These articles were first published in our October edition of the newspaper, click here for more.
In mid-August, Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, said couples should be given paid leave from work if they lose an unborn child.
Sturgeon, who suffered a miscarriage in 2011, agreed with legislation going through the New Zealand Parliament to give women and their partners up to three days leave to grieve an unborn child. The Scottish Parliament does not have the power to introduce compassionate leave for miscarriage as employment law is reserved to Westminster.
A Girlguiding leader who was expelled for saying she believed boys could not become girls is starting legal proceedings against the organisation, it was reported in August.
Katie Alcock, a feminist and lecturer in developmental psychology, was removed from the volunteer group along with fellow leader Helen Watts in 2018. Alcock said: ‘You can’t say the Guides is a single-sex movement and yet take in boys and men as members.’
It was reported in August that a police Assistant Commissioner in London said conservative religious believers, including Christians, should not be ‘condemned’ for practising their faith.
Britain’s most senior counter-terrorism police officer, Neil Basu, said a ‘socially inclusive society’ should accept people who practise their faith openly. He said: ‘You should be able to practise your religion without suffering some condemnation of that; so my view is, do no harm.’
The National Secular Society (NSS) is trying to remove Christian representatives from schools, it was reported in August.
The NSS wrote to every Scottish council claiming that religious representatives on school boards are ‘unrepresentative, unnecessary and unjustified’. Two Scottish councils have now stripped church leaders of their voting rights with more councils set to do the same.
A bus driver was suspended during August after he allegedly refused to drive a bus supporting Pride events.
He reportedly told passengers in Norwich: ‘This bus promotes homosexuality and I refuse to drive it.’ Rainbow numbers were used on the bus in a nod to the Pride flag. Go East Anglia, which runs Konectbus, said the driver had been suspended and an investigation was under way.
On 29 August, the Revd Jonathan Baxter was ordained and inducted to the local congregation at Stornoway, which includes a ‘preaching station’ in the Isle of Harris.
Jonathan trained in Edinburgh Theological Seminary for three years. The prayer of many is that the ministry resumed after a seven-year vacancy will be anointed with a ‘double portion’ (2 Kings 2.9).
It was reported in August that many women working in the loos of nightclubs in London have come to faith in Jesus.
A Christian who had found fellow believers at work and had prayed for the women and shown kindness to them, saw 20 colleagues turn to Jesus, bringing hope and joy in an often thankless job.