British Asian Christians are issuing an urgent call for peace in Manipur as the area grapples with escalating violence and persecution. They are calling on people to join a peaceful protest in London next week. They said, ‘This unified effort, driven by the desire for justice and equality, seeks to shed light on the discrimination faced by Christians in the region.’ They are calling for ‘people of faith or no faith, who have good conscience and are moved by the recent attacks to come together and call for change.’ The violent persecution of Christians, which began four months ago over land rights and jobs, has been brought to the attention of British MPs, and a meeting in Parliament to discuss the situation is scheduled for later this month. Prime minister Modi is accused of ignoring the situation and not doing enough to quell the violence, earning him a vote of no confidence.
Pray for bankrupt Birmingham
07 Sep 2023
Birmingham City Council has announced that it is bankrupt, and all new spending will stop, with the exception of money protecting vulnerable people and legal services. Following the bankruptcy announcement, Birmingham’s faith leaders raised a ‘Call to Prayer for Birmingham’ outside the council house between 6.00 and 6.45 pm on Friday 8 September. Currently, the council's outgoings and legal liabilities are more than it can afford, and Bishop Desmond Jaddoo is calling all faith leaders to come together in prayer and to offer what help they can in this time of need. Bishop Jaddoo said, ‘We've noticed that at times like this, the poor, the vulnerable, families who are struggling with the cost of living, our children will feel the impact this is going to have. It's going to exacerbate pre-existing hardships along with cuts in services. We are in this together, and we've got to come together to deal with this collectively.’
Church’s statement over RAAC school closures
07 Sep 2023
As families navigate the start of school, the Church of England has released a statement following news that 156 schools are at risk of collapsing because a type of concrete known as 'RAAC' was used in their construction. 52 buildings could suddenly collapse, and action was immediately taken to make them safe by propping up the concrete. The other 104 are scrambling to put safety measures in place and stay open. Schools with RAAC and no safety measures prepared must close, with pupils relocated to temporary facilities or pandemic-style online learning reintroduced. The CofE education office, which is in contact with government ministers and the Department for Education on this matter, is ensuring that dioceses are aware of the situation where it affects their schools. It says, ‘We are in close communication with them about any needed mitigations or contingency measures.’ See also
A generation of children’s mental health
07 Sep 2023
Shelter states that two-thirds of families living in temporary accommodation (TA) have been there for over a year; some families have lived in TA for more than ten years. TA is usually overcrowded and of very poor quality. Children share beds with siblings or parents, with little to no space for belongings. Youngsters have no room to play safely or even learn to walk. Older children have no privacy, nowhere to do homework or have friends over. Parents struggle to feed their children nourishing meals without suitable cooking facilities, relying on expensive, unhealthy takeaways or what they can heat up with a kettle or a microwave if they have one. Children attend school tired, or late, or hungry; many travel long distances from their TA. Families are cut off from support networks. Families live in limbo. They move frequently. Uncertainty and insecurity hang over them. Their children’s mental health suffers.
Escaped criminal: prisons scandal
07 Sep 2023
Khalife, a former soldier who was on remand at HMP Wandsworth, a category B prison rather than a high-security prison, escaped by clinging to the bottom of a delivery van. Professor Ian Acheson, a former prison governor and head of security at HMP Wandsworth, called it a ‘catastrophic system failure that actually starts with the allocation of Khalife to Wandsworth’. He said: “It’s pretty odd because what you would expect in terms of the allocation process is that somebody who was charged with terrorist offences under the Official Secrets Act, who’s an alleged fake bomb maker and is collecting information of use to terrorists, all of that package would lead you - I think reasonably - to conclude that this person is a flight risk, is an escape risk. The place that he should have ended up in, by all estimations, is Belmarsh prison. Wandsworth is filthy and infested with vermin; 44% of staff are off sick, and morale is awful.’
House prices fell at their fastest annual rate in 14 years in August as rising mortgage rates affected the market. ‘We may be seeing a greater impact from higher mortgage costs flowing through to house prices,’ said the Halifax director of mortgages. ‘The market will continue to rebalance until it finds an equilibrium where buyers are comfortable with mortgage costs in a higher range than seen over the previous fifteen years.’ First-time buyers have welcomed a fall in prices but face relatively high repayment costs, alongside other cost-of-living pressures such as higher prices in the shops. On the flip side, wage growth has helped affordability. Despite the fall in property values, the Halifax said that prices were only back to the level seen at the start of last year, and still £40,000 higher than before Covid.
Finland: Christian MP on trial for Bible tweet
07 Sep 2023
In April 2022, Finnish MP and former government minister Päivi Räsänen was declared innocent of all charges over her beliefs on sexuality, but the prosecutors appealed the verdict. The latest trial involves expressions of her Christian faith in a tweet, in a church pamphlet twenty years ago, and in a 2019 radio interview. She is accused under the ‘War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity’ for ‘agitation against a minority group’. She says it is a very important verdict for freedom of speech and religion in Finland, which has consequences across Europe. Räsänen’s tweet challenged her church leadership for sponsoring a Pride event, and included a picture of a Bible verse from Romans. The prosecutor said she wasn’t putting God in the dock, but rather those who interpret what the Bible says: ‘You can cite the Bible, but it is Räsänen’s interpretation and opinion about Bible verses that are criminal.’ The court will deliver a verdict by 30 November.
Yuri Sipko, a retired pastor and former president of the Baptist World Alliance, fled Russia when the authorities attempted to arrest him for publicly praying for peace in Ukraine. He decided to do this after his participation in an online prayer vigil for Ukraine at an event hosted by Mission Eurasia. From an undisclosed location in Europe, he said, ‘The law makes it a crime to call the war a war and forbids anyone to call for peace in Ukraine. But I prayed for peace and said it is a crime to drop rockets and bombs on the Ukrainian people’. He evaded capture on 8 August and has since been placed on a most-wanted list for disseminating false information about the invasion. ‘It is a terrible thing when the word “peace” is outlawed. Everything is upside-down in Russia’, he said.