Displaying items by tag: Finland

Finnish MP Päivi Räsänen was chair of the Christian Democrats from 2004 to 2015; as interior minister she had responsibility for church affairs. On 2 March she faced a police investigation because of a tweet she posted last year directed at the leadership of her church, questioning its sponsorship of the LGBT event ‘Pride 2019’, and quoting a Bible text. After a lengthy police interview last November, she now faces a second interrogation about a pamphlet she wrote 16 years ago on human sexuality for a Christian foundation. These sorts of cases create a culture of fear and censorship and are becoming common throughout Europe. In a free society, everyone should be allowed to share their beliefs without fear of censorship. Finland has a number of laws to regulate speech, including the ‘ethnic agitation’ law which carries a prison sentence of up to two years.

Last week it was reported that the Arctic Sea is breaking up for the first time on record, and we prayed for nations to acknowledge climate change and seek ways to turn it around. The acceleration of climate change has greater impact on the Arctic region than elsewhere, posing serious threats to the sensitive environment and those who depend on it. Good cooperation is needed between researchers, public authorities, companies, and Arctic inhabitants. Pray for the adoption of a new kind of climate-resilient thinking. Further development is needed in flood warning systems and dam safety. In response to these needs, and as part of its 2017-2019 chairmanship of the Arctic Council, Finland will be hosting the first Arctic Resilience Forum on 10-11 September 2018.

EU officials supervise and fund the Palestinian Authority (PA) education system. A series of Helsinki talks examined the new PA curriculum and agreed that the new textbooks stir up further radicalisation and hatred. They concluded that radicalisation is persistent throughout the curriculum, grooming children for martyrdom and jihad war, with a fundamentalist worldview. ‘This curriculum is not only a catastrophe for Palestinian youth but also for the reputation of the Finnish education system, as the curriculum was reviewed under the supervision of Finnish experts and officials,’ said the spokesperson for the EU consultations. An elementary mathematics book asks, ‘If the number of martyrs from the first intifada is X and the number of martyrs from the second intifada is Y, what is the total number of martyrs?’ In basic physics, Newton’s law of gravity is explained by a picture of a young Palestinian aiming a slingshot at an Israeli officer. See