Assisted dying bill starts process through the Commons
A bill to legalise assisted dying for terminally ill adults in England and Wales was introduced in the House of Commons yesterday, in a short process which declared the date for the first MPs debate will be Friday 29 November. The text of the private members bill is not yet published but will become clear in the weeks before the debate. Its title says it will “allow adults who are terminally ill, subject to safeguards and protections, to request and be provided with assistance to end their own life”. MPs will have a free vote, but there is an impassioned debate and there were protests outside the Commons as the bill went forward.
Faith spaces including churches ‘part of the tapestry’ creating health in society
Faith organisations across the country are offering NHS services from within their buildings, providing a way for vulnerable people, especially in minority groups, to seek help in safe settings. Their role is only likely to increase once the government starts to shift NHS emphasis towards the community and away from hospitals. The faith organisations’ role became clear in a Religion Media Centre briefing on a report from the National Churches Trust which says the care provided by churches would cost the NHS £8.4 billion in costs of buildings and volunteer support. Details were given of a church clinic for drug and alcohol addicts in Scotland which helps the most difficult cases, a church in London which houses a GPs clinic, community nurses employed by and working out of 86 churches in Britain, a Sikh health centre in Birmingham where Sikh GPs volunteer their time, and a health hub at a mosque in Cambridge offering wellbeing classes. Merron Simpson, chief executive of The Health Creation Alliance, said faith spaces were part of the tapestry of organisations and spaces that can create health in society. View the briefing or listen to the podcast via links on this page
Army veteran guilty of silently praying in buffer zone near abortion clinic
Adam Smith-Connor, an army veteran and now physiotherapist, has been found guilty of breaching an abortion clinic buffer zone in Bournemouth, by praying silently, standing with his head bowed and hands clasped, near the clinic in November 2022. Poole magistrates handed him a conditional discharge and ordered him to pay prosecution costs of £9,000. Smith-Connor, aged 51, denied failing to comply with the order, but the court heard that when a community officer asked him to leave, he refused. The court was told he had been praying for his unborn son, who he said died from abortion 22 years ago. He was represented by the conservative Christian legal group ADF UK which said the case was “a legal turning point of immense proportions. A man has been convicted today because of the content of his thoughts – his prayers to God – on the public streets of England. We can hardly sink any lower in our neglect of basic fundamental freedoms of free speech and thought”. It is considering an appeal.
Bishop pledges support for families traumatised by cruelty at CofE mother and baby home in Kendal
ITN has followed up on its story of cruelty, mistreatment and abuse at St Monica’s mother and baby home, run by the Church of England in Kendal. Earlier this year, it reported that 45 babies who died there during and after the war, were buried in an unmarked grave in the town’s cemetery. Last night, it reported the traumatic story of a local man, Bob Chubb, whose sister gave birth to a baby girl there in 1941. His sister was told there was a still birth, but records show baby Faith lived for 12 hours and was buried in an unmarked grave. Mr Chubb and his wife Carole are deeply distressed and have installed a plaque over the grave, taking flowers to rest there. The acting Bishop of Carlisle, Rob Saner-Haigh, told ITN that what happened was wrong and he was really sorry for the way women and children had been treated. Asked about requests from some families for access to records, he said: “The Church of England should do all it can to support people who have lived with the trauma. We need to listen and give them a choice in decision making so they can tell us what they need and as an organisation we show them the love and dignity that they weren’t shown before”. ITN story is here
New Jewish chaplains in Yorkshire removed after historic anti-Palestinian tweets
Jewish News reports that a rabbinic couple hired to become chaplains covering universities in York, Bradford, Hull, Huddersfield, Sheffield, and Leeds, have been removed from their roles after “historic social media posts including a call for ‘biblical punishment’ for Palestinians were uncovered”. Rabbi Ariel Pariente and his wife, Sonia, were appointed by the University Jewish Chaplaincy earlier this year and recently moved from Jerusalem with their three children. They were meant to replace the previous chaplains at Leeds University, Rabbi Zecharia Deutsch and his wife, Navawho, who were forced to flee Leeds campus on police advice, following death threats over his time with the Israel Defense Force. The full story is here
Bishop “deeply hopeful” CofE will remain united despite same sex dispute
The Bishop of Leicester, Dr Martyn Snow, who is leading the Church of England’s discussion on same sex marriage in a project called Living in Love and Faith, has issued a video message re-stating the current position and saying he remains “deeply hopeful that we will be able to find a way through our disagreement and remain as one church”. The Church of England is deeply divided over the introduction of prayers of blessing for same sex marriage in stand-alone services. Those who disagree have formed a powerful lobby threatening to set up a parallel structure and have already moved their money into a separate fund. The bishop restates that the prayers can be used on the understanding they do not change doctrine. He said churches will need to opt in, to register with the bishop and ensure the church council backs the move. There will be spiritual and pastoral oversight for those who disagree, perhaps organised on a regional basis. Diocesan synods will discuss the practical arrangements between the synods in February and July, but the church wants to see national consistency in what emerges. He hoped that those unhappy would remain in the church and those who want swifter action would understand this is a learning process that cannot be hurried. “Learning to live with disagreement is core to our calling at this moment in time”. His video message is here
CofE announces further work on lessons of Soul Survivor abuse
The Church Times reports that a working group is being set up in the Church of Egland to review safeguarding and church processes in the light of the decades long abuse by the founder of the movement Soul Survivor, Mike Pilavachi, who groomed young men, massaged them and wrestled them to the floor. The lead bishop for safeguarding Dr Joanne Grenfell, said it will look at areas not fully covered by the Scolding review, commissioned by Soul Survivor itself. The working group will review “robustly” ordination processes, clergy training and supervision, and safeguarding and governance in church-plants, bishop’s mission orders and mission charities that have an Anglican focus to their work. She was responding to an open letter from 30 synod members who asked for further action.
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints joins Jesuit Refugee Service to feed asylum seekers
A delegation from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) has joined refugees, staff, and volunteers at the Jesuit Refugee Service UK to help provide access to healthy meals for refugees facing food insecurity. Over the coming year, LDS will support JRS UK’s provision of monthly food supplies and regular hot meals for people made destitute by the asylum system. The Church will also support JRS UK’s provision of clothing, toiletries and other essentials for refugees at risk of homelessness. The announcement was made yesterday, World Food Day.
Pope Francis’ autobiography out in January
Pope Francis has written an autobiography “Hope”, which will be published in January, coinciding with the 2025 Jubilee, a time of spiritual renewal in the Catholic church. The book recounts his life story from his family’s Italian roots, through childhood in Latin America, to highlights during his papacy. His publishers say Pope Francis deals “unsparingly with some of the crucial moments of his papacy and writes candidly, courageously, and prophetically about some of the most important and controversial questions of our present times.”
Trigger warning over Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales ‘infantilises students‘
The decision by Nottingham University’s English department to issue a trigger warning over Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, because of its expressions of the Christian faith, gets short shrift from journalist Catherine Pepinster. Writing in The Telegraph, she says it infantilises students: “Perhaps the most insidious aspect of this latest wokery is the idea that Christianity is part of the past, rather than acknowledging that it continues to be part of the warp and weft of British culture, the foundation of both our laws and the Established Church, with its most senior churchman the Archbishop of Canterbury, his title reflecting the significance of his see from before Chaucer’s time to the present. If any trigger warning is needed it is this: there are attempts to untether us from our past”. Her comment is here
‘Conveyor belt’ former CofE vicar in the running to be next Chancellor of Oxford University
The Rev Matthew Firth, a vicar in the Free Church of England who came to public attention for claiming there was an asylum seekers’ baptism conveyor belt in the Church of England, is on the list of 38 candidates in the running to be the next Chancellor of the University of Oxford. His claims were shot down by a senior cleric overseeing Darlington, where Mr Firth was a curate until he left the CofE in 2020. He is now head of church planting outreach in the northern diocese of the Free Church of England, which is described as biblical, evangelical and orthodox, and is aligned to GAFCON, the conservative global Anglican group against liberal changes such as same sex marriage. Backed by free speech campaigners, he said: “The reality is that I’m the only candidate who would publicly bring the university back into line if it were to erode freedom of speech in any way. Please vote for me if you care about freedom of speech and want public action to protect it, rather than just words”. He has also made clear that he would rebuke any department that “walked the way of wokery”.
