Views from the News

MALAYSIAN PRIME MINISTER CALLS FOR RESTRICTIONS ON EVANGELIZING MUSLIMS

Most of Malaysia’s sixteen states have laws which prohibit the propagation of other religions amongst Muslims. Recently Malaysia’s Prime Minister, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, has called for the remaining four states which do not have these laws to introduce them. The debate about the supremacy of Islamic over Secular law and religious freedom has come to the fore given the publicity for the Lina Joy case, and some Muslims are trying to force Malaysia closer to becoming an Islamic state. Badawi is regarded as a moderate, but is coming under increasing pressure from Islamists. Source: The Barnabas Fund (5/9)

MERKEL BACKS ‘CHRISTIAN’ CONSTITUTION

The EU constitution should be revised to acknowledge Europe’s ‘Christian values’, Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor and European Union President-in-waiting, has said. Mrs. Merkel declared her support for the Vatican campaign to recognize Europe’s Christian heritage after meeting Pope Benedict at his summer residence. Mrs. Merkel, daughter of a Protestant pastor, is determined to re-open the debate, three years after France’s secular leaders fended off references that it felt would upset Muslims and Jews. Source: The Guardian (29/8)

THE DESCENT OF DARWIN

Increasing numbers of UK students accept ‘creationist’ and other God-centred explanations of the universe, a new survey has found. Some 19 per cent favoured ‘intelligent design’, the theory that some features of life can only be explained through the existence of God. Another 12 per cent of the 1,000 students surveyed accepted ‘creationism’, the belief that God created life within the last 10,000 years, The Guardian reports. Almost a third of Christians and 10 per cent of those with no particular religion favoured intelligent design, while a third of Muslims and a quarter of Christians held to creationism. Researchers were surprised to find that only 56 per cent favoured evolution theory. In Kenya, meanwhile, the museum with the collection of the world’s earliest believed hominid bones has been asked to change its emphasis by a six-million strong Pentecostal church. Christ is the Answer Ministries wants the National Museum to give the prehistoric fossils less prominence and cease presenting evolution as a fact. Sources: The Guardian (15/8); Daily Telegraph (12/8)

HITLER BIBLE UNEARTHED

A Bible edition revised on the orders of Adolf Hitler has been found in a German church, Scotland’s Daily Record reports. The paper says the edition was re-written to remove all references to the Jews and to conform to Nazi ideology. Jewish words including Jehovah and Jerusalem were eradicated from the Bible, while Commandments such as ‘Thou shalt not kill’ were eradicated in favour of ‘Honour your Fuhrer’. Editions were printed in 1941 and sent to thousands of churches, but Christians are believed to have destroyed most copies, the paper says. Source: Daily Record (8/8)

Scots suicide rate highest in UK

Scotland has the highest suicide rate in the UK, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics: ‘From 1991 to 2004 the suicide rate among men was 50% higher in Scotland than other UK countries, while the rate for women was double that of elsewhere. During 2002/04 the suicide rate among Scottish men was 30 per 100,000 compared with 22.4 in Wales, 18.3 in Northern Ireland and 16.7 in England. For Scots women the rate was 10 per 100,000 compared with 5.4 in England. In Wales it was 6 per 100,000 and 5.6 in Northern Ireland. The report said Scotland’s highest rate of male suicide was found in Shetland, Blackpool for England, North Belfast in Northern Ireland and Denbighshire in Wales. For women the highest suicide rate in Scotland was found in Glasgow, Camden in England, Conwy in Wales and West Belfast in Northern Ireland. The report said the overall UK suicide rate peaked in 1998 and has since fallen, while the suicide rate for women remained stable between 1991 and 2004. Source: www.prayer.tv (5/9)

Scots suicide rate highest in UK

Scotland has the highest suicide rate in the UK, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics: ‘From 1991 to 2004 the suicide rate among men was 50% higher in Scotland than other UK countries, while the rate for women was double that of elsewhere. During 2002/04 the suicide rate among Scottish men was 30 per 100,000 compared with 22.4 in Wales, 18.3 in Northern Ireland and 16.7 in England. For Scots women the rate was 10 per 100,000 compared with 5.4 in England. In Wales it was 6 per 100,000 and 5.6 in Northern Ireland. The report said Scotland’s highest rate of male suicide was found in Shetland, Blackpool for England, North Belfast in Northern Ireland and Denbighshire in Wales. For women the highest suicide rate in Scotland was found in Glasgow, Camden in England, Conwy in Wales and West Belfast in Northern Ireland. The report said the overall UK suicide rate peaked in 1998 and has since fallen, while the suicide rate for women remained stable between 1991 and 2004. Source: www.prayer.tv (5/9)

Compulsory R.E. breaches human rights

Compulsory R.E. for older pupils is an abuse of human rights, a Parliamentary joint committee has said. A month after schools minister Lord Adonis said students aged 16 upwards will have the right to withdraw themselves from collective worship, the committee said this right should be extended to R.E. Under article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights pupils have ‘freedom of thought, conscience and religion’. But Brian Gates, chair of the R.E. Council for England and Wales said the proposal would do nothing to help ‘young people’s need to make sense of religion in the contemporary world’. He said the committee would do better to investigate the opportunities 16- to 19-year-olds have to ‘enrich’ their life values and beliefs. Source: Times Educational Supplement (11/8)

The purpose of this page is to make believers aware of developments that are taking place in the world today that may adversely affect Christians or their freedom to live and spread the gospel. Our objective is not to promote false teaching or ungodly people but to stimulate intelligent prayer and awareness of the issues that we are confronted with in an ungodly and condemned world. Please pray that in our day the ‘word of the Lord may have free course and be glorified’.