Displaying items by tag: Politics

Justin Welby called for a Christmas truce in the increasingly bitter Brexit row. He called for a ‘ceasefire’ on insults and personalised attacks as the process of leaving the EU continues. His intervention came after Dominic Grieve was accused of ‘treachery’ after the Government was defeated in a Brexit legislation vote. Conservative rebels have been subjected to intense criticism from newspapers as the EU Withdrawal Bill goes through the Commons. He said, ‘In Christmas 1914 there was a ceasefire. It would be very good to have a ceasefire from insult and the use of pejorative terms about people at this time. As a country, we have a future ahead of us, we have made a clear decision about Brexit. How we do it is a question for robust political argument, but personalised attacks have to be avoided.’ See also next article, ‘Spiritual Brexit battle’.

Theresa May, David Davis, and the negotiating team showed tenacity and skill to achieve breakthrough in the Brexit negotiations, despite derogatory comments by political opponents and anti-Brexiteers. This significant step recognised that Britain will leave the EU in 15 months’ time, with or without a trade agreement. Then on 13 December an amendment was thrown out, meaning an even more compressed timescale to pass secondary legislations to implement Brexit. The next day Shadow Brexit secretary Sir Keir Starmer demanded assurance that government will not overturn that decision. The battle goes on. But the God of Creation holds the nations in his hands. The Brexit battle is primarily a spiritual battle, and evidence of this has been seen as powerful personalities and media conspire to undermine this agreement. See also

Twenty-six C of E bishops have reserved seats in the House of Lords, with the right to debate and vote on changes to the law. Recently the Archbishop of Canterbury led a debate on education, in which three other bishops spoke about values, schools, early years, further education, and skills. Bishops also spoke in debates on the autumn budget, and in response to Government statements on Zimbabwe, the social mobility commission, and terrorism. They asked questions about social housing in rural areas, and rough sleeping. In the House of Commons the second church estates commissioner answered questions from MPs on her bill to enable mothers to have equal status on marriage certificates, and on religious minorities in Egypt. Our bishops’ words have an influence on Westminster, so pray for God's Spirit to fill each one of them and spill out in all that they say and do.

According to the National Secular Society, Prince Charles’s accession to the throne could trigger a national debate about the relationship between the Church of England and the state, providing an ‘opportune moment’ to make the case for disestablishment. Debate about whether an established, privileged ‘state church’ is appropriate in an increasingly multi-faith and secular society is seen by many as off-limits while the Queen remains monarch. But the society’s report says Charles’s coronation is likely to throw up pressing questions about the institutional links between church, monarchy and parliament, claiming that the disestablishment of the church is now necessary and inevitable. Only two countries in the world, Britain and Iran, have religious leaders in their legislatures by right. Pray for the continuation of a monarchy crowned and anointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury at Westminster Abbey.

As 2017 closes, Syrian warring parties are moving towards reconciliation - but America is not among them. IS is all but defeated: the Syrian army and its allies are closing in on the few remaining pockets occupied by other extremists. Donald Trump may have hinted at changes, but he’s treading the same path as Obama on Syria. Determined to oust Syria’s President Assad as a means to weaken Iran and re-establish American regional control, Barack Obama gambled on two pathways to this goal: 1) military strategy to snatch control over Syria from the regime; 2) UN/American mediation in Geneva to remove Assad. Washington lost its military venture when the Russian air force entered the battle; next it resuscitated a limp Geneva peace process for political settlement without Assad. It failed. But a fresh process is being established in Sochi, not Geneva, with Iranians, Russians and Turks carving out ceasefire zones and negotiating peace.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s court case, at which she was expected to have her jail sentence extended, was postponed following the Foreign Secretary’s visit to Iran. Boris Johnson has said he held ‘worthwhile’ meetings in Tehran over the case of the jailed British-Iranian woman, but warned that he did not wish ‘to raise false hopes’ for her release. He believed his messages had been understood by senior Iranian figures, but admitted it was too early to be confident of the outcome, casting doubt on her family’s hopes that she might be released in time for Christmas.

A two-minute video calling on Christians to safeguard God's good world by working towards a future free of nuclear weapons has been released. This call to action is being distributed digitally to thousands across the world by the Baptists, Methodists, Quakers, Church of Scotland, and URC. The video explains, in simple cartoons, the basis for the Church's support for the new UN treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons, and calls on people to join in this multinational movement towards a world free of them. The treaty, once ratified, will make the use and threat of use of nuclear weapons illegal under international law. People are being invited to submit their names to a picture petition, which will be delivered to the UK Government in February.

In 1995 the US passed the ‘Jerusalem Embassy Act,’ which formally recognised Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and called for their embassy to move there from Tel Aviv. With overwhelming support it passed the Senate by 93 to 5. President Trump has now implemented that decision. Israel’s intelligence services minister Yisrael Katz said, ‘The Palestinian reaction is a rejection of Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, just as Arabs did 70 years ago.’ He also said that this action will make it clear to Palestinians that they too must recognise Israel, which is necessary for the peace process. He said Israel would take economic steps to help the Palestinians, singling out the regional railroad project currently being proposed. Manuel Hassassian, Palestinian representative to Britain, warned, ‘Trump is effectively declaring war in the Middle East’. See also

Asia Bibi, a Pakistani Christian woman who has been on death row for blasphemy since 2010, has been nominated for this year’s Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought. The 2017 report by the International Humanist and Ethical Union, presented on 5 December, should be alarming to all who care about freedom of thought and expression, as it shows ‘a pattern of regression on a global scale’. It shows that 85 countries have at least one law or symptom of ‘severe discrimination’ against those who think or believe differently; the free thinkers. Thirty countries are guilty of ‘grave violations’ such as prescribing the death penalty for apostasy, or ‘religious instruction in a significant number of schools, of a coercive fundamentalist or extremist variety’. See also the next article, about Canada’s religious freedom in schools.

Canadian father Steve Tourloukis - who featured in television commercials for the Coalition for Marriage - has been fighting a legal battle since 2012 to protect his parental rights and religious freedom. The legal battle has just come to an end, but not in the favour of Mr Tourloukis - or Canadian religious freedom. He initially sent a letter to the school board asking that his children be opted out of the sexual education programme, since many of the messages in the class directly conflicted with his religious beliefs. He specifically mentioned that he was concerned about the ‘discussions or portrayals of homosexual/bisexual conduct and relationships and/or transgenderism as natural, healthy or acceptable’. When they refused his request, he took them to court, but Ontario’s appeal court has ruled against him, and against the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.