QUOTES FROM THE MEDIA
GOVERNMENT ‘SHOULD DO MORE’ TO PROMOTE RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
CHURCH LEADERS SHOULD TALK ABOUT PORN ADDICTION, SAYS CHARITY
ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY PRAYING FOR PEACE IN EASTERN CONGO
The government could be doing more to make religious freedom central to its operations and culture, according to campaigners. The Catholic Union is among those who urged the government to promote freedom of religion and belief around the world in a meeting [in June]… The meeting came nearly three years after a report was published which called attention to the persecution more than 250 million Christians worldwide face for their faith, pointing to evidence that ‘Christians constitute by far the most widely persecuted religion’. The Truro report, commissioned in 2018 by then foreign secretary Jeremy Hunt ... outlined 22 recommendations which the government committed to implement in full. Recommendations included [seek] a UN Security Council resolution urging governments in the Middle East and north Africa to protect Christians, consider imposing sanctions on perpetrators of human rights violations against religious minorities and [provide] religious literacy training to all Foreign Office staff at home and abroad.
Churches will be offered resources in a programme launched … to help them to address addiction to pornography. The Naked Truth Project, a UK charitable venture to ‘open eyes and free lives from the damaging impact of porn’, is to allow churches to acquire membership status, giving their leaders access to resources and training to discuss and combat harmful effects of pornography on individuals and communities. The Naked Truth Project’s founder and chief executive, Ian Henderson, said: ‘There are people in our churches and wider communities walking with addiction, betrayal trauma, relational crisis, breakdown, depression – all deeply impacted by pornography.’
The Archbishop of Canterbury has taken to social media to urge Christians to pray for the situation in eastern Congo. The country is undergoing a resurgence of violence prompting more than 30,000 people to flee their homes and seek refuge in neighbouring Rwanda. The Congolese military is fighting M23 rebels, a group of mainly Tutsi fighters that were defeated in 2013 by the Congolese army and UN peacekeepers... [The] Most Rev Justin Welby wrote on Twitter: ‘I’m praying for peace in eastern Congo… I’m praying that the population does not fall into the trap of violence [and] ethnic hatred… I pray too for the churches in their role as peacemakers.’
Church Times
Premier
The Tablet
The Times
CHURCH URGED TO AXE WEDDING FEE ‘DETERRENT’ The Church of England has been urged to abolish fees for couples marrying in its churches amid a sharp decline in the number of traditional ceremonies. Blackburn Diocesan Synod has put forward a proposal to set marriage fees at nil or a minimal amount so that ‘everyone who wants to get married in church should be able to, without worrying about affordability’… The proposals were put forward before a meeting of the General Synod, the church’s parliament, [this] month. They are due to be debated. However, with dwindling funds, the Church of England does not appear to be in favour of removing the fee… William Nye, secretary-general of the Synod, said: ‘A wholesale elimination or reduction of the fee would be a poorly targeted intervention as many couples can afford to pay the fee, which represents a small proportion of the overall cost of their wedding. The income lost from setting the fee to nil or a nominal amount reduces the resource available to fund ministry, including in the poorest areas – at a time when many dioceses … are facing deficits.’ He added that a priest or rural dean has an option of waiving or reducing the fee in cases of ‘clear financial hardship’.
SALVATIONIST salvationist.org.uk/media/magazine Issue No 1866
CONTACT US 020 7367 4890 (main) / 020 7367 4901 (editor) salvationist@salvationarmy.org.uk
EDITOR Lieut-Colonel Jonathan Roberts
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MANAGING EDITOR Ivan Radford EDITORIAL ASSISTANTS Simon Hope, George Tanton, Lyn Woods, Major Margaret Bovey ART DIRECTOR Hannah Holden GRAPHIC DESIGNERS Mark Knight, Louise Phillips PROOFREADER Chris Horne Published weekly by The Salvation Army and printed on paper from sustainable sources by CKN Print, Northampton. © The Salvation Army United Kingdom and Ireland Territory. ISSN 2516-5909.
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Salvationist 9 July 2022
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