NGOs and Organizations which involved with the issues of conversion will be closed.

"Mr. Mujajdi, the Chairman Of Afghan Senate, said that if the Afghan Government does not take serious action, he and other Islamic leaders will call and request the Afghan people to take practical measures to kill all Afghan Christians. President Karzai himself showed his personal interest in this regard and said that all Afghan Christians will be arrested and executed and Christian organizations which are involved with this issue will be stopped. He ordered the Afghan security organs to take serious measures in this regard. The Afghan Home Minister and the Chairman of the Afghan Intelligence told the Afghan Parliament that 4 Afghan Christian individuals and one family have been arrested and they are under investigation, 13 NGOs have been named and suspended, the names of Afghan Christians have been listed, and the Afghan Intelligence agency is trying to arrest them. Two Church organizations have been closed. As we are in contact with our brothers and sisters in Afghanistan, many believers are arrested, our houses are checked by police and intelligence people in Afghanistan, our families and parents (though they are Muslim) are under investigation and even arrested, and all Afghan believers are misplaced."

The letter-writers, "(Afghan Christian Community) along with our other Afghan Christian brothers and sisters who are in Afghanistan" request you to:

"Pray for us and for this critical situation, pray for those who are arrested, and those who are under investigation. Please come together and help your Afghan brothers and sisters in Christ, as we are sentenced to death, we are arrested, we are under investigation, the Afghan Government kills us because we believe on Jesus Christ, we know that we should consider it pure joy when we suffer (James 1: 1 -4), and we are enjoying all suffering all joy. But we also know that faith without deeds is useless (James 2: 14 - 17), and this is the time to raise your voice for your brothers and sisters, for our children, for our old parents, for the execution of thousand Afghan believers. "This is the day that all of us should come together and pray, think, help and raise our voices to the International Community, to put pressure on the Afghan Government to stop killing, persecuting and executing Afghan Christians, to give us freedom of religion, to respect and accept us as Afghan Christians.

"We do not know how the whole world and especially the Global Church is silent and closing their eyes, while thousand of their brothers and sisters (Body of Christ) are in pain, facing life danger and death penalty, and are tortured, persecuted and called criminals because they believe in the Truth.

"We need to wake up, get up and speak up today, and to prove it that we are really in concern, and care for our brothers and sisters in Christ, we should help the persecuted part of the body of Christ, for His Glory. If we really believe that Lord Jesus Christ is God, then, He commands us to love Him and to love our neighbor, if our own brothers and sisters, are in pain and suffering, and we are silent and we ignore them and their suffering, then the question is that do we really obey Lord Jesus' commandment to love Him and our neighbor?"

The letter concludes: "So, dear brothers and sister (the Body of Christ), we (Afghan Christian Community in New Delhi) on behalf of all Afghan Christians request you to support us by your prayers and practical measures, let us tell the Afghan Government that we are not pagans and infidels, we are not criminals because of our Christian faith, and let us tell them not to sentence us to death."

An Open Letter from the Afghan Christian Community to the Body of Christ Worldwide

Why I am Not a Roman Catholic

2010-09-18T16:47:00.001Z

With the visit of Pope Benedict to the UK in full swing many issues that have exercised Christians for years are, for a short season, exercising the minds of a wider audience. Beyond the perennial and seemingly endless scandal of child abuse at the hands of Catholic priests, a scandal that goes back a thousand years, questions are being asked about the popularity of this pope, the relevance of the church and the relationship between Rome and Canterbury.

Religious correspondents and media and newspaper commentators are talking about what divides them and what might bring them closer. As the pope highlights the challenges of militant secularism and urges young people to find fulfilment in the spiritual some are seeing a common cause and asking whether they are now close enough to work together in mission.

Some insist that a bigger threat than any sectarian controversies is modern liberal values against which we should be working alongside Roman Catholics. This makes sense on some levels and there is much to be gained in being co-combatants with Rome against the secularism that is threatening us; but how far down that road might we safely go?

The issues with which the Reformers were concerned were fundamental to biblical faith and we must ask is the gap on these issues now so small as to be unimportant, or are there still significant issues that prevent us embracing across the Lord's Table? For me the issues have always been more fundamental than gay clergy, women priests and church government. It is about the question of whether we are saved by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone. Whether he is our sole and sufficient mediator or whether there need be a priestly class to mediate Christ.

Christ Alone, Faith Alone, Grace Alone

Christ Alone

The Catholic and Evangelical understandings of Christ's death and what it achieved are profoundly different. Those who seek common ground with Catholicism fail to address this problem. Yet it is the most important aspect of the New Testament message and it is essential to get it right:

“For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then the Twelve...” (1 Co.15:3-5)

What we believe about these things is “of first importance”.

To the Catholic Christ died for “sins” and not for “sinners”.

To the Catholic Christ's death earned a "treasury of merit" on which the believer draws time and again by means of the sacraments to gain forgiveness and purification from sins today. This adds works of merit to Christ's work of Atonement.

To the Evangelical Christ's death was a "once for all" act that won complete salvation "for all who believe", i.e. “sinners”. This is the classic "penal substitution" doctrine denied by Rome.

When Paul writes in 1 Co.15 about Christ dying “for our sins” he is not saying that Christ died for sins and not sinners. He means “for the sake of” our sins, or “because of” our sins. In other words, it is because we are sinners that Christ died. Sin in man was the reason for Christ dying. But in dying Christ died for sinners:

To purchase people – Rev.5:9; 14:4

With his blood – Acts 20:28

Bought at a price – 1 Cor.6:20; 7:23

To ransomed many – Mt.20:28

The picture is of one purchasing, buying and redeeming and not one of simply making grace available on condition of a quid pro quo:

“If justification were through the law, then Christ died for no purposes” (Gal.2:21)

Christ’s death won a complete salvation:

“But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified” (Heb.10:12-14)

Faith Alone

The Catholic and Evangelical understanding of how we receive salvation are irreconcilably different.

To the Catholic salvation is gained, first, by continually applying to Christ's store of merit and applying Christ's merit to themselves daily. Secondly, this merit is mediated through a priesthood and ritual activity - the sacraments.

"If anyone says that justifying faith is nothing else than confidence in divine mercy, which remits sins for Christ’s sake, or that it is this confidence alone that justifies us, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Council of Trent, Canons Concerning Justification, Canon 12).

To the Evangelical salvation is a gift that is received all at once. To deny faith alone is to deny Christ alone. To add to Christ's work is to subscribe to a profoundly different ecclesiology which includes essential rituals and priesthood mediation.

“Unlike the other high priests, [Christ] does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once for all when he offered himself” Heb 7:27

Faith alone safeguards the more important Christ alone.

Grace Alone

The Catholic understanding of grace is piecemeal, applied daily in our pilgrimage in order to win a little more salvation each day. This puts the emphasis on the activity and attitude of the believer.

"If anyone says that the justice received is not preserved and also not increased before God through good works, but that those works are merely the fruits and signs of justification obtained, but not the cause of its increase, LET HIM BE ANATHEMA" (Council of Trent, Canons Concerning Justification, Canon 24).

The Evangelical understanding of grace is that it is God's unmerited favour toward the sinner that cannot be accessed via fallen man's activity but through faith alone in Christ alone. This puts the emphasis on the activity and attitude of God.

Grace is:

A State - Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God (Ro.5:1-2)

A Companion - But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me (1 Cor.15:10)

Christ’s Work - For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people,

training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ (Titus 2:11-13)

God’s Gift - Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith (Ro.12:6)

Catholics have conflated justification and sanctification; the gift of life and the course of life.

The Power of “Believing”

"What must we do to do the works God requires?" Jesus answered:"The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent" (John 6:28-29)

To believe”, of course, does not simply mean to give intellectual assent. In the Bible to believe is to put your full trust in. The believer has put his or her full trust in Jesus for salvation.

In John’s gospel he uses the verb “believe” 98 times (Mt.11; Mk.10; Lk.9). John can teach us something about “believing”. We can believe “that” something happened; believe “what” people say, but John uses the verb with the preposition “into”, as in

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16)

Paul writes:

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ--by grace you have been saved--and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast (Eph.2:4-9)

He is saying that our standing before God is such that, in Christ, we are seated in heavenly places. Of course we do have the rest of our lives to go through on this earth. But Christ has paid for our sins and we can now walk in confidence, in him, knowing that we have eternal life, a life that has been won for us by him and that we appropriate by trusting “in” him.

Of course, a gift must be appropriated and this gift is appropriated by believing. The recipient of the gift has put their trust in the giver and the worth of the gift and thereby receives the gift. John 5:24 clearly shows this; Hear, believe and receive eternal life.

Of course works follow, but they follow, they don't lead to salvation. The person whose works have worth is the saved person. The unsaved may work and work but to no avail because they have not trusted. They have refused the gift by the very act of trying to prove worthy of it!

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (Ro.6:23)

Sin pays wages! Eternal life, on the other hand, is a free gift "in Christ Jesus our Lord" What does that mean, "in Christ Jesus our Lord"? It means that those are in him who have put their trust in him. If you put any trust at all in anything you can do by way of works then you are, by definition, not in him but in yourself; because that is what you have trusted in.

The Australian theologian Leon Morris called the following the most important paragraph in history:

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it-- the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.

For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.

It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith.

For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law (Romans 3:21-28)

Catholicity has been described as a local community with a world-wide vision; the people of God, gathered around the word of God, ready to do the will of God. Catholic, in this sense, is not a structure, or church order, but a description of God’s people, the universal church. It is not a divide between laity and clergy but a fellowship of all prepared to work the works of God. It is a means of mediation only in that it mediates God’s grace to a fallen world, not insisting it is the way but humbly pointing to the One who is the way so others may come too and know salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

BBC News - Stephen Hawking: God did not create Universe

2010-09-12T14:55:00.001Z

There is no place for God in theories on the creation of the Universe, Professor Stephen Hawking has said.

He had previously argued belief in a creator was not incompatible with science but in a new book, he concludes the Big Bang was an inevitable consequence of the laws of physics.

The Grand Design, part serialised in the Times, says there is no need to invoke God to set the Universe going.

"Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something," he concluded.

It is interesting that Prof. Hawking’s attitude to religion is highlighted in reports on his new book because he is as convinced that the physical sciences have made philosophy just as redundant. The emphasis on religion reflects perhaps the current rabid drive on the part of the neo-atheists to rid the world of believers. But philosophers?

It depends on how you define philosophy I suppose but if philosophy is thinking about how we think about the world then he has just made a philosophical statement and needs the context of philosophy in which to make it and to give it meaning; ergo, philosophy is not redundant.

With regards God, he has made the familiar mistake of assuming that the more science can discover the less need have we for God to explain this world. This is an argument directed at a particular view of God popular in certain fundamentalist circles but fails completely to address what the Bible has to say. It addresses the infamous “God of the gaps” error but not the God of the Bible.

While it is popularly believed (believed, now there’s a loaded term) that the more we have of science and reason the less our need of God, the biblical view is the more we have of science and reason the more we fulfil the creation mandate. In the creation account man is commanded to have dominion over the earth, to replenish it and fill it (Gen.1:28)

This has been interpreted by some as licence to exploit but this is quite wrong. Man’s dominion was to bring glory to the God who made everything and, acting as steward over God’s creation, he was to care for the world. What we see today as exploitation is the fruit of the fall when man’s “dominion” was diminished and lost but…

Hamlet declared, “What a piece of work is man…in apprehension how like a god!” Never a truer word was spoken. Not that man is, or will become a god, but that man was made with godlike qualities, what Christians call God’s communicable attributes. Those attributes of God that, in his wisdom and grace, he has shared with us, his creatures.

An expression of those attributes, albeit marred by sin, is still seen in mankind’s concern for and curiosity about our world. A steward of God’s world, far from being ignorant of his or her charge and duty, is industrious in learning and growing in knowledge of this world. Hence science, far from making God redundant, is, even unknowingly, obeying a godlike instinct to know, understand and responsibly steward the creation.

A Christian has no need to fear science and should rejoice in the knowledge that, even when some in the scientific community are determined to dismiss God, yet they fulfil God’s purposes and will in the end, like everyone else, see God either as their saving Father or as their judge.

BBC News - Stephen Hawking: God did not create Universe

The Giant Islam Sleeps Lightly

2010-09-09T15:53:00.001Z

The world’s attention is focussed on pastor Terry Jones in Florida who has declared his avowed intent to burn copies of the Koran on this, the anniversary of the 9/11 atrocities in New York. It is sobering to think that a very little man, who leads a small and failing congregation of no more than fifty people - people who may be as small-minded, mean-spirited and contemptible as himself – can command such attention. In the world of the Internet and instant news, however, it seems almost inevitable.

But let’s not run away with the idea that this one man’s actions are as newsworthy as the press and media coverage he is getting might suggest. It is the fear, the very real fear of the reaction of the Islamic world that has brought this petty act to the fore.

There is no substantial support for what this man plans to do; it has been roundly condemned by political and religious leaders around the world; Christian voices, Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant, have been raised loudly denouncing this pointless act; all my Christian friends condemn him outright, indeed my American Christian friends condemn him. In light of which any reasonable person would mentally place Pastor Jones in the “wacky but what can you do” category and get on with their lives; not so Muslims.

In the Muslim world this act is defined as “A ferocious attack on Islam and Muslims” (al-Jazeera); There is talk of an uncontrollable Muslim response (al-Alam TV, Iran); there has been talk of “bloody wars and reprisals” (al-Quds al-Arabi newspaper); there are calls for the criminal court in the Hague to get involved (Qatari al-Watan newspaper) and the Jakarta Globe declared the American authorities “powerless” to stop the burning of the Muslim Holy Book.

Perhaps this last is an indication that not everyone understands the true nature and cost of democracy, that democracy means even the foolish can walk the streets without let or hindrance. You can read a digest of responses from the Arab world on the BBC US and Canada news site

Hysteria seems to define the character of Muslims brought up in those parts of the world we have come to identify as “Muslim countries”, although it is clear that it is as much underlying cultural influences as it is Islamic teaching that is to blame for such hysteria. Such cultural characteristics are exploited however by religious leaders and people are easily whipped up into a frenzy of vengeful and quite irrational and disproportionate expressions of rage. It sometimes seems like a population of petulant children who would be manageable if they didn’t have access to devastating weaponry that their temperament predisposes them to use without discrimination and on the slightest pretext.

It leads one to ask why, if Islam is such an important and positive cultural influence, so many of its adherents seem incapable of proportionate responses or reasoned reflection. Why they haven’t learned from this “great world religion” those values so characteristic of that other Middle Eastern religion, Christianity. Values so eloquently defined by Paul in his letter to Christians in the province of Galatia:

“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, godliness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” (Gal.5:22)

It also raises the troubling question of how far the liberal democracies of the West, founded squarely on Christian principles of equity and freedom, can go down the road of appeasement and still keep its citizens safe. It is all well and good to beware we don’t wake the sleeping giant lest we provoke dreadful consequences, but if it takes one insignificant pastor of a church of just fifty people in Florida to evoke such responses as we have seen this week we urgently need a counter-response that declares loud and clear, “thus far and no further.” The truth is the giant Islam sleeps lightly and in that sleep continues to dream of conquest and subjugation.

The much misunderstood and misrepresented crusades of nine-hundred years ago were, contrary to popular belief, not an incursion into “Muslim territory” but an eleventh hour response by the political powers of Europe to a ferocious Muslim incursion that had swept out of the Arabian peninsula, across the Levant and North Africa with devastating effect. It had already arrived in the islands of the Mediterranean and settled in Southern Spain. Surely we can’t allow things to go so far and cost so much again.

But maybe by the time we sit down to count the cost of protecting our freedoms and values, the cost of appeasement, it will be found to be costly beyond our means. Then we will treat for peace and discover that Islam is no more gracious in victory than she is tempered and proportionate in response to slights and meaningless provocations.

The crimewave that shames the world - Robert Fisk, Commentators - The Independent

2010-09-07T19:28:00.001Z

This is a must-read. The inimitable Robert Fisk, author of Pity the Nation and The Great War for Civilisation, has just ended a ten month investigation into honour killings around the world and today in the Independent Newspaper starts a four part report on his findings.

“It is a tragedy, a horror, a crime against humanity. The details of the murders – of the women beheaded, burned to death, stoned to death, stabbed, electrocuted, strangled and buried alive for the "honour" of their families – are as barbaric as they are shameful. Many women's groups in the Middle East and South-west Asia suspect the victims are at least four times the United Nations' latest world figure of around 5,000 deaths a year. Most of the victims are young, many are teenagers, slaughtered under a vile tradition that goes back hundreds of years but which now spans half the globe.

A 10-month investigation by The Independent in Jordan, Pakistan, Egypt, Gaza and the West Bank has unearthed terrifying details of murder most foul. Men are also killed for "honour" and, despite its identification by journalists as a largely Muslim practice, Christian and Hindu communities have stooped to the same crimes. Indeed, the "honour" (or ird) of families, communities and tribes transcends religion and human mercy. But voluntary women's groups, human rights organisations, Amnesty International and news archives suggest that the slaughter of the innocent for "dishonouring" their families is increasing by the year.

Iraqi Kurds, Palestinians in Jordan, Pakistan and Turkey appear to be the worst offenders but media freedoms in these countries may over-compensate for the secrecy which surrounds "honour" killings in Egypt – which untruthfully claims there are none – and other Middle East nations in the Gulf and the Levant. But honour crimes long ago spread to Britain, Belgium, Russia and Canada and many other nations. Security authorities and courts across much of the Middle East have connived in reducing or abrogating prison sentences for the family murder of women, often classifying them as suicides to prevent prosecutions.”

The crimewave that shames the world - Robert Fisk, Commentators - The Independent

Homosexual activist speaks at ‘Christian’ festival - CCFON.org - Christian Concern For Our Nation

2010-09-03T21:11:00.001Z

I know that Peter Tatchell is not every gay person but he is representative of a large tract of gay people, a gay icon and leading spokesman for the gay cause; hence his appearance at the Greenbelt Festival. When are the liberal-minded, naive Christian fellow-travellers of the gay agenda going to learn that this is not simply about a man preferring to have sexual relations with a man instead of with a woman. It is about the liberalising of sexual practices in general, the licensing of perversion, the promotion of promiscuity and the destruction of those standards that have made ours a civilised, Christian and stable society.

“Mr. Tatchell is well known for his view that the age of consent should be lowered to 14 for homosexuals. On his website he states that if children under 14 have consensual sex, and if there is no greater than a three year age differential, there should not be a prosecution.

Mr. Tatchell is also a strong advocate of pornography which he believes is good for people. In his book “Safer Sexy: The Guide to Gay Sex Safely” he writes approvingly of sadomasochism, bondage, infidelity, orgies and public cruising for sex.”

Greenbelt has always been controversial, seen by many as a Christian version of Glastonbury with its alternative agenda, but they now seem to have lost any connection they had with their Christian identity and will disappoint many many of its fans while confirming the worse fears of their critics.

Homosexual activist speaks at ‘Christian’ festival - CCFON.org - Christian Concern For Our Nation

Court case won't just look at Mormon polygamists; Muslims under scrunity too - Winnipeg Free Press

2010-08-26T19:36:00.001Z

A court case to determine whether Canada's polygamy laws violate religious protection might have been sparked by a fundamentalist Mormon sect in southeastern British Columbia, but the legal challenge will also examine rarely discussed polygamous practices among North America's Muslims.

Interesting to note that there is wide agreement among experts that women in polygamous marriages “had greater frequency and severity of a variety of psychiatric symptoms, decreased marital satisfaction, and lower self-esteem.” and that “more often than not, the practice is a harmful one.”

As one might expect, and certainly from the records of early Mormon polygamy, it is usually about power and the attitude of men towards their wives in this arrangement is abusive.

Court case won't just look at Mormon polygamists; Muslims under scrunity too - Winnipeg Free Press

Romance Is Not Dead – Quite.

2010-08-08T11:44:00.001Z

The Song of Songs compares love to “a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys. Like a Lily among thorns…”

Shakespeare compares his love to a summer’s day, declaring, “Thou art more more lovely and temperate.”

Robby Burns declares his love to be “like a red, red rose that’s newly sprung in June…like the melody that’s sweetly sung in tune.”

This week Robby Williams married and is reported to have compared his love to “a Swiss Army penknife because she can do everything.”

Its nice to know romance isn’t dead, though troubling to see her lingering on life support.

Ian Huntley’s Occupational Hazard

2010-07-31T21:40:00.001Z

I admit this story got my hackles up. When you have taken two innocent young girls and murdered them you should count yourself lucky that you are still alive, have a room and a bed and three square meals a day, let alone doctors, psychiatrists, counsellors, recreations… When even the worse of the criminal classes are so disgusted with what you have done that one of them takes a pop at you, then surely that is an occupational hazard and goes with the territory.

I am no flog ‘em and hang ‘em merchant and I do believe in rehabilitation but I wonder sometimes at the rights the worse of us enjoy that the rest of us can’t have. The one that always gets me is when someone has been prosecuted, tried and judged guilty of some terrible crime but fails to appear in court for sentencing. They refuse to come. Refuse to come!? They have forfeited any right to refuse and should be dragged kicking and screaming if necessary to face the full wrath of the society they have offended and should count their blessings that all they must face is the stern verdict of a judge and not the wrath of the mob.

Surely the first step to rehabilitation is facing what you have done. These days, if someone is caught standing over the body, with a gun in one hand, a blade in the other and a bottle of poison in their pocket they plead not guilty and, if found guilty, launch an appeal straight away, demanding a reduced sentence if not acquittal. “Fair cop guv’”? Not a chance these days.

BBC News - Soham killer Huntley 'should not sue' over jail attack

Editorial – Kay Parris: Glimpses of metanoia

2010-07-30T21:15:00.000Z

An excellent and thought-provoking comment by Kay Parris in the new online Reform magazine. Maybe it is the cult of personality that explains how we ended up with this dreadful chimera of a government that my daughter-in-law calls "The ConDemnation."

Editorial – Kay Parris: Glimpses of metanoia

Religious Liberty Monitoring: USA: not immune from Western religious liberty trends

2010-07-24T23:01:00.001Z

“The principal religious liberty trend of the multicultural West is that religious liberty is disappearing as the traditionally Judeo-Christian culture's Biblical foundations are being excavated. The excavation is integral to the social engineering/renovation project underway aimed at producing a 'post-Christian' culture. Unfortunately, most Christians do not comprehend the implications of this phenomenal strategic shift, and likely will not until the new social order has been consolidated and direct persecution starts to impact them personally.

Christians in the West are losing the right to criticise non-Christian (minority) religions (particularly Islam) and witness to non-Christians (particularly Muslims). They are also losing the right to conscientiously object to new social norms being imposed upon them essentially at the behest of radical feminist and Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgender (GLBT) lobby groups.”

This quote is from an excellent commentary on the threat to religious liberty posed by post-Christian, liberal social norms. The non-thinking nonsense in the two stories illustrating the piece is breathtaking. Its a long blog but, I think, well worth taking time to read.

One of my favourite quotes is from George Orwell who wrote,“Liberty is the right to tell people what they don’t want to hear.” This , as the blog illustrates, is being taken from us in the truly meaningless name of multiculturalism and tolerance. Some Christians are being taken in by this message, mainly because “tolerance” seems so right somehow, so typical of what Jesus would do. They need to remember that this same Jesus declared, “I am the way and the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me” (Jn. 14:6) Let’s define a couple of terms that are frequently abused today and bring them back to their true and original meaning, the meaning they had before the liberals got hold of them:

TOLERANCE: My dictionary gives the definition of an allowable variation from a standard dimension. In the liberal world there is no standard dimension and every worldview, philosophy and “lifestyle choice” is equally right. Tolerance, according to my dictionary, means indulgence of beliefs or practices different from one’s own. One who is tolerant is said to be practicing forbearance, to be enduring something. The language of tolerance then is endurance, forbearance, indulgence, allowance. To tolerate something is not to give it approval but to indulge it, to endure it for the greater good. Liberals would have us treat the words “tolerance” and “approval” as synonyms and fiercely condemn anyone who isn’t “tolerant” by this definition.

Democratic principles demand that, while I disagree profoundly with the tenets and practices of Islam, I am willing to endure its presence in a democratic society. I am not, however, bound to like, appreciate or approve of Islam and I am certainly not bound to welcome the colonisation of Western societies by Muslims with the attendant cultivation of Muslim principles and ideas.

PHOBIA: A phobia is defined as an exaggerated and illogical fear. Common phobias include fear of spiders, the dark, flying, indoors, outdoors etc. It does seem irrational for a grown person to fear a common house spider, or to fear going outdoors, but plenty of people do and many seek help to overcome them. This word has become almost meaningless as people are encouraged to think of those who disagree with them as phobic. The previous paragraph would, in the eyes of many, identify me as “Islamophobic.” I also adhere to the biblical view that homosexual practice is wrong in the eyes of God and this, to many, makes me “Homophobic”.

Of course, the old way of presenting the same idea is by dubbing people “anti” this, that or the other. Critics of Mormonism are dubbed “anti-Mormon”, of the Roman Church as “anti-Catholic” etc. In those days it was easier to see that these tags were often ways of avoiding the issues and dismissing the critic by naming and blaming. In those days fewer people got away with it.

Things have changed however and the liberal lobby has such a grip on society that people indifferent to faith issues don’t just tut in disapproval when they hear people declaring strongly held beliefs contra to the beliefs of others. These days, to hold strong beliefs, no matter how tolerant one is prepared to be towards others, is to risk vilification and possibly prosecution. Because you are allowed to be anything in the brave new world – as long as it is liberal and adheres to the new dictionary definitions prescribed by liberals.

Some Christians fail to see that, while democratic principles, tolerance, liberty and freedom are precious, nevertheless, our first loyalty is to the God of the Bible. I note that many who enjoy this new way of looking at the world move away, very quickly, from Scripture and instead embrace the values of fallen man. If freedom and tolerance mean immorality, compromise, idol worship and worldliness then we had better get back to the true definitions of those terms. More urgently, we had better get back to God’s Word. Click on the link to read the Religious Liberty Monitor review.

Religious Liberty Monitoring: USA: not immune from Western religious liberty trends

Something for the Weekend: Plaid MEP, Jill Evans heralds Historic day for Welsh language in the European Parliament (From Western Telegraph)

2010-07-23T19:59:00.001Z

The language of heaven is finally accepted in the European Parliament as Plaid Cymru (Party of Wales) MEP Jill Evans delivers a seminar on language policy in her native tongue. Mrs Evans insists that the EU could develop a better relationship with its citizens by using the languages people actually speak.

"Currently Welsh enjoys a semi-official status after a long hard campaign. It is now my goal to use this historic day to push for Welsh to be a fully recognised EU language" she said.

The EU translates documents and speeches into 23 “official languages.” At its inception the official languages of the EU were Dutch, French, German and Italian but as it has grown more languages have been included, such as Danish, English and Irish (added 1973), Greek (1981), Portuguese and Spanish (1986) and Finnish and Swedish (1995).

The first thing that often comes to people’s minds when the subject is raised is the cost and, of course, this has to be a consideration. The argument is often put that most people speak English, certainly everyone in Wales does, so what exactly is the point? The argument is made that if we stick with a few languages that most people speak then why go to such trouble and expense just to please people?

“Just the Facts Ma’am”

This famous line attributed (incorrectly) to Sgt. Joe Friday of the Dragnet police drama perhaps epitomises the spirit of a world that puts a high premium on data, facts and efficiency, a world imprisoned by literalistic ways of thinking. In such a world the ability to convey “just the facts” seems paramount. But he world is about a lot more than simple facts, and language conveys more than facts, it conveys culture, heritage, custom and creates identity and belonging. As the Welsh anthem has it:

Mae hen wlad fy nhadau yn annwyl i mi,
Gwlad beirdd a chantorion, enwogion o fri;
Ei gwrol ryfelwyr, gwladgarwyr tra mâd,
Dros ryddid collasant eu gwaed.

(Cytgan - Chorus)

Gwlad, gwlad, pleidiol wyf i'm gwlad.

Tra môr yn fur i'r bur hoff bau,

O bydded i'r hen iaith barhau.

Don’t try it at home, you’ll only hurt yourself. The following is one translation of the whole song:

The land of my fathers is dear to me,
Old land where the minstrels are honoured and free;
Its warring defenders so gallant and brave,
For freedom their life's blood they gave.

Home, home, true am I to home,

While seas secure the land so pure,

O may the old language endure.

Old land of the mountains, the Eden of bards,
Each gorge and each valley a loveliness guards;
Through love of my country, charmed voices will be
Its streams, and its rivers, to me.

Though foemen have trampled my land 'neath their feet,
The language of Cambria still knows no retreat;
The muse is not vanquished by traitor's fell hand,
Nor silenced the harp of my land.

Who Are You?

What is the harp, the bard, Eisteddfodau (Welsh cultural festival), valley and mountain, choir and chapel, coal mine and slate quarry, Welsh Rugby, Welsh history and politics to one not Welsh? In the same way, each culture claims its own distinguishing features, its foods and customs, its traditions and festivals, its habits of mind and action and its language in which all these are expressed in a way not entirely possible in translation.

This is important, not just because the culture, heritage and identity of 611,000 Welsh speakers in Wales are represented in the European Parliament but because if we don’t know who we are, don’t have a clear idea of our identity we risk losing it.

Civitas is the Institute for the Study of Civil Society and in a recent report claimed that new hate crime legislation is preventing free speech and singling out alleged crimes by white Christians. A foreword to its report ‘A New Inquisition: religious persecution in Britain today’ argues that prosecutors and police are interpreting laws in favour of ethnic and religious minorities. The report calls for a public enquiry into whether religion-based groups in the criminal justice system are driving a campaign of bias against the majority population defined as ‘white’ or ‘Christian’.

In a week when the despicable Nick Griffin was barred at the last minute from a Buckingham Palace official party and is making capital of the fact, complaining on the basis that he represents 1million voters in the UK, it is well to remember that if the majority population feels under attack the fault lies as much with ourselves as anyone. If we see richness and colour in others’ cultures but not our own, if we are unsure about our place as a people in the market of world cultures and if we too easily concede to others who have strong cultural identities then it lies with us to stop blaming those others, rediscover who we are and be proud of our heritage and values. Maybe this weekend we could think about who we are and what it really means to us.

BBC News - David Cameron launches Tories' 'big society' plan

2010-07-19T11:03:00.001Z

Speaking to the BBC before the speech, Mr Cameron rejected suggestions that the plans [for a big society]were "cover" for substantial cuts in public services in many areas as the government tries to cut the deficit.

"It is not a cover for anything," he told BBC One's Breakfast. "This would be a great agenda whether we were having to cut public spending or whether we were increasing public spending.

"This is not about trying to save money, it is about trying to have a bigger, better society."

Margaret Thatcher told us that there is no such thing as society, meaning of course that there is no autonomous entity called society to catch you if you fall and we all have to take responsibility. Now David Cameron tells us that there is little else but society, meaning – well the same thing really. They are two sides of the same coin.

It was worrying to hear him tell Phil Redmond that he got his “Big Society” idea from watching Grange Hill. What I want to know is, if we are all going to take more responsibility for things and government is going to do less, will we pay less in taxes, moving the resources as well as the task to the big society, or will we pay the same or more in taxes leaving the weak to go to the wall – Social Darwinism which has always been a key Tory philosophy?

BBC News - David Cameron launches Tories' 'big society' plan

Something For The Weekend

2010-07-16T19:37:00.001Z

When I first saw the headline “Christians Complain about EastEnders” I thought perhaps some group of culturally savvy Christians had had enough, made a stand and demanded this poor excuse for a TV drama be taken off our TV screens. But no, this country’s taste for low end, badly-written, poorly acted and depressingly repetitive kitchen sink drama is nowhere near being satiated.

I remember when these programmes were interesting portrayals of lives lived out on the gritty streets of Northern towns, or farming communities in the Dales. But I haven’t watched one since Ena Sharples got buried under the railway viaduct and everyone in the snug of the Rover’s Return commiserated with Ena’s best friend, Minnie Caldwell, buying her milk stouts and lending a shoulder to cry on.

These days, soaps are a grotesque parody of themselves as they present increasingly implausible plots in a breakneck race to top the previous week’s plot with ever-more improbably complicated relationships and more incredible cliff-hangers to keep an increasingly credulous public on the edge their seats awaiting the next excruciating episode. Anyone who followed Jimmy McGovern’s groundbreaking drama, The Street, in recent times will surely have been spoiled for this sort of pap served up three times a week, the opiate of the people.

No, the complaint is about the portrayal of a Pentecostal pastor who turns out to be your typical neighbourhood wacky Christian wife murderer. It is a negative portrayal, they insist, and wonder if the BBC would have portrayed a Muslim cleric in such a bad light. I see what they mean, of course, but it isn’t as if this is a departure from the norm when it comes to portraying Christians in TV dramas. And isn’t this “you wouldn’t do it to Muslims” lark wearing a bit thin. It’s true enough but it is a tired old argument that everyone knows is true but it falls on deaf ears.

The aforementioned Ena Sharples, if I recall, was the caretaker of the local mission hall back in the ‘60s, and she was a right busybody, criticising the lifestyles of other inhabitants of Coronation Street and telling them to “think on.” A popular ploy for drama writers is to make the vicar gay (I think that was EastEnders too), or a woman in a comedy role – the vicar of Dibley, a limp and overwhelmed by it all liberal, as in the latest TV comedy “Rev”, or a hellfire and damnation, Pope-hating, Presbyterian with a Northern Irish accent (you couldn’t make it up)

What concerns me, however, is not how Christians are portrayed on television. After all, dramas revolve around conflict, that is built on character flaws and the bible is chock full of those, and comedy is founded on an oblique look at the ridiculous, and how can that happen if the vicar isn’t somehow funny, intentionally or otherwise. No, what bothers me is that Christians watch EastEnders. I think people who watch these things can distinguish between a dramatised portrayal of the clergy and the local pastor in their street. But what will they think of the faith when Christians show themselves so unimaginative in their choice of entertainment? Like sin, poor taste is something you expect from the world but, surely Christians need to aim much higher.

I’m Glad You Asked…

2010-07-14T15:35:00.001Z

I am at an age when I am increasingly dependent on the wonders of modern medicine to keep me upright and functioning. “It comes to us all” is what they say and it certainly hasn’t given my house a miss, although there are times when I wish it had. As part of my drug-dependent regime I take a glass of water to bed every night and take my two final pills of the day.

Every Tuesday evening I have the thrilling task of emptying the bins around the house and putting out the rubbish, recycling etc. and when it comes to my bedtime routine, I reach for two tablets from the strip at my bedside and, would you believe it, they are the last two in the strip, every fortnight the last two in the box and so I throw the strip in the bin. Now call me fussy but it offends my fastidious nature that a bin so recently emptied should so soon begin to fill.

How can this be? What is going on that every Tuesday I should suffer this frustration? That strip, that box could have been out on the pavement with the rest of the rubbish waiting to be picked up early next morning. It is one of those things that irks you each time it happens but you just as quickly forget about it and get on with your life (I think I ought to say that my wife thinks I’m more than a little unhinged to worry about this, but she doesn’t throw an empty strip into a bin she has just emptied – or have I missed something here?)

This week I decided to get to the bottom of this mystery, sat down with a strip of tablets, a calendar and a calculator and figured it out. (I lied about the calculator actually and only put it in for dramatic effect. Also, I did have a calendar but in my head. I don’t want people to get the impression I can’t count and don’t know what day it is) There are fourteen tablets on a strip and two strips in a box. I take two tablets every night, start a strip on a Wednesday and, therefore, come-to-my-last-two-tablets-the-following-Tuesday-evening and the last two in the box every other Tuesday. The sense of relief, I can’t tell you! (I know, I ought to get out more)

Its with not a little pride I can tell you that I broke the cycle last night – today being Wednesday and the day the rubbish is collected. When I emptied the bin in my bedroom I took the two remaining pills, placed them on the bedside cabinet, and threw said strip, and the box as it happens, into the rubbish to be taken away. Oh, the sense of triumph! Tomorrow the WORLD!

Life can be like that. Something troubles you but not enough for you to actually give it serious thought. But each time it arises this bothersome and unresolved issue winds you up. For a lot of people questions of faith can be like that. Something is reported on the news, or happens locally, and someone asks, “If there is a God why…” Someone close to us dies and for a moment we feel prompted to ask some of the bigger questions, the “God that’s not fair!” questions. But then life presses in on us and soon the questions are laid aside for another day.

I’m Glad You Asked…

When I am asked such questions, sometimes quite challenging questions I can find it a struggle to answer, not because I don’t have an answer, but because I don’t have a neat, glib sound-bite answer to do justice to what is often a very good question. I want to say, “I’m glad you asked. Can you set aside some hours to talk about this?” And, of course, people are busy and very reluctant to commit the time, afraid perhaps of what they might be drawn into.

But, just like my puzzle over tablets and bin day, sometimes you just have to stop and give it some serious thought. Just as I sat down with a calculator, a calendar and blister strip (OK, there wasn’t a calculator, but you get my meaning) so you, if your questions are serious, must sit down with a Bible, a Christian friend and maybe a good book or study guide if you are going to get real answers.

I often ask people if they are readers because many people are not these days, which is a great pity for all sorts of reasons. If they are, or at least are open-minded enough, I suggest they go and browse around their local Christian bookshop. They would be amazed, I insist, at how many of life’s questions, how many big issues are addressed in Christian books, journals and magazines and how determined, serious-minded Christians are to understand the world. A Christian bookshop is just that, i.e. a bookshop. It isn’t a “truth shop” where all issues are answered definitively and where dogma is sold by the pound but a bookshop where people with different views are represented and ideas are presented to get explored, tried and tested.

Why don’t you come to church? I ask them and, as they give a wary look, explain that churches hold courses where these questions are addressed and answers are sought. Sermons inform as well as challenge, enthuse and convict. Why not come and listen to a few? Why not come over for a coffee and spend an hour or two talking about things, maybe make a start on the journey of discovery that begins with the kind of questions you are asking? Because the big questions are not destinations but departure points and you have to be prepared for the journey of discovery that leads to the answers. Otherwise, why ask?

Be as wary as you like, sit near the door at church, tell the bookseller you’re “just looking” but don’t put it off any longer. Make a move, get a Bible, ask a trusted Christian friend, put that best seller down, good as it is, and pick up a Christian book that looks like it might be interesting, informative and helpful. Come over for a chat some time and lets talk about God and what’s fair and not fair, and what’s it all about, and why you want to do the right thing but so often find yourself doing the wrong thing, and what happens when you die, and does evolution disprove God, and…well you get the picture. Give it time, and effort and you might be surprised what answers come if you just ask.

Here are some books I have personally found very helpful:

A Fresh Start, by John Chapman and published by Matthias Media tackles some of life’s fundamental questions.
God That’s Not Fair, by Dick Dowsett, published by OM, addresses some of the really hard questions people ask
Six Modern Myths, by Philip Sampson, and published by IVP, is a look at six popular myths about the church in history and society, from Galileo to Environmentalism
Knowing God and Knowing Christianity, by JI Packer and published by Hodder and Staughton and Eagle respectively are excellent insights into the God of the Bible and the faith of a Christian
Why I am a Christian, by John Stott and published by IVP is a refreshing insight into one man’s reasons for embracing the Christian Faith.
The Puzzle of God, by Peter Vardy and published by Harper Collins is a more philosophical look at the subject
You Can’t be Serious, by Michael Green and published by Monarch is a serious look at 12 reasons for avoiding Jesus
At the Heart of the Universe, by Peter Jensen and published by IVP is a close look at what Christians believe about God, man and the purpose at the heart of the universe
There is a God, by Anthony Flew and published by Harper Collins is, in the words of the author, an account of “How the world’s most notorious atheist changed his mind”
Simply Christianity, by John Dickson and published by Matthias Media, is a reading of Luke’s Gospel with simple but challenging commentary designed to discover what is simply Christianity when all the extraneous stuff is stripped away.

There must be something there that caught your attention and made you think it might be worth turning off the TV and curling up with a cup of tea and a book. If you do take up the challenge to do more than ask the questions, more than dismiss God with a wave of your hand as you walk away still bemused, let me know. Write to me and we can have a chat about it. I always like to chat about my faith and hear what others have discovered on the journey. Your here until you go so you may as well make the best of it. Who knows but that it might turn out better and more meaningful than you ever dreamed or imagined?

Italy appeals against ban on school crucifixes - Telegraph

2010-07-04T20:30:00.001Z

Why are so many non-believers such miserable nuisance neighbours? They have a real dog-in-the-manger attitude to religion. Not happy to have God in their own lives they are determined that no one else should either. I hear people sometimes say, “Don’t push your religion down my throat!” I feel like saying, “Don’t push your secular, neo-Darwin, aimless and nihilistic word-view down MY throat!”

Freedom of religion does not mean freedom from religion. If you want freedom from religion you will have to find another planet to inhabit because this world is filled with believers of one kind or another. It colours our lives, informs our society and, when it comes to Christianity, it is the foundation of the very schools from which you want to remove all signs of it. Talk about biting the hand that feeds you.

Italy appeals against ban on school crucifixes - Telegraph

Exclusive: The Breathless Celts

2010-07-04T18:16:00.001Z

With the new Condem alliance threatening cuts of between 25% and 40% across the board and in all departments this column can exclusively reveal how the regions, and especially the peripheral, Celtic nations of the UK will carry the brunt of those cuts.

A leaked document today reveals that the North of England will be closed from Friday to Monday, while the Midlands will close early on Tuesdays and Fridays. Regions further south will remain open, but will see a ban on every mode of transport except walking and piggy backs. Residents across the UK are encouraged to go to bed early, especially as the days get shorter, to save on electricity. The Home Counties are under review, although there are no plans for any such radical money-saving measures because that’s where David Cameron lives.

But in a move that some commentators say makes Margaret Thatcher look like a socialist citizens of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are being asked to hold their breath when there is an ‘R’ in the month. The leaked document reveals the government’s concern that there isn’t enough air to go around after MPs have debated the issue. Other ideas for making such savings include restricting women to only breathing out, an idea that was rejected when someone pointed out that most women can talk breathing in, a feat of multitasking considered vital to the nation.

A member of the Welsh Assembly, when asked to comment, said that policies were still under consideration and everyone was holding their breath in anticipation of official announcements. “After all”, she observed, “we might need the practice.”

BBC News - Duncan Smith considers incentives to relocate jobless

2010-06-27T12:17:00.002Z

“Unemployed people living in council homes could be offered incentives to move to areas where there are jobs, the work and pensions secretary has said.”

It was only going to be a matter of time but even I am surprised at how quickly this Condem government has come around to Norman Tebbit’s way of thinking. And this old recidivist Tory policy has been dusted off and wheeled out by the acceptable face of Ian Duncan Smith (left). They have already started thinking of the disabled as benefit cheats and the old as retiring too early, now they are talking about the working population as work shy and feckless people who need to be encouraged to “get on your bike” and move across the country to find work. Their disdain for “the great unwashed” is palpable, shameful and all-too-typical.

And where are these jobs for which people should mount their bikes and ride? They are depending on the private sector taking up the slack but have absolutely no control over that and so no guarantee of a jobs market to which bikes may be confidently ridden.They have plans to savagely cut back on public services, throwing hundreds of thousands of people out of their jobs, swelling further the ranks of the unemployed and shrinking considerably the amount of money people have to spend.

With millions more unemployed, belts being tightened and significantly less money to spend in the country what on earth reason for hope can the private sector have in the prospects for growth and expansion? Why should they invest in a country that has more and more people out of work and less and less money to spend? In a shrinking market and a growing liability? But of course the next step in this grand design (Oh, the plan, the plan) is to get rid of the minimum wage so that those nice people at the CBI can bank on a growing population of slave labour.

I am reminded of that verse in Exodus which declares that “there arose a new king over Egypt, that did not know Joseph.” That king’s policies led to slavery for Israel. In the same way it might be said that a king arose in Downing Street about which this new generation knew nothing; but they will soon learn, they will soon learn. Welcome to the 1980’s, a place of individual wealth and collective poverty, of blaming the poor and celebrating the wealthy, of social Darwinism, a meritocracy in which only the strong survive.
BBC News - Duncan Smith considers incentives to relocate jobless

BBC News - 'No foetal pain before 24 weeks'

2010-06-25T22:57:00.001Z

“There is no new evidence to show foetuses feel pain in the womb before 24 weeks, and so no reason to challenge the abortion limit, UK doctors say.

The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists' review said foetuses are "undeveloped and sedated".

Brain connections are not fully formed, and the environment of the womb creates a state of induced sleep, like unconsciousness, they add.”

One expert explained that this latest research says nothing about the ethics of abortion. It simply tells doctors whether the foetus feels pain when aborted. If the findings went the other way then the doctor could anaesthetise the foetus before aborting it.

So let me see if I understand this. If it can’t feel the pain of its demise then its alright to kill it. By this logic if it is anaesthetised, in “a state of induced sleep”, in other words the nerves are prevented from sending signals to the brain cortex, then it can be killed – whatever it is. Old for example, disabled, unwanted, inconvenient, the list seems endless.

Oh, brave new world that has such people in it.

BBC News - 'No foetal pain before 24 weeks'

Brave New World

2010-06-23T22:38:00.000Z

I don't usually do political comment but I have been catching some of the budget debate in the Commons after the ConDem Alliance emergency budget. I can't let this moment pass without offering my heartfelt condolences to all those who voted for the fair-minded, progressive, metrosexual, Europhile champions of minorities, the LibDems only to wake up to the nightmare of a totally macroeconomics driven, right wing, minority bashing, homophobic, slash and burn Tory budget. I have one proverbial piece of advice for you. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Now you have seen that the Liberal party only flies a flag of convenience and is more than happy to negotiate principles for power you know better next time.

I think perhaps the country might resist the temptation to toy with proportional representation now they have seen what happens when their favourite cuddly politicians take power. It has been a lot like watching the film Gremlins. One minute you just want to run up to nice Nick Clegg and shake his hand, the next Calamity Clegg is doing monstrous things to your job, your public services and your bank balance. Take it from me, if it isn't nailed down they will have it off you before you can say "redundant and homeless" - unless your a city banker of course.

BBC News - 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

2010-05-21T08:13:00.001Z

Scientists in the US have succeeded in developing the first synthetic living cell.

The researchers constructed a bacterium's "genetic software" and transplanted it into a host cell.

The resulting microbe then looked and behaved like the species "dictated" by the synthetic DNA.

This reminds me of the story of a group of scientists who, after years of work, finally produced a human being. They realised in their moment of triumph that someone had to take on the onerous job of telling God that he was redundant. No one was keen to do it and so they drew straws and the one who got the short straw got the task.

God listened patiently as this man explained that, in light of recent scientific advancements, God was now surplus to requirements. Then God said, “Alright, I see your point. Lets have a contest.”

“What sort of contest?” asked the scientist.

“Well”, said God, “You make a human being and I make a human being and whoever makes the better model gets the job while the other retires.”

“Alright”, said the scientist as he stooped down to take up a handful of soil.

“What are you doing?” asked God.

“I’m collecting up some of the basic building blocks of life” the scientist replied.

“Oh, no”, God said, “That’s cheating. You go and get your own dirt.”

No doubt there will be those who will worry about this latest development and, certainly, there are serious ethical issues to be considered. However it should be remembered that this synthetic living cell, while its creation is an incredible achievement, hasn’t actually been “created.” The genetic information pre-existed, as did the host cell, and what science has done is effectively copy the former and put it into the structure of the latter. No mean feat I am sure but nowhere near the actual act or process of “creation” as described in the Bible.

It is rather like typing this blog post. These words were already there, the computer on which I am typing already existed and, although I like to think there is some originality in my creating this post, the ideas were already out there. What I have done is take all these pre-existing factors and ordered them such that they express my thoughts. The worrying thing about this development is not that science is somehow making God redundant but that humans are doing these things without any reference to God. But then we have been doing this for some time now and on the whole the world is a worse place for it. As the writer of Ecclesiastes wrote, “There is nothing new under the sun.”

BBC News - 'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists

Christian preacher arrested by homosexual police officer for saying that homosexuality is a sin - CCFON.org - Christian Concern For Our Nation

2010-05-07T20:51:00.001Z

Gays in uniform are now taking the law into their own hands. It is not enough that they are legal, they have to make anyone and everyone who disagrees with them illegal. They as fascist as any right-wing movement that defames and condemns them. Mail on Sunday columnist Peter Hitchens wrote:

‘The Public Order Act of 1986 was not meant to permit the arrest of Christian preachers in English towns for quoting from the Bible. But it has. The Civil Partnerships Act 2004 was not meant to force public servants to approve of homosexuality. But it has.

‘The Sexual Offences Act of 1967 was not meant to lead to a state of affairs where it is increasingly dangerous to say anything critical about homosexuality. But it did.

‘And the laws of Britain, being entirely based upon the Christian Bible, were not meant to be used by a sneering judge to declare that Christianity had no higher status in this ancient Christian civilisation than Islam, Buddhism or Hinduism.

‘But it has come to that this week,’ he wrote.

‘We have travelled in almost no time from repression, through a brief moment of mutual tolerance, to a new repression. And at the same time, the freedom of Christians to follow their beliefs in workplaces is under aggressive attack.’

Christian preacher arrested by homosexual police officer for saying that homosexuality is a sin - CCFON.org - Christian Concern For Our Nation

Religious Liberty Monitoring: PERSECUTION, whatever that is.

2010-05-04T16:20:00.001Z

A thoughtful and intelligent blog on the nature of persecution asking whether we are being “persecuted” in the UK. Elizabeth Kendal’s Religious Liberty Monitoring blog is well worth the time to visit.

“When it comes to showing what we believe about the Lordship of the Risen Christ, I advocate that the Church stop wasting time appealing to "Pharaoh" (Exodus 5:15) and instead, look to the Lord, our crowing glory, for the "strength to turn back the battle at the gate" (Isaiah 28:5-6).”

Religious Liberty Monitoring: PERSECUTION, whatever that is.

Life on Mars and PC Tact

2010-04-29T16:33:00.001Z

“My name is Sam Tyler. I had an accident and I woke up in 1973. Am I mad, or in a comma, or back in time?” So says the voice of Sam Tyler, a 21st Century police officer, over the opening credits of the hit BBC TV drama series Life on Mars, first broadcast in January 2006. It ran to two series and was such a phenomenon it was followed up by another series, Ashes to Ashes, featuring another character, Alex Drake, this time thrown back to 1983 as the result of being shot in the line of duty.

Both meet the same characters “back then” and both suffer culture shock as they have to adapt not just to the more primitive policing methods but the customs and idiom of those very different times. Both series are packed with politically incorrect dialogue and assumptions as we follow the very un-PC Detective Inspector Gene Hunt and his team in their efforts to keep the streets safe.

You can sympathise with the main characters’ impatience with and attempts at correcting unreformed police officers who call a deaf boy a “spastic”, who regard WPCs as being there to make the tea and be leered at, who make gags at the expense of black people and homosexuals and who regard criminals as deserving of “a good kicking.” Thank goodness for most of us the world isn’t like that anymore. But is it any better?

If roles were reversed and DI Gene Hunt were to wake up in 2010 how would he faire? Of course, he wouldn’t last five minutes because in that time he would have broken just about every anti-discrimination law in the country, not to mention health and safety. But what would he think of a world where a question from a pensioner about immigration becomes an international news story?

Where we allow our society to be slowly colonised by Muslims at the same time as we are at war with Muslim countries and Muslims are becoming suicide bombers on our streets – and we are not even allowed to talk about it for fear of being labelled Islamophobic?

What would he think of the proliferation of mosques across the country when young Muslims are being radicalised in some of those same mosques? Of the rise in popularity of the BNP and the real and frankly frightening prospect of Nick Griffin getting a seat in the British parliament and all because no one else is prepared to talk about the problems of immigration and he cashes in on that fact?

What would Gene Hunt make of a Britain where our libel laws are so wacky that “libel tourism” has become a major problem and Eastern European as well as other criminals, businessmen and politicians are flocking to our shores to sue investigative journalists who are getting too close to the facts? Where a journalist is guilty until proven innocent? Where foreign criminals are enslaving girls and running them as sex slaves in our towns and streets?

What would he make of a country where broadcast news is no longer news but tittle-tattle and gossip. Where the cult of celebrity puts no-talent nobodies on the front pages of our newspapers? Where news broadcasters do pieces to camera while the main event goes on behind them because they believe their comment and opinion is more valuable than those of the people who actually run the country, its businesses and services?

What would Gene Hunt think of a country where we are policed at a distance by cameras and are now the most scrutinised society after China and Russia? Where teachers run the real risk of being physically attacked, maligned on social networking sites, accused of abuse and little or nothing to be done because we are currently in the grip of the cult of the child? Where having a baby is regarded by some as a career move and others as an occupational hazard? Where aborting a baby is considered so inconsequential that it is possible to do it in your lunch break, like going for a dump?

How would he faire in this brave new world where we are all so PC, not because it makes for a better world but because of some misplaced guilt over our patriarchal history of empire that makes us feel we have to be the world’s social worker and “understand” how hard it must be having been our victims? Where we are actually implicated in charges of torture along with our “special friends” and war allies? Where right and wrong are defined not by agreed standards of decency and morality but by who has the money to sue you if you don’t toe the line they draw and dare you to cross, those who cry, “its our world now so have a care how you walk in it or we will have you for dinner!”

There have always been problems and each generation must find its own way to deal with them but the one “solution” that must be avoided like the jaws of hell is the one that insists, like Basil Fawltey, “Don’t mention the war (or immigration, or abortion, or over-surveillance, or Islamification)!” If we can’t express our views, share our fears and hopes, declare our convictions and speak our minds without fear of retribution and the PC brigade then we are storing up problems that may explode in a reaction of violence that we neither want nor can fully realise until it is too late.

George Orwell said, “Liberty is the freedom to tell people what they don’t want to hear.” That liberty is in real danger in Britain and while we are all arguing terms on what terms we can use in public discourse and private conversation there are those with a very different agenda planning our future and that of our children. Maybe we need a Gene Hunt to share with us some well overdue home truths and perhaps it doesn’t matter too much in what terms as long as we face them.

Yes, it is a different world and in some ways the changes are welcome, but is it really a better world? I don’t think so.

French Catholic Church launches campaign to attract young believers - Telegraph

2010-04-26T20:45:00.002Z

"France's Catholic Church has launched a vast poster campaign whose English slogan is "Jesus is my Boss" in a bid to convince young believers that becoming a priest can be hip.
The poster, featuring a cheery young man's face superimposed onto a wacky yellow and green collage, also bears the question in English: "Why Not?"

This at the same time as Catholic leaders in England and Wales issue an apology and express their “deep sorrow for decades of child abuse.” Read more here

“Decades?” More like centuries, a millennium! This scandal goes back a thousand years and involves some of the greatest names in Catholic history. One leading historian says that during the Middle Ages, “in some areas the mere fact of having taken Orders seems to have rendered one liable top the suspicion of being a sodomite.” (John Boswell)

In 1651 in Florence an Apologia for schoolmasters falling for their children recommended boys between nine and eighteen, “although there is no fixed rule, since some retain their boyishness longer, and others fade early, just as some full round, little boys excite you from infancy.” (L’Alcibiade fanciullo a scuolo, in Michael Rocke, Forbidden Friendships p.95)

In her excellent book Fallen Order Karen Liebreich draws comparisons across the centuries with her account of paedophile priests in 17th-century Italy. Implicated is Fr. Jose’ de Calasanz, founder of the Piarist Order to house and educate the poor children of Rome. He was created patron saint of all Christian schools in 1948. His Order was so rife with abuse that in 1646 was abolished by the pope. Every aspect of abuse and how the church deals with it that so disturbs us today has a long and shameful history going back centuries.

The British Foreign Office has apologised for a leaked internal memo suggesting ways to make the Pope’s impending visit successful. These included having him blessing a gay marriage, opening an abortion clinic and launching his own brand of condoms. Richard Dawkins has put his name to a campaign to have the Pope arrested for crimes against humanity for the alleged cover-up of abuse in the Catholic Church.

Apologies have been issued for the leaked memo and, of course, Dawkins’ love of the limelight is well know so this latest stunt shouldn’t be taken seriously. However, after protests, crippling law suits and worldwide condemnation following the most damning publicity they still don’t seem to get it. It is not a local difficulty, neither is it one or two generations that have suffered the abuse.

They can’t stand outside of this and look on with disapproval alongside the rest of us. Abuse is historic and endemic in the Catholic Church and the church can no longer be a law to itself, hiding behind the conceit of being a state with its own legislative system. Their system doesn’t work, their laws protect the criminals, their tradition puts perpetrators before victims and brings shame and distress to honest Catholics, priesthood and laity, around the world. The church needs to offer what it demands of its members, full confession and heartfelt repentance.

French Catholic Church launches campaign to attract young believers - Telegraph

e100 challenge - The Program

2010-04-25T20:14:00.001Z

This is an initiative by Wycliffe to encourage Bible reading. The Bible reading habit has declined alarmingly among Christians and it is a cause of great concern. This looks like a great programme from the real experts in Bible translation and distribution.

WHAT IS THE E100 CHALLENGE?
The Essential 100 Challenge™ (The E100) is an effective Bible reading program built around 100 carefully selected short Bible passages — 50 from the Old Testament and 50 from the New Testament. It enables people in your church to get the big picture of God's Word and in the process develop a daily Bible reading habit.

e100 challenge - The Program

BBC News - Doctor Who fans angered by trailer for Over the Rainbow

2010-04-25T16:52:00.001Z

That irritating little Irishman ruins things just by turning up. Please, can someone bring back my Saturday evening viewing? It used to be full of professional entertainers – actors, comedians, singers - but now I turn on to watch people rehearsing, auditioning, and all commented on by an irritating little Irishman who thinks everyone is thrilled to see him. I might put out a contract.

“Thousands of Doctor Who fans have contacted the BBC to complain that the ending of Saturday night's episode was ruined by a trailer for the next show.

The on-screen caption featured an animated cartoon of presenter Graham Norton, host of Over the Rainbow.

It appeared as The Doctor, played by Matt Smith, was making an emotional speech during the story's cliffhanger ending for The Time of Angels.”

BBC News - Doctor Who fans angered by trailer for Over the Rainbow

BBC News - Iranian cleric blames quakes on promiscuous women

2010-04-20T20:27:00.001Z

Next time the earth moves for you consider the possible consequences.

“Promiscuous women are responsible for earthquakes, a senior Iranian cleric has said.

Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi told worshippers in Tehran last Friday that they had to stick to strict codes of modesty to protect themselves.

"Many women who do not dress modestly lead young men astray and spread adultery in society which increases earthquakes," he said.”

BBC News - Iranian cleric blames quakes on promiscuous women

Primark, Padded Bikinis and the Paedophile Pound.

2010-04-14T21:16:00.001Z

A push up bra for very young girls from Asda, a pole dancing kit for children from Tesco, Playboy children’s stationary from W H Smith and now a padded bikini top for girls as young as seven from Primark. It seems our public morals are being determined purely by commercial interests and, as someone observed, this is a bid for the paedophile pound.

What astonishes me is that someone sat down and considered this a good idea.

‘Clothing chain Primark has withdrawn the sale of its range of padded bikini tops for girls as young as seven following criticism.

The company apologised to customers for "causing offence" and said it would donate profits to a children's charity.

The Children's Society criticised Primark for "premature sexualisation and unprincipled advertising".’

BBC News - Padded bikini for girls withdrawn

Latest News - Gospel for Asia UK

2010-04-13T21:36:00.001Z

Ignorance and superstition defeated by light and faith. God still works today, you just have to look.

The people in Rijul's village worshiped a plethora of gods and goddess, and Rijul's family was no different. But there was one god that captured most of their devotion.

Rijul and his family believed if they worshiped this god, it would give them power to have victory over their enemies. But Rijul received no strength as he battled his own inner weaknesses.

Charity in a Moral Vacuum?

2010-03-20T13:12:00.001Z

By last night (20/03/’10) the popular charity initiative Sport Relief had raised almost £30 million for charitable causes both abroad and in the UK. Via telethons and sponsored events such as running the Sport Relief Mile huge sums have flooded into the charity and much more is expected to be raised in events up and down the country this weekend.

You would have to be churlish to the point of perverse to not celebrate the good-hearted generosity of people and the great and practical good that is done as a result of such events. From the now historic Band Aid concert, through the well established British institution Comic Relief to Sport Relief and even the money raised for causes by the National Lottery much good is done.

However, I can’t help but think that when we look back at 19th century missionary societies and, indeed, their 21st century counterparts, and consider how they are represented in our social and cultural histories they don’t come out well. Yet they did, and continue to do much the same in raising resources to help developing societies, feed the hungry, teach the ill-educated, protect the vulnerable – and share the gospel. This last is what our secular society finds little to celebrate about, being suspicious about the fact that what they do is done in the name of Christianity. But what is the difference between going into a country in the name of liberal democracy and insisting that something must be done and things have to change and doing the same in the name of Christian charity?

Christian teaching, building, nursing and, yes, evangelistic missions are carried out by people who have chosen to serve a moral cause because they have committed their lives to a moral course. Unlike the celebrities who front events like Sport Relief and who fly in for a few days filming and then fly out to talk endlessly into a camera about how harrowing and moving was their experience, Christian missionaries devote years, sometimes their whole lives in the cause to which they are committed. Sometimes they sacrifice their lives to serve their God by serving “the least of these” (Mt.25:45)

The difference, it seems to me, and the great advantage to a secular society of such charitable events as Sport Relief is that, where Christian missionaries serve a moral cause because committed to a moral course, here people can serve a moral cause without making a commitment to a moral course. In this way they can salve their conscience, feel they are doing some good, but make no fundamental change to the way they live their daily lives.

It looks as though they are living their lives in a morally neutral world. One in which they can give and serve if it suits but pass on the other side if not. But this is not a morally neutral world and the requirements, indeed commandments of the God who made us apply equally to everyone in it. That is why mission exists in its most fundamental, evangelistic form. It is ironic that, while many perhaps feel that charity without religion is the best of all possible worlds, the greatest good that can be done them in this world is to remind them of their obligations to God and of what he requires of them “in these last days” (Acts 17:29-30)

Every effort at helping and serving the needy and vulnerable is to be applauded but as Christians the greatest help we could ever offer is to pray for and be involved in the mission of the church to “go into all the world and tell the good news” (Mt.28:16-20) It is not always popular but we may as well nail our colours to the mast – the world has.

The Brick Testament

2010-03-07T23:22:00.002Z

Yes, this is the Bible in Lego Bricks. What made me smile was the content notice:

- CONTENT NOTICE -
The Bible contains material some may consider morally objectionable and/or inappropriate for children. These labels identify stories containing:
= nudity = sexual content = violence = cursing

Whoever said the Bible was not for today simply hasn’t read it lately.

The world's largest, most comprehensive illustrated Bible.

Genesis Garden of Eden, Cain and Abel, The Flood, Sodom & Gomorrah...
37 stories with 568 illustrations

Exodus Burning Bush, Plague of Frogs, Ten Commandments, The Golden Calf...
31 stories with 431 illustrations

Wilderness The Fire of Yahweh, Moses and Aaron Doomed, God Sends Snakes...
25 stories with 271 illustrations

The Brick Testament

Gay marriage plan threatens churches says Bishop of Winchester -Times Online

2010-03-06T22:39:00.001Z

So here’s the deal. Gay people insist on the right to marry. I don’t think it is meaningfully possible and object on social and religious grounds. But we live in a liberal democracy so I can hardly deny others the privilege that democracy affords me. But that is not enough – it never is. They want enshrined in law the right to marry in religious premises. Of course, there are already those liberal churches that afford this privilege without legal coercion but that is not enough – it never is. So the final situation stands something like this:

You have no right to force me as a gay person to comply with your religious code but I want enshrined in law the right to force you to act against your religious conscience. Nice!

‘Church of England clergy will be sued for discrimination if they refuse to “marry” homosexuals under a proposed law, a bishop has warned. Other religious leaders fear that churches that refuse to bless civil partnerships might be forced to close…

Don Horrocks, of the [Evangelical] alliance, said: “We understand the Lords’ desire to allow a few liberal religious groups to have freedom to follow their consciences. But other religious groups must not be forced to betray their consciences by facing lawsuits if they fail to allow a civil ceremony.

“This amendment hugely confuses the distinction between civil secular ceremonies and religious ceremonies, as well as the nature of marriage, and has major implications for the UK’s matrimonial laws which haven’t begun to be thought through.”’

Now this is going to upset some people I know personally but it has to be said. It is never enough, whatever you do to enshrine gay rights in law, it is never going to be enough.

In the UK there are calls for all kinds of “traditional” gay activities to be acceptable and legally protected now that basic gay rights are recognised. This includes the right to participate in cruising, the frequenting of public places for the purposes of casual sex – see here. It seems some wish to be free to liaise in places like the infamous Highgate Cemetery for instance without let or hindrance (shades of Joe Orton)

What next? The right to organise and participate in cottaging? As a young man I was more than once the target of such activities and I can tell you it is not the happy-go-lucky and wholesome activity some might have you believe. But this is the way it is going as the gay programme embraces any and all sexual activities once considered aberrant and wrong. The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender movement (LGBT) is vocal and growing in its call for the acceptance of any and everything that would overturn the accepted and traditional mores and customs of society. Likeminded people gathering around a common cause, or an example of my enemy’s enemy is my friend?Sociologist Mary Bernstein said:

"For the lesbian and gay movement, then, cultural goals include (but are not limited to) challenging dominant constructions of masculinity and femininity, homophobia, and the primacy of the gendered heterosexual nuclear family (heteronormativity). Political goals include changing laws and policies in order to gain new rights, benefits, and protections from harm." (Bernstein, Mary (2002). Identities and Politics: Toward a Historical Understanding of the Lesbian and Gay Movement. Social Science History 26:3 (fall 2002).

The “cause” is anarchic then and not simply about being accepted but about creating a social chaos out of which this new, promiscuous order will rise. Promiscuous?

There are faithful and good people who remain in gay relationships for a lifetime, this I know personally. But casual and promiscuous sex seem to be the overwhelming norm in the gay community. So, on one hand you have people that seek, reasonably in many eyes, to be accepted in homosexual relationship as equals in the wider society with heterosexual partnerships. But then you have many in that same community seeking to have the same wider society give licence for their promiscuous agenda.

Of course, when such concerns are expressed we are met with the same cry - “Homophobia!” Its a lot like talking to a Mormon who will cry “Anti-Mormon!” But crying foul and damning your critics as blind and ill-informed enemies hardly helps to move the discussion along and does nothing to address the genuine fears and concerns of intelligent people.

Gay marriage plan threatens churches says Bishop of Winchester -Times Online

BBC News - BNP votes to ditch whites-only membership rule

2010-02-14T21:40:00.001Z

Imagine that! Having to be equitable and inclusive in a liberal democracy. I think Black and Asian people should join in droves, achieve a majority voting block and vote the BNP out of existence.

The British National Party has voted to scrap its whites-only membership rules after an extraordinary general meeting.

Members who had gathered in Essex voted to amend the party's constitution to let black and Asian people join.

The BNP had been threatened with a possible court injunction over its whites-only membership policy by the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

Now, if I had a party I would include everyone, take them to the movies, buy them popcorn and Ben and Jerry’s and tell them funny stories. Takes all sorts I suppose.

BBC News - BNP votes to ditch whites-only membership rule

Man Sues California Mall After Guard Arrests Him for Having Conversation About God - Local News | News Articles | National News | US News - FOXNews.com

2010-02-11T22:22:00.001Z

Stop and think for a moment about the possible implications of this wacky story:

Imagine getting arrested for just striking up a conversation about religion in public.

That’s what happened to California resident Matthew Snatchko in 2006 when the youth pastor initiated a conversation about God with three shoppers at the Roseville Galleria mall.

I have been suspicious of shopping malls for some time. There are undeniable benefits but inner city malls effectively rob us of otherwise open streets, privatise public space, restrict right of passage and make us subject to rules beyond the normal laws and bylaws of the country.

You cannot eat food, walk a dog, ride a bike, busk or enjoy buskers, hand out literature, smoke and a hundred other things we take for granted on these privatised streets, and when the mall closes we cannot walk through them but must go around them to get to where we want to be.

Everything comes at a price and we would be wise to think seriously before we give up even more of our rights just for the sake of doing a bit of shopping in comfort.

Man Sues California Mall After Guard Arrests Him for Having Conversation About God - Local News | News Articles | National News | US News - FOXNews.com

BBC News - Dubai court annuls marriage to 'bearded lady'

2010-02-11T15:06:00.002Z

If ever there was an argument for banning the niqab surely this is it. Proof, if ever it was needed, that when someone wears a veil you just don’t know what your getting. The words pig in a poke spring to mind.

An Arab country's ambassador to Dubai has had his marriage contract annulled after discovering the bride was cross-eyed and had facial hair.
The woman had worn an Islamic veil, known as the niqab, on the few occasions the couple had met.

BBC News - Dubai court annuls marriage to 'bearded lady'

BBC News - Bombs and beatings: Life among the Taliban

2010-02-05T21:19:00.001Z

Do you want to know what a craven coward looks like? It looks like a man who would strap bombs to children, drug them so they don’t know what they are doing, send them into crowded market places and detonate the bomb. These are the people who want to rule our streets, bring their Islamist civilisation to our country and “enlighten” us all.

People say I have a strong heart. I've had to be strong. What can I do? God won't even let me die.

If my brother gets hold of me, I will poison him and myself.

The Taliban slaughter other people's children. They turn women into widows. They should be made to suffer too.

I want these Taliban to be burned alive.

BBC News - Bombs and beatings: Life among the Taliban

Welsh MPs, Gas Bills and Sofa Beds

2010-02-04T21:06:00.000Z

The big story of the day has been MPs expenses. What a tangled web, as they say. The taxpayer is apparently owed £1.3million, which will come in handy as we try to keep our heads above water having bailed out the banks, spent a fortune bailing out the Americans in their ill-conceived venture in Iraq, and more taxpayer's money soon to be doled out to pay for an election. A full list of who fibbed about what can be found here

But the thing that has been bothering me is not the naked greed of MPs (after all, if they wanted to live with any degree of integrity they would have chosen another career route). What struck me is the almost total lack of ambition on the part of Welsh MPs. While some English MPs have to pay back tens of thousands - Barbara Follett £42,458; Andrew and Julie Kirkbride £60,000; Liam Fox £24,878 - Welsh MPs are mostly paying back pocket money. Check the numbers here

If there is one thing worse than being represented in politics by thieves it is being represented in politics by thieves with no ambition. What "bunce" is out there that we might have enjoyed but they hadn't the imagination or fight to get it for us? For more on the Welsh political scene check out Betsan Powys' blog

Book: John Paul II used belt to whip himself - The Vatican- msnbc.com

2010-01-31T22:46:00.001Z

Oder the Postulator promotes Carol the Flagellator.

There is an unseemly rush to make John-Paul II a Saint. Files and boxes of evidence is being put together by a bloke named Monsignor Slawomir Oder to make a case and all that is needed now is evidence of a miracle attributable to John-Paul’s intervention. I just wonder how crazy this all has to get before someone cries, “Stop! ‘Christ died for sinners to bring us to God.’ He was whipped so you wouldn’t have to be. Only God is good and a saint is someone who trusts God. Someone so filled with self-loathing that he whips himself needs a therapist not sainthood.”

At a news conference Tuesday, Oder defended John Paul's practice of self-mortification, which some faithful use to remind them of the suffering of Jesus on the cross.

"It's an instrument of Christian perfection," Oder said, responding to questions about how such a practice could be condoned considering Catholic teaching holds that the human body is a gift from God.

In the book, Oder wrote that John Paul frequently denied himself food — especially during the holy season of Lent — and "frequently spent the night on the bare floor," messing up his bed in the morning so he wouldn't draw attention to his act of penitence.

"But it wasn't limited to this. As some members of his close entourage in Poland and in the Vatican were able to hear with their own ears, John Paul flagellated himself. In his armoire, amid all the vestments and hanging on a hanger, was a belt which he used as a whip and which he always brought to Castel Gandolfo," the papal retreat where John Paul vacationed each summer.

While there had long been rumors that John Paul practiced self-mortification, the book provides the first confirmation and concludes John Paul did so as an example of his faith.

Book: John Paul II used belt to whip himself - The Vatican- msnbc.com

BBC News - Sceptics stage homeopathy 'overdose' to discredit drugs

2010-01-30T21:09:00.001Z

Homeopathy sceptics have staged a mass "overdose" of homeopathic remedies, in a bid to prove they have no effect.

Protesters ate whole bottles of tablets at branches of Boots in places such as Liverpool, Manchester, Glasgow, London, Leicester, Edinburgh and Birmingham.

I am no fan of homeopathic remedies and would probably agree with the arguments presented by these protestors. However, I can’t help regretting that such a thing is done in the name of Scepticism and not some more positive outlook on life. If they had a happier cause they might throw their weight behind some of the positive science they purport to believe in. Still, it’s all grist to the mill I suppose and gives us something to think about.

BBC News - Sceptics stage homeopathy 'overdose' to discredit drugs

The Invisible Woman

2010-01-15T20:17:00.000Z

Is Google Making Us Stupid? - The Atlantic (July/August 2008)

2010-01-13T23:19:00.001Z

From Socrates and writing through Gutenberg and printing to Google and the Internet new technology has been changing the way we think, the way our minds work. Should we be worried and is Google really making us stupid?

If your too busy to click through and read a thoughtful and challenging article then this may be talking about you.

Is Google Making Us Stupid? - The Atlantic (July/August 2008)

BBC News - Muslim protester denies plan to upset Luton parade

2010-01-08T23:14:00.001Z

Muslims desecrated the proud occasion when the Royal Anglian Regiment marched through Luton town centre at a homecoming parade on 10 March last year. As British citizens expressed their pride and gratitude to brave British troops a group of Muslims hurled abuse and insults, calling them murderers and baby-killers.

“A Muslim protester accused of calling soldiers murderers at a parade claims he did not intend to upset anyone.

Munim Abdul told Luton magistrates he did not expect to cause offence because his group had spoken ‘the truth’.”

Their defence is that if its the truth then it is not abuse. Remember this the next time you hear an hysterical Muslim crying “Islamophobia”; if it is the truth then it is not abuse and therefore not a prejudice. Here are some truths about Islam which I hope will cause no offence because their true.

You will hear people declare that Islam is a peaceful religion and that “Islam means peace!” This is not the truth. Islam means submission and even if you submit to Islam there is little chance of peace since within 50 years of the prophets death Muslims were at each other’s throats and have been murdering each other ever since. Have you ever wondered why Muslims would blow up Mosques?

It is a fact that not all Muslims are terrorists but the majority of terrorists are Muslims (read who said it here). Islam is historically, culturally and temperamentally a vanquishing and subjugating religion. The Christian Crusades are a complicated historical phenomenon but make no mistake they were a response to a violent Islam that fought and butchered its way to the South Iberian Peninsula and posed a real and present threat to Christian Europe. Many of the countries and communities we today regard as Muslim were, in fact, Christian and only became Muslim by conquest. Eastwards, Islam warred its way as far as SE Asia in the same way. Ask the Hindu how he sees the history of Islam on the Indian continent.

Of course, any religion is a mix of dogmas, cultures, traditions and other influences. That is why it is quite reasonable to say that my Muslim neighbour and yours are decent, peace-loving people whose concerns in life are common enough, family, security, community, etc. But does he share our values because of his religion or in spite of his religion?

Jesus told his disciples to “Go into all the world and tell the Good News to all creation” (Mark 16:15) He said “But I say to you, do not resist evil, but whoever shall strike you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also” (Matthew 5:39)

Muhammad declared, “Against [the unbelievers] make ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of war, to strike terror into (the hearts of) the enemies, of God and your enemies, and others besides, who ye may know, but whom God doth not” (Q 8:59-60)

This Muslim group have abused the very freedoms fought for by those soldiers, freedoms not available under Muslim rule. We must welcome the stranger and proffer our hospitality and those who seek to live among us, as one of us, are welcome to adopt and embrace our values. However, those who seek security in the notion that, if you concede a little territory, accommodate a little sharia, allow cultural ghettos in the name of peace and liberal values then all will be well, are tragically mistaken. Remember the fable of the camel's nose:

One cold night, as an Arab sat in his tent, a camel gently thrust his nose under the flap and looked in. "Master," he said, "let me put my nose in your tent. It's cold and stormy out here." "By all means," said the Arab, "and welcome" as he turned over and went to sleep.

A little later the Arab awoke to find that the camel had not only put his nose in the tent but his head and neck also. The camel, who had been turning his head from side to side, said, "I will take but little more room if I place my forelegs within the tent. It is difficult standing out here." "Yes, you may put your forelegs within," said the Arab, moving a little to make room, for the tent was small.

Finally, the camel said, "May I not stand wholly inside? I keep the tent open by standing as I do." "Yes, yes," said the Arab. "Come wholly inside. Perhaps it will be better for both of us." So the camel crowded in. The Arab with difficulty in the crowded quarters again went to sleep. When he woke up the next time, he was outside in the cold and the camel had the tent to himself.

BBC News - Muslim protester denies plan to upset Luton parade

Franco’s

2009-12-06T14:51:00.004Z

Christmas has arrived as far as I am concerned since yesterday I had my first Christmas dinner. It was so very good that any subsequent festive meals have a lot to live up to and believe me comparisons are unavoidable. It was so generous that I have to go back next week to have my Christmas pudding, and the coffee…

But do I let you in on the secret or will I be making things more difficult for myself? Every other Saturday Ann and I go into Swansea to our favourite cafe, more often if we can. Its always bustling but we always find a table as our host constantly busies himself making sure that no one is turned away and even if you have to wait it is always worth it, and the coffee…

The menu is colourful and varied and the specials on the board are always worth trying (which is where I found my Christmas dinner). The Italian dishes are especially good, and did I mention the coffee?

You know that, wherever you go, when you order a coffee you are taking a risk. I mean you don’t expect much at motorway services or at Sid’s greasy spoon, but even in places that claim to be dedicated to the art of serving a good cup of coffee, where reputation rests on the quality of the java and little else, the good stuff does not often make it to your table.

Well, I know a place where the good stuff is standard faire and a man at whose feet baristi of the world should sit and learn. Franco has a modest but popular cafe in Singleton Street, Swansea, just across from the Quadrant shopping centre and around the corner from the city’s bustling market. He drives his longsuffering wife crazy with Dean Martin music and serves coffee that is like the ambrosia served up to the gods, sustaining, invigorating, liquid gold and all served with a smile in an atmosphere of good cheer.

There now, I have told you so if I can’t find a table when next I go I have only myself to blame. On the other hand, what civilised man could possibly keep such a good thing to himself. See you in Franco's. Bon appétit!

FRANCO

The Manhattan Declaration: A Call of Christian Conscience

2009-12-02T17:10:00.001Z

On November 20th a formidable coalition of 150 Catholic, Orthodox, and evangelical leaders released a 4,700-word document, titled the "The Manhattan Declaration: A Call of Christian Conscience," which calls on Christians to engage in civil disobedience to defend their doctrines.

It calls on Christians to reject secular authority — and even engage in civil disobedience — if laws force them to accept abortion, same-sex marriage, and other ideas that betray their religious beliefs.

Signatories ranged from evangelical leader Chuck Colson to two of the leading Catholic prelates in the United States, Archbishop Donald Wuerl of Washington, D.C., and Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York.

It is frustrating, even frightening to see the direction this world is travelling and it is easy as individuals to complain from the relative safety of our pews, generating our pet conspiracy theories and eschatological predictions. Leaders do not have the luxury of relative anonymity and carry a burden of responsibility the ordinary Christian rarely understands.

They cannot speak casually, have a good rant on a personal blog, or gather with others around their complaints to have a good moan. They know that when they speak people listen and make important decisions based on what they hear. These leaders are careful and measured in what they say and this makes it all the more important that they have made such an uncompromising and public statement.

The full declaration and a list of signatories can be found here

An executive summary can be found here

You can put your name to the declaration here

Children who front Richard Dawkins' atheist ads are evangelicals -Times Online

2009-11-30T23:43:00.003Z

"The two children chosen to front Richard Dawkins’s latest assault on God could not look more free of the misery he associates with religious baggage. With the slogan “Please don’t label me. Let me grow up and choose for myself”, the youngsters with broad grins seem to be the perfect advertisement for the new atheism being promoted by Professor Dawkins and the British Humanist Association.

Except that they are about as far from atheism as it is possible to be. The Times can reveal that Charlotte, 8, and Ollie, 7, are from one of the country’s most devout Christian families."

You don’t need me to tell you that when it comes to religion and philosophy Richard Dawkins is a complete doughnut of the first order. Now the dozy plum has come up with a poster advertising his ill-tempered dog-in-the-manger form of atheism featuring two happy, bouncing Christian children. I knew he was after our kids but I didn’t know he would go to these lengths.

The British Humanist Association, a church of the disillusioned who gather regularly around their grievances to blame a God who according to their own creed isn’t there, explained the campaign:

“The message is that the labelling of children by their parents’ religion fails to respect the rights of the child and their autonomy. We are saying that religions and philosophies — and ‘humanist’ is one of the labels we use on our poster — should not be foisted on or assumed of young children.”

So unconvinced are they of their worldview that they claim they won’t share it with their own children. It is so vacuous and meaningless that they have no intention of passing it on. Now that puts a different spin on the idea of ‘convictions’ doesn’t it? Put a gun to their head and surely they will cry, “Of course there’s a God! Always knew it.”

They betray the empty-headed nature of their arguments by apparently insisting that it is right for others to have a greater influence on our children than we do. Personally, I believe in the indoctrination of children and any parent with a firm view and an ounce of common sense will believe the same. We inculcate them with ideas of right and wrong, infuse them with ambition and drive and inspire them as best we can to live full and meaningful lives and these ideas are informed by what we believe.

If I believed there wasn’t a God I would press that view on my children to save them the heartache and disappointment of finding out for themselves after perhaps half a life of pointless devotion to a deity that doesn’t exist. By the same token, since I believe in God, I have done all I can to tell my children about him, to let them know he loves them and that the life of man is not solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short but sociable, rich, charitable, elevating, purposeful and eternal.

There is an irony in Philip Pullman’s support for the campaign and his statement that, “It is absolutely right that we shouldn’t label children until they are old enough to decide for themselves.” He is a very successful children’s author who influences the minds of children around the world and takes every opportunity to promote his jaded atheism, surely in the knowledge that they are listening. It is an atheism that has little to do with Christianity but is informed by a gothic/medieval view of the church instilled in him by his peculiar catholic upbringing.

As to the support of Derren Brown for this campaign, here is a man who would rather go to enormous lengths to prove 2.6 billion Christians wrong than simply admit that the Christianity he grew up with doesn’t suit his homosexual lifestyle. It is truly tragic that men with such great skills and intelligence should prove such total numpties when it comes to even the most basic philosophical and religious principles. Dawkins for science by all means, Pullman for good fiction and Brown for great magic and entertainment but as to religion and philosophy I wouldn’t cross the street to hear what they have to say.

Children who front Richard Dawkins' atheist ads are evangelicals -Times Online

Church Times - IBS-STL decides to ‘exit the business’

2009-11-20T22:55:00.001Z

It is bad news when a major outlet of Christian publishing goes under. In the church people are already surviving on Christianity-lite thinking they are feasting without making it more difficult to obtain good Christian literature.

THE Bible Society has called for urgent consultation over the future of Christian bookshops, after Monday’s announcement by the Christian book distributor and Bible charity IBS-STL that it is to sell its UK operations. They include the 40 Wesley Owen bookshops.

The company said that financial problems, alongside supply and ser-vice difficulties in its distribution and retail outlets, had led to a “decision to exit the business”, a statement said. STL, formerly Send the Light, merged with the International Bible Society (IBS) in 2007 to become one of the world’s biggest not-for-profit book distributors.

Church Times - IBS-STL decides to ‘exit the business’

Benny Hinn Exclusive Interview

2009-11-18T22:53:00.000Z

Benny Hinn gives an exclusive interview to ABC's Nightline, but don't worry, there's no danger of him saying anything that challenges your scepticism. What do you mean your not a sceptic? What sort of Christian doesn't ask questions? Oh, your sort, right. By the way, I can't help but wonder how Jesus' publicist would have handled this. I think Benny sacked his after this interview - or was it part of the gameplan? Lord, please don't let me turn into a conspiracy theorist.

Education: Parents angry at evangelicals' charity scheme | Education | The Guardian

2009-11-13T21:23:00.001Z

Shock! Horror! This is simply SCANDALOUS! Who would have thought an organisation called Samaritans Purse, the organisation behind a charitable initiative Operation Christmas Child, could have anything to do with Christianity? It beggars belief that this clandestine and subversive organisation should have got away with doing millions of dollars of charitable work every year without anyone realising it. Surely no respectable educational establishment would wish to be associated with something so evil as Christian charity!

But its alright, “Samaritans Purse insists it now makes clear in all its information that it is a Christian organisation.” Phew!

You know, if this wasn’t so tragically pathetic it would be funny.

Teacher union leaders are warning schools to vet the charities they support after complaints from parents about a scheme to send gifts to the developing world run by an evangelical Christian group.

Under Operation Christmas Child, schoolchildren are asked to fill a shoebox full of presents and wrap it up before the charity Samaritan's Purse distributes the boxes to children in Africa and eastern Europe. Last year 1.2m boxes were sent by children in the UK and the charity received £23.5m in voluntary donations…

Education: Parents angry at evangelicals' charity scheme | Education | The Guardian

Latest News - Gospel for Asia UK

2009-11-11T16:35:00.001Z

How would you feel if you were met with this threat? How strong is your faith and how much do you love Jesus? Please read this story and see how much Christians in India love him and what it costs them. Please pray for them.

“If you don't leave Jesus, we will come back on Sunday and burn you alive.”

An Open Letter to Sir Ian McKellan « Smoking Lizard Soapbox

2009-11-08T20:35:00.001Z

A very wonderful open letter to Sir Ian McKellan who it seems has taken to tearing a page out of the Bible he finds in every hotel room in which he stays. It is a well reasoned response to this unwarranted act of vandalism and deliciously funny in its execution. You will not regret clicking through and reading the whole letter and it won’t take you long.

This message really should have come in the mail or to a private email address that can be forwarded. Regardless, please take this as my polite request for you to either cease and desist or change the nature of your Leviticus 18:22 protest concerning hotel Bibles. As I am a Christian who takes matters of faith seriously, I have no other teeth here than a polite request written in, I hope, inescapable logic and devastating wit.

I appreciate that to a gay man it must hurt that the instruction book for the dominant spirituality in the English-speaking world has words that baldly put, don’t like homosexuals. I also take the fact that you only tear out the offending page out of the hotel Bible as a sign of room to negotiate. Clearly, you approve of most of the rest of the Scripture in some fashion.

An Open Letter to Sir Ian McKellan « Smoking Lizard Soapbox

The Mormon Chapbook

2009-11-05T21:45:00.001Z

On my other blog I discuss the importance of language in transmitting truth and the significant change in the way Mormons understand the Book of Mormon peoples. If you have a moment why not drop by and take a look?

Dear Mormon: A Word can Change your World

Language is a powerful weapon. The ancients knew this and some societies put such great store by it that they wouldn’t even commit it to writing. Enormous feats of memory were developed to pass on the stories of the community from one generation to another and in such communities writing was regarded with great suspicion, as placing your story at the disposal of your enemies. If it could be written it could be owned by others and altered.

In those societies where writing developed and oral traditions were committed to writing the people guarded their written texts as their greatest treasures, copying them with meticulous attention to detail. The ancient texts of the Bible were copied with careful and detailed checking and correction and modern archaeological discoveries confirm the incredible accuracy of modern translations when compared with recent discoveries of ancient texts. It is little wonder since a word can change your world or worldview.

The Mormon Chapbook

Just Do Something

2009-11-03T19:53:00.000Z

How many books have you read on seeking and finding the will of God and his “special plan” for your life? Have you found it yet? Or are you still putting off decisions until you get that inexplicable prompt from God that you just know every good and mature Christian experiences on an almost daily basis?

Search no more because Kevin DeYoung has the answer for you. Yes, another book on finding God’s will but with a refreshing twist – it works. In a soundly biblical and biblically sensible little book DeYoung administers more practical and workable common sense advice than you might find in a thousand tomes promising to put you in the centre of God’s will if you will just practice spiritual contortions to make yourself a super Christian.

Forget dreams, ‘pictures’, visions, fleeces, Words, etc. DeYoung has found the truth in the Bible. Who would have thought it? Actually there in God’s written and constant Word? He describes incisively the prevarication so typical of our times and, dismissing what he calls Christianese, he challenges his readers to stop messing about, get up and get on with it; in other words Just Do Something.

If I were a pastor or youth leader I would put a copy of this book in the hands of everyone in my ministerial care and it would lighten my burden of helping lost and aimless souls almost immediately. It would also inspire people young and not so young to finally get on with it and find the joy of making decisions the biblical way and finding God’s purpose in almost everything they do.

The Mormon Chapbook: Mormon Demographics That Don't Add Up

2009-11-01T20:04:00.000Z

I thought people might like to see what I am doing on my new blog devoted exclusively to all things Mormon

The Mormon Chapbook: Mormon Demographics That Don't Add Up

Rev. Moon Sells Off Mass-Marriage to Mormons | GlossyNews.com

2009-10-23T19:01:00.001Z

The Mormon franchise continues to grow.

Sun Moon University, Seoul, South Korea —The final 10,000 Moonies exchanged their marriage vows this week. The ceremony came just before Utah’s Latter Day Saints, the Mormons, prepared to take over the franchise from Rev. Moon and his three sons. Rev. Moon Sells Off Mass-Marriage to Mormons | GlossyNews.com

Why Mormons are so Misunderstood

2009-10-19T14:18:00.001Z

“That’s a misconception people have about Mormonism. Actually, we believe…”

How often does this sort of thing get said every day around the world as Mormons explain their faith, on the doorstep, at open houses, in the office or over a barbecue? We read it on blog posts, internet sites, discussion forums, in Mormon magazines and we hear it in sermons from Mormon leaders at conference time. The following, from the official Mormon web site, is typical:

“Much misunderstanding about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints revolves around its doctrine. The news media is increasingly asking what distinguishes the Church from other faiths, and reporters like to contrast one set of beliefs with another.” (Approaching Mormon Doctrine)

Surely, they are the most misrepresented and misunderstood people in the world. Yet the same commentary goes on to talk about the “abundant material available” to those inquiring into Mormon doctrine. Certainly there is such an abundance that even the casual inquirer will find themselves assaulted by an information overload.

January 2010 will see the publication of the third edition of The A to Z of Mormonism, an exhaustive encyclopaedia of Mormon history, key people, doctrine and praxis. It promises to “clear up many of the misconceptions held about Mormonism and its members, making it an essential reference.” (Dust Jacket)

March 2010 will see the publication of Mormonism: A Historical Encyclopedia This offers broad historical coverage of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, covering its historic development, important individuals, and central ideas and issues.

This on top of the long established Encyclopedia of Mormonism, a four volume work published by Macmillan in 1992. Hard copies are no longer available but the full version is available on the web.

Then there is the plethora of print, electronic and video materials, a professional newsroom, an official website, a prominent public profile, the familiar missionaries and a public relations department many would give anything to have.

Mormons are blogging like second nature, explaining, correcting, challenging and generally talking to the world about their faith, and organisations like Farms, FAIR and SHIELDS (they love acronyms) and the Mormon Wiki are more professional almost semi-official manifestations of the same thing.

So why are Mormons so misunderstood?

In a news item on the official Mormon news service the church addressed the question “What is it that people find so difficult in accepting Mormons as Christians?”

“While others have their opinions, ‘in our terms,’ President Hinckley said, ‘we worship Christ.’”

There is your answer, in those three words, “in our terms”. When they complain about being misunderstood they are effectively demanding that we call it as they insist we see it, in their terms. But we call it as we see it, in our terms. In a previous post, Why Mormons Have Problems With Jude, I wrote:

“Mormons will protest that any such argument as you present is based on the idea that Mormons are not Christians and since Mormons are Christians your argument is hollow. But this response postulates the very thing that is in contention and is yet to be demonstrated.”

Mormons assume that their protestations should be sufficient evidence of their Christian credentials, that if they say they are Christians they simply are. But Christians questioning those credentials already have a clear understanding of what makes a Christian, their own terms by which to judge, and they are not the terms of Mormonism. It is on those terms, on biblical terms, that Christians view Mormonism and regard Mormons as not Christians and it is unreasonable that Mormons should try and dictate terms.

When we “believe” it is natural that we should become comfortable with those fundamentals that inform our faith and our lives but it is the cardinal error of true fundamentalist believers to become so familiar and easy with their faith that they believe it is self-evidently true. Such believers talk about what they “know” rather than what they “believe”, what they understand rather than where they put their trust, of gnosis rather than pisteuō. Such absolute certainty seems unassailable and those who question it are considered obtuse, even disingenuous.

Mormons “know” their church is true and that they are Christians “in their terms” and so cannot comprehend how anyone might doubt that claim, much less have completely different terms by which they judge these things. But the argument of ministries to Mormons is that, on our terms, we believe that Mormonism yet has a case to answer.

John Ruskin wrote:

“The greatest thing a human being ever does in this world is to see something and to tell what it saw in a plain way”

We see Mormonism and tell what we see “in our terms”, and if it isn’t the greatest thing we do we try and tell it plainly and, according to Ruskin, no human being can do more.

This is the Truth

2009-10-15T18:56:00.002Z

The Incomparable Chris Rea's New Single

2009-10-13T19:14:00.001Z

The Mormon “Gordian Knot”

2009-10-11T20:58:00.001Z

Is the Book of Mormon true? Who knows! Were there such people as Nephites and Lamanites? It’s anybody’s guess! Did Israelites migrate to the Americas from Jerusalem? It is a vexed question. At least a growing number of Mormons seem to think so. A conference talk by apostle Jeffrey Holland has provoked a storm of speculation about the official attitude to the authenticity of the Book of Mormon.

“When Elder Holland delivered his stinging rebuke to Book of Mormon critics in his General Conference address last Sunday, reactions ranged from “woots” and “double woots” by literalist believers of the Book of Mormon, to disappointment by those who felt Elder Holland was backtracking on his prior statement that Church members who don’t believe the traditional story of its origins should not be considered “unacceptable . . . as a Latter-day Saint if [they] can’t make that step or move to the beat of that drum.” However, after listening carefully to Elder Holland’s address again, I think both camps might be mistaken about what Elder Holland was intending to say, particularly with regard to the “Inspired Fiction” theory of the Book of Mormon.”

Inspired Fiction? Hmm. A thoughtful account of this theory can be found at Mormon Matters. In summary, some Mormons have so come to recognise the insuperable difficulties presented by the Book of Mormon that they have come up with an alternative explanation of its nature and purpose. Given the absence of archaeological evidence, the implausibility of its provenance and the growing evidence against Mormon claims for it that they have hit upon the idea that it is a sort of allegory; a work of fiction that conveys eternal truths.

The article at Mormon Matters gives a very good account of this idea and the speculation surrounding it but here is the problem. These days Mormons seem to be endlessly speculating about such things; might God have meant this, or that, or something else? But aren’t Mormons supposed to have prophets that make such speculation redundant? If the Book of Mormon is Inspired Fiction, more allegory than history, what does that tell us about Joseph Smith who taught that it was history?

The Mormon Church is founded on the scathing criticism of Christendom for indulging in such speculation. If speculation is the problem, they argue, then prophets are the answer; so what’s the problem? That some Mormons can feel comfortable in thinking that an apostle and prophet of the Mormon Church allows for their wild speculations should prove worrying. But today’s Mormon Church seems increasingly broad and tolerant of dissent. Bruce R McConkie would turn in his grave.

Did Elder Holland Denounce or Carefully Avoid the “Inspired Fiction” Theory? at Mormon Matters

Why Mormons Have problems with Jude

2009-10-09T21:04:00.013Z

How often have you set out to argue your case for your Christian faith with a Mormon only to be met by a determination on their part to maintain what they regard a civilised detachment, insisting they don’t want to be contentious? You expect at least a lively discussion, for your Mormon friend to give a good account of his/her faith, but they imperiously declare that they don’t engage in such dubious and uncharitable bickering.

They quote the late Krister Stendahl, (1921-April 2008) one time Bishop of Stockholm and renowned religious pluralist, who said that when you are trying to understand another religion, don’t compare your best with their worst. Of course, in quoting him like this, they are doing that very thing, comparing their admirable determination to stay out of it with your unfortunate propensity to argue.

Mormons have a real problem with Jude. Jude instructs Christians to "contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints" (Jude 3) But Mormons confuse contending for the faith with being contentious, arguing your case with being argumentative. You are left staring incredulously as the Mormon runs every time to the protection of "contention is of the devil. I would never drag down your church!"

This way the actual issues that stand between Mormons and Christians (and they are legion) never actually get addressed. Not least the fact that the Mormon Church is built on a claim that specifically “tears down” other churches (Joseph Smith History, 1:19)

Jude wrote, "Contend for the faith" and if today's Mormons can't bring themselves to defend their beliefs and contend for their faith they are actually being unbiblical. Mormons will protest that any such argument as you present is based on the idea that Mormons are not Christians and since Mormons are Christians your argument is hollow. But this response postulates the very thing that is in contention and is yet to be demonstrated. Their view is based on the hubristic assumption that what Mormons believe is true beyond doubt or revision, is not there to be questioned but received gratefully, and therefore anyone questioning Mormonism is misled, mischievous or plain wicked

Ultimately it excuses the Mormon from the biblical injunctions to "contend for the faith" and "go into all the world telling the good news". The refusal to engage is hard-hearted because it says in effect, "I ‘know it’s true’ and if you don't believe it, tough luck." You may be a soul to win but because you come up with good questions and won't just roll over and express your undying admiration for all things Mormon no one will contend for your soul. So it’s the Terrestrial Kingdom for you.

A Mormon will cite the words of Jesus, “Do not judge, or you too will be judged” (Mt.7:1). However, the idea that we should not judge is unbiblical in respect to the words of Jude. Even Paul urged his readers to "judge for yourself what I say" (1 Co.10:14) and the saints of Berea are commended as noble for "examining the scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true" (Acts 17:11) Proverbs counsels us to “speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy” (Pro.31:8-9) (What about the spiritual poor and needy)

The injunction from the Lord that we should not judge is a warning to not put ourselves in the place of God as ultimate judge. It does not condone the strange idea that we are not to use wise judgement. Scripture counsels us to judge wisely in doctrine and practice, in faith and action. We judge what company we keep, what we believe and what we reject as untrue, how we respond to the needs of others and who we trust. And James, so beloved of Mormons, wrote a whole letter about wisdom and sound judgement in how we conduct ourselves and live out our faith (Js.1:5 has nothing to do with finding truth but with the wise application of the truth we have. See how he develops his argument in Js.3:17)

Many Mormons are raised in almost entirely Mormon communities and many others come under no other influence. Until they serve a mission, or venture onto the Internet for the first time, or engage in this discussion they are so keen to avoid they never hear any other argument. They are drilled with these ideas by their families and church leaders who will shake their heads in regret more than anger that muddle-headed Christians, influenced by anti-Mormon elements, still misunderstand Mormonism and would rather contend than act in the grace so clearly taught in the Bible. But Jude wrote that we should “Contend for the faith.”

Jesus said that if we love our friends we only do what the heathens do. It seems to me that Mormons only want to love their friends and only want to keep company with those who love them back. But Jude said that we should contend for the faith; perhaps because he felt he had a faith worth contending for and because there are souls out there worth the battle.

Note: You may ask how a man like Krister Stendahl, Lutheran Bishop of Stockholm, religious pluralist, ecumenical and gay rights activist and champion of women’s ordination, came to be a champion for the anti-clerical, anti-gay, anti-women’s ordination and staunchly conservative Mormon Church.

It seems that in 1985 the Mormon Church met strong opposition to their building a temple in Stockholm. In a press conference Stendahl took the part of the Mormons and presented his three rules of understanding, developed in response to this crisis for Mormons. It was, then, not so much a meeting of minds but more a case of “my enemy’s enemy is my friend.” Strange bedfellows indeed.

Stendahl’s rules are:

(1) When you are trying to understand another religion, you should ask the adherents of that religion and not its enemies.

(2) Don't compare your best to their worst.

(3) Leave room for "holy envy." (By this Stendahl meant that you should be willing to recognize elements in the other religious tradition or faith that you admire and wish could, in some way, be reflected in your own religious tradition or faith.)

These are very helpful as a rule of thumb and we mustn’t dismiss them as guides to conduct but:

(1) what if the adherents of the religion are deceived or, heaven forbid, deceiving? Would we have been considered wise to ask Kenneth Lay about Enron?

(2) What if direct comparisons don’t help except in the most general of terms, since generalisation is a lie. Mormons are nice people but what does that tell us?

(3) What if you find nothing to envy and much to regret about their religion? How far would investigators have got in probing the truth about Enron if they had grubbed around determined to find something to like?

Why Mormons Don’t Wear Dog Collars – Yet!

2009-10-07T18:33:00.003Z

I recall, many years ago, a priesthood quorum meeting at the local Mormon Church where a discussion revolved around the question of how we could raise the profile of our church and make ourselves more visible to the wider world. We sat there lost for ideas (so much for priesthood) until one man said, “We could wear badges!”

All eyes turned on him with a mixture of scorn and pity and, with a depth of derision usually reserved for talking about the ministers of other churches, someone said sarcastically, “Oh! Why don’t we go the whole hog and walk around in dog collars?” The idea was quashed there and then and nothing more said as the culprit skulked away into the night to think about his apostate ways.

Not long afterwards we saw the first Mormon missionaries turn up wearing those badges so familiar these days. Typically, this innovation came in with no comment and no one remembered the scorn and derision that had been poured on the idea. This was different. This was at the behest of “the prophet”.

The story illustrates something that is so difficult to put across in a seminar or article; the sneering contempt in those words, “why don’t we go all the way and wear dog collars!” It wasn’t a case of “Mormons don’t do that sort of thing” but undisguised disdain and disrespect for those who do. Such contempt is a thread that runs throughout Mormonism like the writing in a stick of Blackpool rock. In barely veiled references to “men that preach for money!” and “Christians that take the easy option” Mormons informally and routinely speak contemptuously (among themselves of course) of Christian churches. Where does this self-reverential attitude come from?

It begins with the defining story of Joseph Smith who taught that all the creeds of all the churches were an abomination and all who profess those creeds corrupt (Joseph Smith History 1:19). Without this account of the Christian Churches Mormonism would be superfluous since it is claimed to be a restoration of things lost in the apostasy of those churches. It continues with the statement in the founding book of Mormonism, The Book of Mormon that the Christian churches are part of the “great and abominable church” founded by the devil and that it slays the saints and corrupts the Bible and is the mother of abominations (1 Nephi chs.13-22)

It progresses through the statements of other Mormon leaders who proclaim that Christianity is “a sounding brass...as corrupt as hell” and an agent of the devil (John Taylor, 3^rd Mormon president) and who identify the Catholic Church as a satanic organisation, the whore of Babylon, and Protestant churches as harlot daughters (Bruce R McConkie, Mormon apostle, Mormon Doctrine).

Finally, it comes via the infamous portrayal in Mormon temple ceremonies of a Christian minister being in the pay of Satan. This portion of the temple ceremony involved a dramatisation, originally played by live actors but latterly shown on film, showing a Christian minister, complete with dog collar, being summoned onto the scene by Satan who offers to pay him if he will preach “the orthodox religion” to Adam and Eve.

The minister proceeds to preach the Christian message which Adam finds “incomprehensible” and rejects in favour of the message brought by two agents from God who preach Mormonism. The conversation between Satan, the minister and Adam when I went through the temple in the 1970’s went like this:

ADAM: Who are you?

LUCIFER: I am the God of this world.

ADAM: You, the God of this world?

LUCIFER: Yes, what do you want?

ADAM: I am looking for messengers.

LUCIFER: Oh, you want someone to preach to you. You want religion, do you? I will have preachers here presently.

(Lucifer turns his head as a sectarian minister approaches the group)

LUCIFER: Good Morning sir!

SECTARIAN MINISTER: Good morning!

(The preacher turns and looks into the camera.)

SECTARIAN MINISTER: A fine congregation!

LUCIFER: Yes, they are a very good people. They are concerned about religion. Are you a preacher?

SECTARIAN MINISTER: I am.

LUCIFER: Have you been to college and received training for the ministry?

SECTARIAN MINISTER: Certainly! A man cannot preach unless has been trained for the ministry.

LUCIFER: Do you preach the orthodox religion?

SECTARIAN MINISTER: Yes, that is what I preach.

LUCIFER: If you will preach your orthodox religion to these people, and convert them, I will pay you well.

SECTARIAN MINISTER: I will do my best.

(Lucifer guides the preacher to Adam and Eve, who stand nearby.)

LUCIFER: Here is a man who desires religion. He is very much exercised, and seems to be sincere.

(As Lucifer presents the preacher to Adam and Eve he steps back and observes the ensuing conversation. The preacher is made to sound sincere, although misguided and credulous. Adam appears humble, faithful and immovable in his determination to serve God. He is not swayed by the preacher, and is astounded by the doctrines espoused by the preacher.)

SECTARIAN MINISTER: I understand that you are inquiring after religion.

ADAM: I was calling upon Father.

SECTARIAN MINISTER: I am glad to know that you were calling upon Father. Do you believe in a God who is without body, parts, or passions; who sits on the top of a topless throne; whose centre is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere; who fills the universe, and yet is so small that he can dwell in your heart; who is surrounded by myriads of beings who have been saved by grace, not for any act of theirs, but by His good pleasure. Do you believe in such a great Being?

ADAM: I do not. I cannot comprehend such a being.

SECTARIAN MINISTER: That is the beauty of it. Perhaps you do not believe in a devil, and in that great hell, the bottomless pit, where there is a lake of fire and brimstone into which the wicked are cast, and where they are continually burning, but never consumed?

ADAM: I do not believe in any such place.

SECTARIAN MINISTER: My dear friend, I am sorry for you.

To find out more about the ceremony and its different incarnations and to hear an audio you can visit Mormon Coffee, the blog of Mormonism Research Ministry

There you will discover that this portion of the ceremony was finally removed, one of several radical changes made in 1990. Nevertheless, it defines the Mormon attitude to other churches and explains that conversation back in the early 1970’s when that minister was still routinely mocked and portrayed as a lackey of Satan.

As I have said, this is the hardest thing to put across in an article, attitudes passed from generation to generation, but it is an important insight. Another instance of it involves an encounter I had with Mormon missionaries earlier this year.

A young man of 20 approached me outside my house to talk about his religion and I told him I was a Christian. With a display of hubris that took my breath away he asked had I ever before met anyone like him who was giving up two years of his life to serve a fulltime mission. I thought of the many people I know who gave up half a lifetime to serve missions in places a good deal less comfortable and more dangerous than the second city of Wales. I answered that I had and it seemed to take the wind out of his sails for a moment.

I then told him that I had been a Mormon but had long left that church to become a Christian. He asked me why I had left and I was glad to share with him the message of grace that had won me to the Lord. This was when his whole demeanour changed and, his face contorted in a mocking sneer, he began barracking me about turning my back on “the church”. When I began to respond he positively bellowed at me, “DON’T YOU QUESTION MY AUTHORITY!” It was quite comical to see this 20 year old really believing he was an “elder” and had authority.

His companion, who had been pretty quiet throughout this exchange, I use the term ‘exchange’ loosely, at least had the good grace to shuffle his feet and look embarrassed. The young missionary then pointed imperiously at the house I had left and told me in no uncertain terms that my faith meant that I could sit at home for the rest of my life unconcerned for the lost since I had my ticket to heaven, unlike his which urged him on to go bravely to - Swansea?

You see, contempt is the attitude of the typical Mormon towards other churches and my missionary encounter confirms that it is not peculiar to older generations but colours the thinking of young Mormons coming through today to represent their church to the world.

But Mormons are so very nice, so very upstanding and responsible and of course this is true. But they still look upon Christians with that peculiar mix of pity and haughty disapproval typical of a people who know that they are God’s best and we are the rest. Perhaps one day, as with the badges, Mormons will adopt dog collars, but you can be sure that when they do they will hold in as much contempt those who don’t as they now do those who currently do.

Youth is Curable, Age Inevitable - Eventually

2009-10-03T20:23:00.001Z

Two stories that caught my attention this week were the news that children born into affluent homes today can expect to live considerably longer and the details of Michael Jackson’s autopsy.

Times Online reported:

More than half of babies born today in affluent homes are expected to live to the age of 100, based on current life expectancy trends.

Analysis of life expectancy and the quality of life in older age indicates that ageing processes can continue to be extended.

Using demographic modelling, scientists calculated that the average British child born in 2007 could expect to live to 103, while in Japan they would live to 107.

While the BBC Online reported of Michael Jackson:

His weight was in the acceptable range for a man of his height, according to the Associated Press.

But the singer, who died of a heart attack in June, had punctured arms, tattooed lips and eyebrows and suffered from lung damage and some arthritis.

Because of the influence of people like Michael Jackson, of those ubiquitous women’s magazine’s (and men’s magazines these days), and of celebrities queuing up to explain how the latest product means they haven’t any wrinkles except the one their sitting on we have fallen for the lie that we will never get old.

“Forever in blue jeans”, we are in denial and turning to Botox and surgery for appearance and drugs for comfort and to kill the pain. But it turns out that we may be older for longer. In which case we should remember that pop music was always meant to be a joke, teenagers were an unfortunate consequence of war, and maturity is meant to produce the elders of our community and not aged rockers.

We need to be reminded that it is not unusual for a fifty-year-old to need treatment for arthritis; that that irritating phase of our lives, youth, can be cured by age; that you don’t have to stay callow and irritating forever, and age should be embraced gracefully and with some style. Otherwise who will pass on wisdom to the next generation?

Babies born into affluent homes can expect to live till 103 - Times Online

Two Iranian Christian Women Still Held in Evin Prison

2009-10-02T17:08:00.002Z

I know this is not a popular message in these “liberal” times when you only have to add the suffix “phobic” to a noun to instantly create a new criminal offense. I know that many people think that all we need to do is find that little spark of niceness inside, realise that “war is over if you want it…and the world will live as one” (to quote the Lennon doctrine). But here in the real world there is as much inequity as ever there was, as much violence, hatred and persecution and we forget the real threats to our freedoms at our peril.
As we rush towards secularisation with glee at our apparent freedoms from the “shackles of religion” we should remember that faith is important still to the vast majority in this world and if we really want a better world we need to fight for their rights as well. Not all religions are the same and my, Christian, religion gave us the foundations on which we have built this more equitable and fair-minded country. It saddens me that people forget the Judeo/Christian roots of our values yet rush to the defence of Islam that dances to a very different, more discriminatory drum.

Maryam and Marzieh boldly defended their faith when they appeared in an Islamic court on Aug. 8. When asked to deny their faith, they proclaimed, "We love Jesus. We will not deny our faith."

Maryam and Marzieh are just two of the estimated 1 million Christians in Iran today. Many of these Christians continue to boldly proclaim and defend their faith, even as the fires of persecution grow hotter.

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