Age UK faces probe over energy ‘deals’
05 Feb 2016
Age UK has warned that pensioners are struggling to heat their homes, but it appears that the charity earns £6million a year promoting expensive energy deals. Energy regulators will investigate claims that Age UK unfairly pushed pensioners into taking out more expensive energy tariffs with E-ON on a rate that was £245 a year more expensive than the cheapest available. Last year, more than 150,000 customers were on the higher rate. In return for promoting the rate E-ON gave Age UK a commission of £10 per customer. The charity ‘strongly rejects’ the interpretation of figures. While it is perfectly legal to accept commissions, the regulator takes a harsh line on any hint that customers have been misled.
‘Caring for the environment is not an optional extra’, the former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Williams said at the launch of a scheme to encourage churches to prioritise green concerns. He said that looking after God’s creation was inextricably part of all Christians’ responsibility to their brothers and sisters worldwide, especially those living in poverty. The Eco Church initiative is backed by the Church of England, the Methodist Church, the United Reformed Church, Christian Aid, Tearfund and others who question whether we want to pass on a liveable world to our children and grandchildren. Some in the Church would argue that they could not afford the time or money to consider ecological concerns. Lord Williams’s response is that we cannot afford not to. The Eco Church website provides a survey to see how environmentally aware churches are in areas of worship, teaching, buildings, land, community and lifestyle. See also
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange was arrested in 2010 under a Swedish-issued European arrest warrant for the crime of rape. He claimed asylum inside the Ecuadorian embassy, after the UK Supreme Court ruled that he should be deported to Sweden on charges of sexual molestation. Today, a UN panel has stated that Assange is being arbitrarily detained; he should be allowed to go free and compensated. However, the Foreign Office say that the panel’s ruling is not binding, and it intends to contest it formally. Previous such rulings have gone against countries with some of the world's worst human rights records, such as Saudi Arabia, Myanmar and Egypt. So this decision against Sweden and Britain in favour of Mr Assange is controversial.
Across the nations, people are crossing barriers to proclaim the crucified and risen Christ and are expressing His love and compassion among those who live and die without Him. SIM is just one of many mission agencies. Originally known as Sudan Inland Mission, in the 1980s SIM joined other mission agencies and became known as ‘Serving in Mission’ .It has 4,000+ workers in 70+ countries serving God among many diverse people groups in every continent. These workers are an international community of seventy nationalities, in a wide variety of career fields. Please pray for more peoples with a variety of skills and who love Jesus to be willing to use their skills on a ministry team in a foreign country. Pray for more Christ-centred churches to be birthed. Pray for those working together with established churches to fulfil God’s mission across cultures locally and globally.
The Zika virus, already common in parts of Africa and Asia and linked with hundreds of severe birth defects, is now spreading with alarming speed in the Americas. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has now declared this an international public health emergency ‘of alarming proportions’, requiring a coordinated international response. Brazil’s president Dilma Rousseff has issued a decree allowing public officials to enter abandoned or empty homes, by force if necessary, to eradicate the breeding grounds of the Aedes mosquito (which carries the virus). The officials will carry out educational campaigns and create public guidelines. They will target the mosquito breeding grounds in the north-eastern states, whose governors attended a teleconference with the president on Friday, along with the governors of Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo states. After the teleconference Rousseff admitted that Brazil is ‘losing the fight against Aedes’ but vowed that it will not lose the war.
Amid the scare over the mosquito-borne Zika virus, which has been declared an international public health emergency by WHO, scientists in Hyderabad say they have developed not one but two vaccines, using a live Zika virus imported officially. This is claimed to be the world's first vaccine for the virus, which is spreading rapidly in Latin America. WHO officials have expressed concern that Zika could hit Africa and Asia as well. Dr Krishna Ella, chairman and MD of Bharat Biotech Ltd, said, ‘On Zika, we were probably the first vaccine company in the world to file a vaccine candidate patent (about nine months ago).’ Dr Soumya Swaminathan, director general of the Indian Council of Medical Research, said that they would investigate the feasibility of taking it forward and that the vaccine could be a good example of a 'Made in India' product.
China: conflicting signals
05 Feb 2016
Legally registered churches are under attack while illegal house churches are being invited into official dialogue. Is China heading for another Mao-era persecution or opening up to religious freedom? With conflicting signals across a range of social, economic and political issues, nothing is certain. There is, however, reason for optimism: the gospel is alive and something must happen. Gu Yuese has served as the senior pastor at China’s largest government-approved Protestant church, a megachurch with ten thousand members. He has also held a leadership role in China’s state-approved denomination, the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM). In January the TSPM and China Christian Council forcibly removed Gu from his Church in a move to ‘move one step closer towards the proper self-construction and management of church locations’ and sort out the relationship between the province and the two municipal Christian organisations. Gu was arrested and sent to a ‘black’ jail (a facility falling outside the established penal system) where he is undergoing a criminal investigation.
World horrified as scores of children massacred
05 Feb 2016
Last weekend, Boko Haram burned children alive in Nigeria, and IS bombed schoolchildren in Syria. Homes were reduced to piles of ashes and left smouldering in the Nigerian village of Dalori following a Boko Haram rampage. For four hours heavily armed gunmen and at least three suicide bombers attacked, setting much of the village aflame. Children were burned alive in their huts. Two nearby refugee camps were also attacked. Nigerian army troops arrived, but were outmanned and outgunned by terrorists. 3,000 miles away, IS detonated two suicide car bombs in a neighbourhood south of Damascus protected by Hezbollah. As people gathered to help dead and injured children, an IS terrorist wearing a suicide vest set off another blast. 45 were killed and 110 wounded.