Cuba: protests against government
23 Jul 2021
Historic and spontaneous protests rocked Cuba on 11 July, taking the communist government and the international community by surprise by their intensity and numbers. Analysts say there will not be immediate changes to one-party communist rule, but it’s a watershed moment and they have put an enormous amount of pressure on the government to speed up reforms. Cubans experiencing food and medicine shortages, increasing Covid-19 cases, inflation, rising prices and long power cuts chanted ‘Freedom’ and ‘We want change’, while holding signs that read ‘Down with dictatorship’. Journalist Yoani Sánchez tweeted, ‘We were so hungry, we ate our fear.’ Dr. Teo Babun said dissent has been brewing in the church for months. Evangelicals and Catholics have been generating a tremendous amount of social media, demanding the government pay attention to the hurt taking place. Political changes depend on whether demonstrators continue the momentum that stunned so many on 11 July.
Japan: Olympic Games - state of emergency
23 Jul 2021
The director of the Olympics opening ceremony was dismissed for making jokes in the 1990s about the Holocaust. Earlier this week, a composer quit the ceremony team after it emerged he had bullied classmates with disabilities at school. In March the Olympics' creative chief quit after suggesting that plus-size comedian Naomi Watanabe could appear as an ‘Olympig’. In February the head of the organising committee had to step down after he made inappropriate remarks about women. The scandals have increased massive unease about the Games. A recent poll found 55% of Japanese were opposed to holding the Games, fearing it could become a coronavirus super-spreader event. Already, organisers are dealing with rising Covid cases. Dozens involved in the Games, including officials and athletes, have tested positive. An increase in cases among Japan's population - only a third of whom have been vaccinated - has led to a state of emergency being declared for the duration of the Games.
Largely thanks to campaigning Christians, one of the most wicked proposed changes in the law ever to have been conceived in this country has failed to win approval. An amendment to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, intended to legalise abortion for any reason up to birth, has been withdrawn after being selected by the Speaker for debate and a vote. Jesus has the victory over death and destruction, and is right beside those who promote justice, righteousness, life, health and peace to a very sick society.
Tahreen’s story
15 Jul 2021
‘This lady was in deep despair when I first met her. She came to a local church foodbank seeking help to feed her four children. Thanks to God, volunteers, donations of daily needs, and gentle support, Tahreen gratefully received practical help. She also heard the gospel, and by God’s grace, she found new life in Christ!’ For further details, click the ‘More’ button.
Young family freed in South Asia
15 Jul 2021
Praise God for an operation this week that brought a young family, including four children, out of bonded labour. One of IJM’s partners discovered an 11-year-old forced to work at a sheep farm and then, by interviewing him, learned that the whole family was in bondage at a nearby brick kiln. Many families like theirs are being left vulnerable due to Covid-19 and a lack of dignified work.
Bishops’ ‘lavish’ lifestyles
15 Jul 2021
Financial data released by the Church of England shows that each bishop costs almost £120,000 a year, in addition to receiving £46,000 per year as a stipend. ‘As a member of General Synod for over a decade I have questioned the cost of bishops’ lavish lifestyles and opulence at the top while parishes up and down the country struggle to meet their bills, and even close their door,’ said Sam Margrave, a lay member of General Synod and a former local councilor, in a written statement submitted before last weekend’s synod meeting. The CofE spends, on average, £70,800 on the ongoing maintenance of each bishop’s house; 26 bishops live in houses that have more than six bedrooms.
Taking the knee at Euros 2020
15 Jul 2021
England and Italy players took the knee at the Euro final. Priti Patel publicly opposed this at the beginning of the Euros, saying that she did not support ‘people participating in that type of gesture politics’. Asked if she would criticise fans who booed England players taking the knee she said, ‘That's a choice for them, quite frankly’. After they missed penalties in the final, Marcus Rashford, Bukayo Saka and Jadon Sancho were targeted by racist abuse. In response Ms Patel tweeted that she was disgusted. Tyrone Mings said, ‘You don't get to stoke the fire at the beginning of the tournament by labelling our anti-racism message as 'gesture politics' and then pretend to be disgusted when the very thing happens which we're campaigning against.’
The CofE has abandoned a proposal to appoint 42 ‘racial justice officers’ across the country, one of the recommendations from its report on tackling racism in the institution. In April 47 proposals were made to address institutional racism and improve diversity in an attempt to end a ‘rut of inaction’ spanning several decades, with the Archbishop of Canterbury conceding that people of colour had been ‘bullied, overlooked, undermined and excluded’ within the Church. With the taskforce warning a failure to act against racism would convince people the Church was ‘not serious about racial sin’, one suggestion was for paid, full-time racial justice officers to be employed in every diocese for a five-year term. However, the idea was scrapped. The Archbishop of York said, ‘The Archbishops' Council has concluded that it cannot support this recommendation in this formulation at this time, given the need to reduce costs in diocesan and national administration.’