Not The BBC News: 30 November 2014

The UK’s Chief Scientist has completed and published a report on fracking for the Government. It has been reported by some newspapers that the report raises major concerns about fracking by comparing it to  “other innovation trajectories that later proved to be problematic”, such as asbestos, dioxins, thalidomide or tobacco, and that the report also argues that the UK could make up any shortfall in energy from fracking from renewable energy. In fact, these comments are not contained in the main report, but in one chapter of a supplementary publication in which a number of experts were invited to contribute personal views. The main report does, however, suggest that the indirect risks of adopting new technologies such as fracking need to be considered, along with the risks of failing to act.

The fire chief of the city of Atlanta has been suspended from duty without pay for one month by the mayor – because he wrote a chapter in a book that said same sex marriage was wrong and called it a “perversion”. He has also been ordered to undergo sensitivity training and banned from distributing copies of the book.

Following the US Supreme Court victory for private companies who do not wish to include abortifacents in the “Obamacare” health care cover that they must offer their employees, an entire U.S. State has now followed suit. A pro-life couple in Connecticut discovered that every “Obamacare” health policy available in the State included a compulsory extra payment that could only be used to fund abortion – and furthermore, that healthcare providers were banned from providing information about this payment, so many people were unaware of it. The couple sued the State, and State authorities now say that new health plans that do not include this payment will be made available.

The Chief Constable of Southwark has been answering questions about the anti-abortion protest outside the GP surgery/abortion clinic in Blackfriars. He said that after consultation with police, the protesters had re-located some of their banners, but otherwise they were not breaking any laws.

In sport, the world of cricket has been shocked by the death of 25 year old Australian Test batsman Phil Holmes, who was struck on the head by a ‘bouncer’ cricket ball, and died in hospital two days later. There has been much discussion over whether cricket helmets should be redesigned to protect batsman better, but it turned out that Holmes was struck high up on his neck (and suffered a burst artery) in an area where it is very difficult for any helmet to provide protection. A doctor described it as a ‘freak’ injury, which has only been recorded once before in the whole history of cricket. Former England and Yorkshire cricketer Geoffrey Boycott suggested that helmets are actually part of the problem; “they make batsmen feel invincible,” he said, “so they attempt pull and hook shots almost every time a short ball is bowled.” Holmes was playing a ‘pull’ shot when he was struck.

In technology news, the US Supreme Court has been asked to make a judgment about the law on cyberstalking and cyber-harassment. The case involves a man who was dumped by his wife,  and turned to social media as an outlet for his feelings. However, he was aware of the law against making direct threats against someone on social media, and so he contented himself with indirect criticisms and threats, such as “It’s illegal for me to say that I want to kill my wife. Not saying I’d do it, just that it’s illegal to say it” and “Hell hath no fury like a crazy man in a kindergarten class.” Both sides in the court case against him acknowledge that his postings have created fear in his wife and others; however, the defence allege that he did not intend to create fear but that the posting were simply “a form of therapy, an imitation of rap lyrics, and exercising free speech.” The Supreme Court has been asked to decide whether the law on cyber-harassment should require intent. The court must walk a fine line in this case, as illustrated by two cases:  a woman who moved house nine times in 18 months and changed her job four times in an attempt to escape an ex-partner; and a college professor who was suspended from his job after posting a picture of his 7 year old wearing a T-shirt captioned with a violent-sounding quotation from TV show “Game Of Thrones”, which the college interpreted as a threat of a school shooting.

And finally, a 430-mile team endurance race in Ecuador had an unexpected ending for a team from Sweden. With two stages left to go – a 20-mile mud-and-jungle run, and a 36-mile kayak – the team stopped for a meal, and one of them threw a meatball to a stray dog (breed unknown, but possibly part-golden retriever). When they left, the dog followed them through their 20 mile slog, and when they tried to leave the dog behind for the final stretch it started swimming after them, so they hauled it aboard one of their kayaks. The team and dog (now named Arthur) crossed the finish line together, and the team then set up a social media appeal to pay for the dog to return to Sweden with them.  Arthur is now in  quarantine in Sweden, receiving regular visits, and the team have set up the Arthur Foundation to help other stray dogs.

Not The BBC News: 26 November 2014

The case of the Christian bakery in Northern Ireland which is being pursued by the Equality Commission took an unexpected and potentially explosive political turn this week, when Gerry Adams of Sinn Fein effectively admitted that his party has been using equality law as a political weapon, by deliberately targeting its enemies with complaints about them breaking equality law. Adams was speaking to a Republican audience about “bigotry” amongst Unionists, and said, “The point is to break these b______ds – break them with equality. Might as well use equality -- who can be afraid of equality? That’s the Trojan horse of the entire Republican strategy.” His words were recorded and distributed by a journalist who was present. Sinn Fein have since scrambled to cover their tracks – one Sinn Fein politician tried to re-define “Trojan horse”, while Adams himself issued an apology for using bad language, which led some major news outlets to focus their coverage of the incident on that apology. However, Adams’ words call into question the genuineness of Sinn Fein’s whole pro-equality policy, as well as many of the complaints made to the Equality Commission of Northern Ireland. And given that one of the three Equality Commissioners who decided to pursue legal action against the bakery was a Sinn Fein member, the Commission’s legal action against the bakery appears especially suspect.

Kenya has placed an indefinite ban on registration for all new religious organisations, and will make all existing religious organisations file details of their registration status and financial returns. The move follows news coverage of alleged illegal activity by pastors promising miracles. The Government says the move is designed to protect its citizens.

Canon Andrew White, the “Vicar of Baghdad”, has been ordered to return home by the Archbishop of Canterbury after ISIS placed a ₤36 million bounty on his head. He says he has no fear of ISIS himself but that he agreed to leave because of the danger to the people around him. He fears greatly for the people he has left behind, and also worries that people in the UK “are not waking up and listening to the reality of what is going on.”

Rob Bell, former pastor of one of the Mars Hill megachurches and bestselling author, will front a self-help TV show on the Oprah Winfrey Network in the USA, starting next month. A trailer describes Bell as a “rock star speaker” and his show as “unconventional”, “revealing” and “inspiring.” Some Christians are uncertain whether to welcome the new show, both because of the “pastor as rock star” concept, and also because of some of Bell’s beliefs – he accepts gay marriage, and has questioned whether a literal, eternal Hell exists.

A mass march in Madrid was held to protest against the Spanish Government’s decision not to tighten restrictions on abortion. The right wing Government had promised to undo changes to abortion legislation made by the previous left wing administration, but decided not to proceed after being told that passing such laws would be “suicidal in election year.” The Government is trying to make amends by preventing 16 and 17 year olds from having abortions without parental consent.

In sports news, Lewis Hamilton won the Formula 1 driver's World Championship for the second time. He needed only to finish second to is team-mate Nico Rosberg in the final race, but after qualifying second, Hamilton overtook Rosberg from the grid, and then led throughout the race except for pit stops. Rosberg suffered problems with his car and did well to finish at all, coming home 13th.

In technology news, an executive at a UK corporation recently got a virus on his computer, despite having the latest anti-virus and anti-malware programs installed. When the corporation’s IT staff failed to find any way that the computer could have been infected, they asked the executive if he had made any changes in his lifestyle; he said “Yes, I stopped smoking two weeks ago and switched to e-cigarettes.” It turned out that his Chinese e-cigarette had malware hard-coded into its charger.

And finally, a schoolboy in Salford was suspended from school because he was too successful at selling sweets and fizzy drinks to his classmates. 15 year old Tommie Rose, who is a big fan of Dragon’s Den and the Apprentice, built up a lucrative business buying sweets in bulk and selling them at a mark-up. He had made ₤14,000 in three years – which he intended to put towards his university fees – but the school said that his activities contravened their healthy eating policy. However, Tommie decided not to waste the 15 minutes of fame that his suspension brought him, and auctioned an autographed bottle of Lucozade on Ebay. The winning bid was just over ₤1 million (plus ₤3.20 postage); there are now several Lucozade bottles being sold on Ebay, autographed by students looking to pay university fees.

Not The BBC News: 24 November 2014

A recent survey looked at the oft-repeated adage that religion is the major cause of war on Earth, to see if it was true. They discovered that it was false: specifically, they found that countries with the greatest religious freedom tended to be the most peaceful; that countries that are highly religious are statistically slightly more peaceful because religion can provide a basis for inclusion and social cohesion; and that the factors most associated with wars were corruption, political terror, gender & economic inequality (but not overall wealth or poverty), and political instability. The report further commented that, of 35 armed conflicts in 2013, only 5 were motivated by religion alone; and of the 15 armed conflicts motivated in part by Islamist groups in 2013, 10 were intra-group conflicts in countries where Muslims are the majority.

The Vatican has published a document that decrees that Greek Catholic churches may make their own decisions about whether their priests may marry. This concludes a conflict that has been running for over 100 years, particularly in the USA where Greek Catholics (also known as Byzantine Catholics, who are widespread in many East European, Middle Eastern and North African countries) can be found alongside their Roman Catholic counterparts. It also removes a significant barrier to dialogue between the Catholic and Orthodox churches.

A Pentecostal church in Udumalpet, Tamil Nadu, India, has been violently attacked by Hindu radicals who destroyed vehicles in the car park, then broke in, desecrated the altar, burned Bibles and broke musical instruments. The pastor and four other Christians are in a serious condition in hospital; some radicals even followed them to the hospital and attacked them again there. There has been a big increase in attacks on Christians and other religious minorities since May, when a right-wing Hindu government was elected.

The National Cathedral in Washington D.C. hosted an invitation-only Islamic prayer service, which was interrupted by a lone woman who loudly proclaimed the name of Jesus. She said afterwards, “Let’s play fair. If there can be an Islamic prayer service in a cathedral, let’s have a Bible study in a mosque.”

A synagogue in New York has come up with a new way to get people through the doors to discuss Jewish law: it has set up a mock trial of Abraham on charges of attempted murder and endangering his son Isaac. New York governor Eliot Spitzer will lead the prosecution; renowned lawyer Alan Dershowitz will appear for the defence; and U.S. District judge Alison Nathan will preside. The synagogue’s new director said, “If I put an ad asking people to come study Bible on Sunday morning, not many people would come. But [this event allows them] to come and study Torah – in a creative way that makes religion relevant to their lives.” The synagogue has sold more than 1000 tickets for the event at $36 each.

A new multimedia Museum of the Bible is under construction in Washington D.C. The motivation for the museum – and many of the items in its collection – come from Steve Green, an Oklahoma businessman who is president of Hobby Lobby (which recently won a controversial freedom-of-conscience case in the Supreme Court). The items, which include stained glass windows, fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the hand-written lyrics to “Battle Hymn Of The Republic” are designed to tell one of three stories: how the Bible was translated and transmitted through the ages; the Bible’s impact on culture; or to tell the narrative of the Bible itself in an ‘immersive’ way (e.g. by making one exhibition room a copy of Abraham’s tent). The museum is scheduled to open in autumn 2017.

In technology news, a computer anti-virus company has uncovered an “extremely sophisticated” spyware program that appears to have been used for data theft and other covert surveillance for at least the past six years. “Regin” is so sophisticated that experts believe it must have been written by a national intelligence service, much like the “Stuxnet” virus which crippled many nuclear reprocessing machines in Iran some years ago, and which was widely believed to have been written by Israeli intelligence. Countries targeted/affected by Regin include Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, Mexico, India, Austria, Belgium and Ireland. No country has yet been reported to be the likely author of the software, but since Regin uses internal codewords that are written in English and use cricketing terminology, the UK and Australia are suspected.

Also in technology news, a five year old boy who was born in Pakistan but has lived most of his life in Coventry set a new world record recently, by becoming the youngest person ever to pass the Microsoft Certified Professional exam. Ayan Quresh’s father, an IT technician, starting giving him old computers to play with at the age of three, and Ayan proved to have such a good memory that his father started teaching him more and more about computers. Ayan has now built his own computer network at home.

And finally, actress Brooke Shields has written an autobiography which reveals that her mother was pressurised to abort her daughter. Conceived out of wedlock, Brooke’s grandfather decided it would hurt his son’s social standing to have such a baby, and so gave an envelope to Brooke’s mother with enough money for an abortion. However, Brooke’s mother defiantly spent it on a coffee table -- which became a favourite standing aid for her baby daughter. Brooke Shields herself has said, “Too many people use abortion as a form of birth control. And that’s very wrong. I could never, ever, have an abortion.”

Not The BBC News: 20 November 2014

The issue of immigration has become prominent in British politics with the rise of UKIP and in American politics with Barack Obama’s plan to offer an amnesty to around 5 million illegal immigrants. There has been a corresponding rise in tensions and obstacles facing immigrants; for example in the UK, the supermarket Lidl recently banned Polish workers from speaking Polish even during their work breaks, and threatened them with dismissal when they broke that rule. Christians in the USA are deeply divided over whether to accept illegal immigrants; as for the UK, a report on the subject from the Jubilee Centre looked at how the Old Testament laws applied to legal immigrants. The report concluded that all immigrants to ancient Israel were to be welcomed and given hospitality, but only those who chose to assimilate with Hebrew society were given equal protection under the Law.

Stories are emerging from Ukraine of Protestant Christians being harassed, tortured or killed by the pro-Russian rebel fighters. Refugees tell of beatings; churches being taken over or forced to close; business being burned; and of arrested Christians being “shot while trying to escape.” A top evangelical leader from Sloviansk, in the eastern Donetsk district, said, “I never thought that in the 21st century in a free country like Ukraine such persecution could happen.” Many believe the persecution is linked to pressure from the Russian Orthodox Church.

Ofsted inspectors have withdrawn criticism of a Roman Catholic secondary school relating to the new “spiritual and moral development” standards. The inspectors’ preliminary report on St Benedict’s school in Bury St Edmunds said the “younger children showed less awareness of the dangers of extremism and radicalisation” and proposed to downgrade the school from “good” to “requires improvement,”  but there was no mention of the criticism in the final report. Meanwhile, a group of MPs have written to the Education Secretary urging her to withdraw the new standards.

The pastor of a Mennonite church in Ben Cat, Vietnam, has issued an emergency appeal for help after his church was attacked by knife-wielding thugs, while the police stood by watching and filming the event. Nine Christians were arrested and charged with not having their identification documents – which had been confiscated by police during previous raids and not returned. The church, which is unregistered and has criticised the government’s human rights record, has been attacked regularly since June; a nearby registered Mennonite church that has made no such criticisms has been left alone.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, has been praised for taking on payday lenders not primarily by public criticism but by encouraging churches to become involved with credit unions. However, he has also made some potentially controversial comments about refugees from the crises in the Middle East; he has said that the UK has a “duty of hospitality and welcome” but that the UK government should not offer the refugees asylum, but rather organise “safe havens” in their own territories. Otherwise, he fears, the Middle East will be “drained” of its long-standing Christian populations.

The Equalities Commission of Northern Ireland has made its annual financial report to members of the Northern Ireland Assembly. Politicians took the opportunity to criticise the Commission for its legal action against a Christian bakery in the province; one told the Chief Commissioner that they were “essentially bullying” a small business and that they “must acknowledge that they are out of step with public opinion.” The Commissioner replied that, although the Commission listens to what the public says, they are not required to take the public’s views into account.

A MSP who tried to reduce the role of churches in local authority education boards has dropped his proposed Bill due to lack of public support. He proposed to remove the current legal requirement to have three religious representatives on each Scottish education board, and also to prevent them from voting, but a public consultation found that only 17% of people supported his idea.

In sport, Sheffield United have bowed to public pressure and retracted their offer to former player Ched Evans to train with them after finishing his prison sentence for rape. A statement said: “We ask supporters to remember the responsibility that we have not only to be a fine and proud club, but to the communities in which Sheffield United is active.”

In technology news, Norway has started issuing new passports to its citizens. Each page is embossed with an image of Norway – and if the page is placed under and infra-red scanner, the Northern Lights appear on the picture.

And finally, a bus driver in Egypt was required to provide a sample of his urine for a drug test. When the results came back, he was informed that he had attempted to cheat the testers by supplying his wife’s urine (which he knew) and that she was two months pregnant (which he was unaware of). He is believed to be no longer working as a bus driver.

Not The BBC News: 19 November 2014

The outgoing president of Uruguay, who chose to maintain his humble lifestyle while in office, has refused a $1 million offer for his Volkswagen Beetle as he prepares for the end of his term. Jose Mujica is a former left-wing urban guerrilla who was imprisoned in the 1970s. He was elected on a centre-left platform, and has made significant changes in Uruguay, by attracting investment; introducing many wind farms (taking advantage of the slump in European demand due to the recession); and legalising abortion and marijuana, despite personally disapproving of both. “Look, no-one likes abortion, but women need it,” he said. His reasons for legalising marijuana are more cogent:  “Drug trafficking is much worse than consumption of marijuana: look at Mexico, Honduras or Guatemala. … And the problem is that state build giant systems to fight it, and [all state employees] start thinking their task is the centre of the world. Instead of repression, I need doctors to deal with this filth!” He plans to continue to live in the three-room house that he has shared with his wife throughout his term of office, and to help her in her trade as a chrysanthemum seller.

The protests in Blackfriars against co-locating an abortion clinic with a GP’s surgery have reached Parliament. A petition against the clinic has attracted 1500 signatures – but a petition against the displays of aborted babies mounted by protesters outside the clinic has attracted twice that number of signatures, despite the protesters placing a banner further down the street warning of “graphic abortion images ahead”. Now Labour MP Diane Abbott has raised an Early Day Motion in Parliament to prevent the protesters from showing such pictures in public. Such Motions have almost no chance of becoming law; they are used to allow MPs to express support for a cause by signing the motion, or even for humorous purposes. Abbott’s motion has only been signed by one other MP to date, the maverick Tory MP Peter Bottomley.

The international news coverage of the terrorist attack on a synagogue in Jerusalem has been criticised by Israeli sources. Some of the criticisms are of the media’s slowness to confirm that this was a terrorist attack, which perhaps reflects justifiable media caution; but other criticisms include the BBC refusing to show the dead body of one of the rabbis who was killed (an Israeli interviewee held up a photo of it and was asked to take it down) despite being prepared to show photos of dead Palestinians on other occasions; the Guardian deliberately excising the fact that the attackers were Palestinian from its initial reports; and CNN describing the event as an “attack on a Jerusalem mosque.” CNN have subsequently apologised.

The New York Times has discovered that the rules of the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) permit IRS undercover agents to pose as “an attorney, physician, clergyman or member of the news media.” The IRS is already facing a Congressional investigation for apparent past bias against right wing and Christian organisations, and the possibility that “when American citizens share their concerns with the clergy, they will actually be talking to an IRS agent” has raised a whole new controversy.

Another “Christian” film that was made for TV in 1994 has been made freely available over the Internet this year. “Time Of Violence” tells the story of the sufferings of Bulgarian Christians under the (Muslim) Ottoman empire, and has good reviews on the Internet Movie Database. It is available at http://shoebat.com/2014/11/13/movie-every-christian-must-watch-understand-christians-lived-islam-2/.

In technology news, a group of artists from London and Zurich are populating their latest art exhibition by shopping on the “darknet” i.e. on the illegal equivalent of Ebay. They programmed a  computer to buy one random item per week with a budget of $100 in Bitcoins. The exhibition will display both the items and the packaging in which they were sent. So far they have acquired a set of fire brigade master keys; ecstasy tablets which were shipped in a DVD case; fake Chesterfield cigarettes from Ukraine; fake trainers; a baseball cap with a hidden camera; and a copy of the “Lord of the Rings” novels, which cost less than a pound. Their last art project involved posting a camera to Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy, and programming the camera to take pictures of its journey through the postal system.

And finally, a male Australian TV presenter decided to make a statement about sexist attitudes – by wearing the same suit every day for a year. Karl Stefanovic, a presenter on the breakfast show on Channel Nine, said he began the experiment when he wore the same suit two days in a row and no-one noticed. “I get judged on my interviews and on my appalling sense of humour – basically on how I do my job. Whereas women are often judged on what they’re wearing or how their hair is.” He conceded that the suit was now “a bit stinky” and that he planned to get it dry cleaned.

Not The BBC News: 15 November 2014

A Texas oil magnate has died at the age of 88. Nelson Hunt was a lifelong Christian, and used some of his vast wealth to fund Christian projects. He funded the making of the “Jesus” film, and described it as his best ever investment: “it cost $22 million to make and over 200 million people have accepted Jesus after seeing it, so it cost me 11 cents a soul.” His other passions included horse breeding and racing; he founded the Breeder’s Cup specifically to provide a way for older horses to continue making money from racing.

Chinese authorities are not only demolishing church buildings but also arresting pastors, with the official Three Self state church being increasingly targeted. Zhang Shaojie, pastor of a church in Nanle County, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for “gathering a crowd to disrupt public order” and “committing fraud.” He appealed but his sentence was upheld – at a hearing that his lawyers were not told about. Now his daughter has been arrested and, according to a frantic text message, is being held at a hotel, possibly to prevent her from attending the Asia Pacific Economic Summit where Barack Obama will be present.

The spread of Ebola in Nigeria was stopped and the country is now Ebola-free, with churches playing a major role in the prevention campaign. The virus entered the country when an infected Liberian man arrived by air into the capital Lagos, and spread to 19 people, seven of whom died. But the Government swiftly ran a public education campaign about how to stop the spread of Ebola, using materials provided by Christian charity Tearfund and with church pastors helping to spread the message.

A new online resource for sex education in  the UK has been widely criticised because it says sex between 13 year olds is “healthy”. The “traffic light” resource also gives a green light to “interest in erotica/pornography” and “sexually explicit conversations with peers.” The charity that produced the resource also offer a sexually explicit book whose author argues (on their website): “Adult shame stops frank lessons.”

A man whose love for art drove him to rebel against his businessman father and became a soldier and then a (dreadlocked and heavily tattooed) tattoo artist has rediscovered his childhood Catholic faith and found a way to use his love of art – as a monk. He has been made curator of the Oregon abbey’s art collection. “People have been bequeathing items to the abbey since the 19^th century,” he said. “Much of it is unmarked, and it’s like a garden; if you don’t weed it, you get some crazy plants.” He collaborates with art museums and has taken a course in iconography. He has shaved his hair, but still has his tattoos.

In sport, the international football federation FIFA have completed an internal investigation into allegations of bias and bribery when the next two World Cups were awarded to Russia and Qatar. A summary of the report was released – it cleared Russia and Qatar of wrongdoing, but accused the failed English bid of attempted bribery. However, the summary was immediately criticised by the author of the full report, who said it contained “misleading and erroneous statements of fact”, and appealed for the full report to be released. FIFA’s credibility has now sunk so low that one newspaper ran a spoof article suggesting that the next World Cup will be held in Hell, as FIFA don’t think that very hot temperatures and a poor human rights record are a good reason to avoid it.

Also in sport, last night’s European Championship qualifiers saw Scotland beat the Republic of Ireland 1-0 – both teams are in joint second place in their group, alongside Germany and behind Poland. Northern Ireland suffered their first defeat of the campaign, 2-0 away to group-topping Romania. And Greece lost 1-0 at home to the Faroe Islands; the last time the Faroes beat a “Western” European team in a qualifying match was 2002 when they beat Luxembourg.

And finally, many people complain about the price of petrol, but in Iran an age-old solution to the problem is being used – donkey transport. The government of Iran cut petrol subsidies causing price rises of up to 75%, and a rapid increase in donkey traffic has since been seen, especially in the mountainous north west of the country, but also in some cities. This is considered good news for the donkeys who would often die in the wild during the winter after being released to avoid the costs of winter feeding.  

Not The BBC News: 14 November 2014

More details are emerging about the death of Dr Myles Munroe of Bahamian Faith Ministries in a plane crash. The crash has been attributed to bad weather, but his daughter Charisa was not on the plane and is alive and well. Tributes have been paid from around the world; Dr Munroe was a regular visitor to Israel, and the youngest recipient of the Order of the British Empire in 1998. He was on his way to an international conference for Christian leaders from his ministry, at which he planned to speak about a dream that he had had; the dream showed an athlete in a coffin with the baton still in his grasp, and spoke of the need to pass on the baton of leadership before it became too late to do so.

A so-called “lost gospel” has been discovered that allegedly states that Jesus married Mary Magdalene and had two sons. It turns out that the document actually tells the story of Old Testament patriarch Joseph and his marriage to an Egyptian princess; the document can only be applied to Jesus if it is assumed that the whole document is written in code (Joseph represents Jesus, and so on). Furthermore the document, which was written around 590 AD, has been in the British Museum since 1847. One Christian commentator summarised the situation: “It wasn’t lost and it isn’t a gospel.”

The Court of Session in Scotland ruled in 2012 that two Catholic labour ward co-ordinators are entitled to claim conscientious objection to “the full range” of abortion services, including delegating, supervising or supporting anyone else to perform abortions; this week, the UK Supreme Court began to review the case, and judgment is expected next year. The chief executive of abortion providers BPAS said it would be “grossly unjust” if an interpretation of the conscience clause should allow a small number of individuals to disrupt abortion clinics and prevent them from “helping women.”

A proposed UK law to criminalise anyone who seriously harmed a child’s “physical, intellectual, emotional, social or behavioural development” has been dropped from the forthcoming Serious Crime Bill. This has been hailed as a victory by Christian organisations who had campaigned against the measure, because its wording was considered so broad that it could be used against parents who brought their children up to believe a particular religion.

Three Northern Irish MPs have launched a petition against the Equalities Commission’s decision to bring charges against a Christian bakery. Northern Ireland’s First Minister has called the decision “bonkers.”

In sport, the argument of the future of ex-Sheffield United footballer and convicted rapist Ched Evans has intensified after the club  allowed him to train at their ground. Some sources have argued that he should not been convicted of rape at all, or at least of a hypothetical ‘lesser rape’ offence, since the woman involved apparently consented while drunk; however athlete Jessica Ennis-Hill, who has one of the stands at United’s ground named after her, has asked for her name to be removed if he is re-signed.

In technology news, a Frenchman has designed the fastest bicycle in the world – by putting a hydrogen peroxide powered jet engine on the back of it. The bicycle can do 0-60mph in 1.1 seconds (more than  twice as fast as a Formula One car) and has a top speed of 207mph.

Also in technology, a company called Husk Power has found an innovative way to supply electricity to the poorest parts of India – by burning rice husks. Set up by four Indians in the USA, the company’s machines burn 50kg of husks per hour to supply 32 kW of power. They sell the power in the extremely poor state of Bihar – customer pay $1.75 per month to power one 30 watt lightbulb and to charge mobile phones for 6 hours per day. The company has also saved money by stripping out automated parts of their machine (e.g. waste extraction) in favour of hand cranking; getting their fee collectors to double as door to door salesmen; and selling the burned rice husks to incense stick manufacturers.

And finally, a Canadian teenager had her school locker broken into by bullies; one of them found her Ipad and used it to post a status on her Facebook account encouraging her to die. The girl’s response was to write out positive notes about all 800 students in the school, and to stick them on their lockers. Although the school’s response was to criticise the girl for littering (because some of the notes fell off), a number of the students say they have kept the notes, and the idea has gone viral around the world – one stationers in Airdrie, Scotland even offered to give away Post-It notes in advance of World Positive Post-It day on October 9^th.

Not The BBC News: 11 November 2014

A possible major embarrassment for the United Nations is brewing in Kenya over anti-tetanus vaccines. The vaccines are being offered by two United Nations funded organisations, the World Health Organisation and UNICEF; the jabs are (allegedly) to prevent neo-natal tetanus, and so are only offered to women of childbearing age. They also require five inoculations rather than the usual three. Because of these unusual features, a Nairobi clinic sent six samples of the vaccine to laboratories in South Africa, and were told that all six samples included HCG, a drug that induces miscarriages. Kenya’s bishops have accused the UN of carrying out a covert mass sterilisation programme and advised their congregations not to have the injections. However, the Kenyan government has said the vaccine is safe and have referred to women who had the injections and became pregnant within six months.

Dr Myles Munroe, head of the Pentecostal Bahamian Faith Ministries International, has been killed in a private plane crash along with his wife and daughter, and three other leaders from the ministry. The plane apparently clipped a crane near the docks. Munroe’s ministry was especially well known in Africa.

The Pope has effectively demoted a Catholic cardinal who was the strongest English-speaking supporter of pro-life issues in the College of Cardinals. Raymond Burke, an American, was especially known for his insistence on the doctrine that Mass should be denied to supporters of abortion and same-sex marriage, which was at odds with the Pope’s recent attempts to promote a less confrontational dialogue on those subjects. Burke has been moved to a largely ceremonial position in Malta, and has been replaced by a French cardinal.

In 2003, the Scottish government was considering legalising prostitution, and it commissioned a study of other countries where such moves have been made. The study looked at Victoria, Australia, where prostitution had recently been legalised; Ireland, where selling sex was illegal but buying it was (in most circumstances) not; Sweden, where buying sex was illegal but selling it was not; and the Netherlands. The study found that the only country where there had been any success in reducing prostitution, and also the associated evils of people trafficking and organised crime, was Sweden. The key to Sweden’s success seemed to be that the legislation had been passed as part of a package of preventing-violence-against-women legislation, and that significant funds had been made available to educate the public (and the police) in seeing prostitution as a sex crime perpetrated by men. Funds were also provided to assist prostitutes who wanted to leave the industry. In the Netherlands, the study found, assistance funds had often been promised but never materialised, and almost 80% of prostitutes said they wanted to leave the industry; in Victoria, the legalisation of prostitution caused  a huge increase in people trafficking and organised crime.

A new film is coming out early next year that follows Martin Luther King’s campaign and march for equal voting rights. “Selma” stars David Oyelowo, Carmen Ejogo and Oprah Winfrey.

In the USA, TV producers Roma Downey and Mark Burnett has produced a new TV series which aims to highlight the role of women in the Bible. The series is called  “The Red Tent”; it stars Minnie Driver as Dinah, the daughter of Leah and Jacob. The series will open next month with a special program called “Women of the Bible”, which will include stories of Eve, Sara, Rahab, Mary Magdalene and Mary as well as interviews with today's women leaders of faith, including Christine Caine and Priscilla Shirer (Going Beyond Ministries); Eva Rodriguez (Latino Evangelical Women's Association); Joyce Meyer;  Kay Warren (Saddleback Church); and Victoria Osteen (Lakewood Church).

In technology news, a Dutch Bitcoin entrepreneur has experimented with the ultimate portable wallet – he has had computer chips implanted in his skin. The Near Field Communication chips can be read using a smartphone. He has programmed his alarm clock so that it will only turn off if he places both of his chips near it, and he plans to install keyless access to his house – but he decided that even these chips are not a secure place to store Bitcoins, because the technology is not yet secure enough for him to store his private Bitcoin encryption key on the chips.

And finally, on the 100^th anniversary of the end of World War 1, and just after the 25^th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, I wish all my readers a chance to enjoy the freedom that has been won for them, and the wisdom to use it well.

Not The BBC News: 9 November 2014

Boko Haram have overrun a whole town in north-eastern Nigeria along with several other communities. Mubi, near the border with Cameroon, has a population of around 130,000 people. Refugees say that the militants are burning churches; torturing or stoning Christians who refuse to convert to Islam; publicly amputating the hands of anyone caught looting; and threatening to marry off unmarried girls and women, for a price. The town was captured 10 days ago; Nigerian army and police forces were reported to be in the area to recapture the two 3 days ago.

After extensive diplomatic pressure, North Korea has released an American missionary along with another American. Kenneth Bae was leading a tour group from China (which may have been an undercover Christian missionary trip) in November 2012 when he was arrested. He was charged with preaching against the North Korean government, and planning a religious coup d’état named “Operation Jericho”, and was sentenced to 15 years’ hard labour. He was hospitalised early this year, but after his health was deemed to have recovered, he was returned to the labour camp. The other American, Matthew Miller, had claimed asylum in North Korea; he was convicted of espionage after North Korean officials decided his claim was an attempt to infiltrate their prison system in order to produce a secret human rights report. Oný the day before Bae was released, his family had used the second anniversary of his arrest to remind people of his imprisonment in order to keep his case in the public eye.

A legal conflict in Poland between an abortion clinic and pro-life demonstrators has been decided in favour of the clinic. The Pro-Familia hospital in Rzeszów objected to the demonstrators claiming that abortion was “killing babies”, arguing that pregnancy terminations could not be equated with killing. The female judge strongly agreed with the hospital: she told the demonstrators to stop using that phrase; to apologize to the hospital through the media, using words that she had chosen (which included “I was spreading false information about the work of the hospital”); and to pay all court fees. She heard no witnesses and kept the explanation of her judgment confidential. Since Polish law defines a foetus as a ‘person’ from the moment of conception, and since the judge’s decision seems to be a strong attack on free speech, her decision has been widely criticised, even in the normally pro-choice national newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza.

A female pastor in the Philippines, whose home was destroyed and church left roofless by Typhoon Haiyan a year ago, has been working with Tearfund and other Christian agencies to rebuild lives and buildings. She has also brought together nine other churches to set up a duck farm. “God gave me inspiration about duck-raising,” she said, “because ducks are resistant to almost any kind of weather and also about egg productions and how it could help our community because here eggs are expensive.” Some income from  the farm will be used to help poor students continue to attend local schools.

The BBC TV programme “Songs Of Praise” is to be revamped in an attempt to attract more viewers. The programme, which was once described by a (Christian) BBC programme maker as “Top Of The Pops for the over-50s”, usually mixes congregational hymn singing with short interviews. However, a BBC source says that demographic changes including immigration have led to declining interest in Anglican-type services amongst its target audience, but increased interest in Pentecostal and Catholic services. The show will now feature multiple church settings in a single programme, including Pentecostal, Roman Catholic and Salvation Army churches. It will also replace some or all of the interviews with magazine-style reports on news-related issues.

In technology news, researchers at the University of Washington have succeeded in demonstrating how one person’s mind can control another person’s body. They wired up pairs of volunteers to EEG machines and gave them a simple computer game (shooting pirate ships with a cannon) to play. The first volunteer could see the screen for the game but had no keyboard to fire the cannon; the second, half a mile away, had a keyboard but no screen. The EEG machine for the second player was wired to send commands directly to his muscles, so that when the first player thought “fire!” the second player’s hand would move in response to the transmitted EEG waves. The most successful of the three pairs of players destroyed 83% of the ships.

And finally, a 12 year old in San Jose, California decided that his school science project would be to build a Braille printer out of Lego. The result was so successful that Intel decided to invest in order to bring the printer to market. Normal Braille printers cost about ₤1,300; the Lego version is about ₤220. The boy has also set up a company, Braigo Labs, which offers the printer’s software and the Lego design as open source code so that it can be freely used and improved on around the world.

Not The BBC News: 7 November 2014

Following the resignation of Mark Driscoll as senior pastor of the Mars Hill church network, and the disbanding of the network, a large group of elders from Mars Hill church have written a public letter of apology to two former elders. The two were removed from Mars Hill’s board in 2007 for “lack of trust and respect for spiritual authority.” The letter says, “We now believe that you were grievously sinned against in that termination. We believe that the termination meeting’s content and tone was abrupt, one sided, and threatening. ... By failing to intervene, we enabled a growing trend of misuses and abuses of power and authority that would be feared and tolerated by the rest of the church’s eldership. We now understand that these sorts of overpowering actions against elders were some of the very concerns that you had each expressed … It is tragic that you were proved right by your own experiences.”

 A Christian couple in Pakistan have been beaten to death and then burned after being accused of blasphemy by the mullah of the local mosque for allegedly burning pages of the Koran. Police took no action to prevent the killings, even though the wife was imprisoned for two days before it happened, but have arrested 44 people in connection with the incident There are indications that the alleged blasphemy was preceded by a dispute about money or employment. A senior human rights activist in Lahore described the incident as another case of misuse of the blasphemy law.

 A woman who is a performance poet, the author of five books, dramatist and broadcaster has spoken about how she was given just three weeks to live at birth because of her multiple disabilities. “No disability is without hope… Every child deserves life,” she said. She encouraged mothers who are told their foetus is too disabled to survive to carry the baby to term anyway, so that even if the baby doesn’t survive, they can say “I gave it life in me for nine months.”

Nigel Dodds, an MP from the Northern Irish DUP, has slammed the Equality Commission’s “relentless pursuit” of a Christian bakery. He said, “The Equality Commission have lined up the might of their organisation against a family run bakery. This bakery does not question the sexual orientation, religion or political opinion of anyone who enters their shop to purchase a product. They simply wish to follow their conscience in relation to a slogan in favour of same sex marriage. The Commission will spend tens of thousands of pounds of public money pursuing this action which would undermine freedom of religion and freedom of conscience. Those principles should be the cornerstone of any free society, but instead we have a public body pursuing intolerance in the name of equality.”

A US federal appeal court has overturned decisions by lower courts in four US states to permit gay marriage. “Changes to such a fundamental social institution should be left to the American people and the democratic process,” said one of the judges.

A number of Hollywood film starts have recently spoken out about their Christian faith. Shia LaBoeuf has continued to hold to the profession of faith he made while filming “Fury”; he has been joined by Matthew McConaughey, Gwen Stefani, and Chris Pratt (of “Guardians of the Galaxy” fame). Stefani spoke of how her young son prayed for a baby brother or sister every night, and gasped in surprise when she discovered she was pregnant just four weeks after he started. And Pratt described how he and his wife turned to fervent prayer when their son was born nine weeks premature; “It restored my faith in God, not that it needed to be restored, but it really redefined it.”

In sport news, one of the eleven teams competing in the Formula 1 world championship has collapsed; 200 staff have lost their jobs. Marussia had had almost no success on the track, and had lost one of their two drivers to a life-threatening head injury at the end of the Japanese Grand Prix. Another team, Caterham, has had its assets seized by bailiffs and is widely expected to collapse as well. The blame has been placed on the way prize money for Grand Prix races is allocated.

In technology news, this week police in 17 countries arrested at least 17 website administrators, vendors and cybercriminals who were operating on the “Dark Web.” More than 400 Dark Web  domains were taken offline as police seized control of the servers. Irish police not only arrested two men but found around ₤150,000 worth of illegal drugs, and computers which contained accounts for drug sales and links to offshore bank accounts.

And finally, a 23 year old Loughborough University graduate who saw a documentary about a huge increase in premature births in Syria due to the stress of war decided to do something to help; this week he won the James Dyson award for innovation. His invention is a portable baby incubator, which can be inflated manually; uses ceramic heating elements; and has a back-up battery that lasts 24 hours. It also has a UV lamp for jaundiced babies and an alarm if the temperature changes. It costs around ₤250, compared with traditional hospital incubators that cost around ₤30,000. He said, “I had to sell my car to fund my first prototype … my dream would be to meet a child that my incubator has saved.”

Not The BBC News: 6 November 2014

The UK Parliament has passed a motion to make sex selective abortions illegal. Since last year, when the Crown Prosecution Service refused to prosecute two doctors who were found to be performing sex selective abortions, top abortion providers BPAS  have been advising their clients that such abortions are legal because the law is silent on the matter, and the British Medical Association has proffered the (even more far-fetched) reason that having a baby of a particular sex could damage the mother’s mental health. As a result, a “Ten Minute Rule” bill to declare such abortions illegal was put forward by a female Conservative MP, and passed its first reading almost unanimously; 181 cross-party MPs voted for it, only the Labour MP and former actress Glenda Jackson voted against. This vote allows the Bill to move into the Government’s legislative programme, although it is unlikely to become law before the General Election in May.

In Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a 90 year old man and two pastors have been charged by police with feeding the homeless on a public beach; one of the police apparently said, “Drop that plate right now!”. They face a possible fine of $500 and up to 60 days in jail. Fort Lauderdale recently became one of 33 US cities to institute a ban on such volunteer feeding programmes; in a similar court case in another Florida city, the city argued that such programmes draw homeless people away from centralised city-run facilities, and that the homeless people sometimes mistreat the public areas where the feeding stations are located. The 90 year old man, who faced a similar charge 15 years ago but won in court, plans to continue his feeding programme even in the face of further charges; he said, “They are the poorest of the poor. How can you turn them away?”

The UK has used foreign aid money to set up and fund a treatment centre for Ebola in Kerry Town, Sierra Leone.  It can treat 100 patients and is the first of six planned centres. It is being run jointly by the Department for International Development and Save The Children. It will be staffed by British volunteers and army medics.

The Equalities Commission has reached a decision regarding the Christian bakers in Northern Ireland who refused to bake a cake supporting gay marriage: the bakers are deemed guilty of “unlawful religious, political and” [sic] “sexual orientation discrimination” and must either apologise and pay compensation, or face legal action. A spokesman for the Christian Institute described the accusation of political discrimination as “baffling.” The bakery says it is continuing to take its original stand because “we believe it’s Biblical, we believe it’s what God would want us to do, and we also think that if we do cave in, it’ll put pressure on other citizens who are defending their view of traditional marriage.”

A man who has volunteered for the Red Cross for 20 years has been ‘sacked’ by the charity because he held a sign that said, “No Same Sex Marriage.” The charity wrote him a letter saying that his views on marriage were incompatible with the Red Cross’ ”fundamental principles and values.” Former MP and minister Ann Widdecombe has called on the Prime Minister to condemn the actions of the “supposedly neutral” charity, and has confirmed that she herself will withdraw her support from it.

In the recent US elections, an 18 year old woman from West Virginia became the youngest ever elected member of the House of Representatives. Her website says, “I believe this country was founded on Judaeo-Christian principles. Our constitution guarantees freedom of religion, not freedom from religion.”

In technology news, a recent review of gadgets that are produced and marketed in China included a gyroscope-stabilised unicycle that fits in a commuter’s briefcase; a smartphone that automatically edits selfies to remove freckles, soften lighting, improve skin tone and add lights to eyes; a cooker that uses downloaded recipes to cook food for the correct time and temperature (and can be switched on remotely);  a phone that displays 3D holographic images (by using one of its several cameras to monitor the user’s eye movements) and can also print out the image on a 3D printer; and a cigarette lighter that aims to cut down on smoking simply by reminding users how many cigarettes they have smoked that day.

And finally, a correction published several years ago by the Guardian newspaper (which used to be infamous for its spelling errors) has recently been re-circulated. The correction read as follows:  “In our interview with Sir Jack Hayward, the chairman of Wolverhampton Wanderers, page 20, Sport, yesterday, we mistakenly attributed to him the following comment: ‘Our team was the worst in the First Division and I'm sure it'll be the worst in the Premier League.’ Sir Jack had just declined the offer of a hot drink. What he actually said was ‘Our tea was the worst in the First Division and I'm sure it'll be the worst in the Premier League.’ Profuse apologies.” 

Not The BBC News: 2 November 2014

The Seattle-based Mars Hill church network, founded and (until recently) led by pastor and prolific author Mark Driscoll, is to disband into individual autonomous churches. Driscoll resigned as senior pastor of the network last month after facing growing criticism of his leadership style and also of the marketing of his books. A church investigation found that Driscoll had not done anything immoral or illegal, but that he was regularly brash, arrogant and rude in personal relationships, and that he had led the network in a ‘domineering’ style. Driscoll resigned after accepting that the criticism was accurate. Mars Hill will sell its offices and other properties that are not connected with individual churches.

A father in the Ivory Coast who tried to sell his 11 year old daughter into a  forced marriage has been fined and jailed. He was caught when the girl’s school reported her absence from classes to a rights group, which in turn told police; the girl was found wearing a marriage veil at a ceremony where the groom was absent. The practice of child marriages is widespread in poor Muslim areas of the country; the convicted man’s brother told journalists that Islam “recommends” child marriages because it says that when a woman has her first menstrual period, she can marry. The brother added that their own mother was married at the age of nine.

Meanwhile, Boko Haram has denied claims from the Nigerian government that a ceasefire has been agreed that will include the release of the captured schoolgirls. It says no deal has been agreed and that the girls have been married off.

A hospital in Orange County, California has designed a special “Small Baby Unit” for babies who are “micro premature” i.e. born before 28 weeks’ gestation, or below 1kg in weight. The unit is kept dark and quiet, in order to mimic conditions in the mother’s womb. Parents are encouraged to play the role of therapists, touching the baby, then learning gentle baby massage, and eventually having extended skin-to-skin contact (during which any essential painful procedures are carried out). Compared with 2009 before the unit was set up, the hospital has seen chronic lung infections among such babies drop by 40% and infections drop by 60%; the treatment also reduces stress and anxiety for parents.

There are reports from eastern Ukraine, where pro-Russian militants are in charge, of abductions and killings of Protestant and Catholic Christians. Four church ministers have been murdered, and numerous church buildings either destroyed or taken over by the militants.

In sport, a film called “United Passions” has been released that charts the creation and development of FIFA, the governing body of world football. One newspaper described it as “thoroughly un-objective” and “full of scenes of people looking out of windows at scenic locations where boring meetings are taking place,” and summarised, “we have seen it and reviewed it so that you don’t have to.” However, it might have one redeeming feature for Scottish viewers; the English are the bad guys since the English FA originally opposed the creation of FIFA.

In technology news, a new gadget has been released in the USA to help locate ‘lost’ items. The KiiTAG can be attached to items such as your hand luggage in an airport, and it will send a Bluetooth notification to your phone if the tag is more than 200ft from the phone, telling you its last known location. It should be a godsend to people who regularly forget where they left things -- as long as they have remembered their smartphone.

And finally, an IT help desk worker in New York became so fed up with people treating him like he was a robot that he started pretending to be an automated machine when he answered calls. However, he earned himself a 20-day suspension when he successfully convinced one caller that he really was a machine.