UK & Ireland in Brief

It has been revealed that Newham Council assured residents in April that a decision allowing mosques to broadcast the Muslim call to prayer during Ramadan last year would not be repeated this year.

In May 2020, the sound of ‘There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his messenger,’ followed by the command to pray, could be heard. Residents complained, but after an unsatisfactory response one resident challenged Newham’s mayor, a Muslim, on a Zoom drop-in, but was met with ‘excuses’. A legal letter was sent, arguing that the decision was unlawful on various grounds. It is not known whether the council acknowledged any unlawfulness, but it said it would not authorise broadcasts during Ramadan 2021.

An MP ridiculed by a member of a church congregation after she attended a service has received an apology from the Bishop of Bangor.

Virginia Crosbie MP attended the Sunday service at St Cybi’s Church, Holyhead, then gave private advice on funding to train new organists. After a congregant accused her on social media of ‘schmoozing’, Crosbie made a formal complaint to the bishop, The Rt Revd Andy John, who apologised, saying the individual’s behaviour was ‘unkind and unacceptable’. He said he would repeat his guidelines on appropriate use of social media and Christian responsibility for tolerance and respect through his regular bishop’s letter.

A proposal that would legalise abortion on demand up to birth for any reason has been dropped.

Dame Diana Johnson MP and Caroline Lucas MP had tabled what is known as New Clause 55 as a proposed amendment to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill but it was withdrawn at the last minute. This meant the proposal did not reach a vote. Antonia Tully, director of campaigns at SPUC, said: ‘Many MPs have received the message loud and clear that we will not tolerate such extreme and barbaric practices.’

An ambitious drive to open 10,000 new churches to tackle dwindling church attendance was the key headline from a recent online conference.

However, the plans have been criticised for condemning parishes to die and as a cost-cutting exercise. Addressing the multiplyX 2021 on the theme of ‘Together’, the Archbishop of Canterbury endorsed the plan for church planting. The Revd Dr Jason Roach, assistant curate of St Helen’s, Bishopsgate, was one of the conference speakers and described planting a church on a housing estate in west London.

A ‘cancelled’ school chaplain must wait another 14 months for an employment tribunal hearing after a last minute adjournment.

The Revd Dr Bernard Randall was the chaplain at Trent College near Nottingham when he gave a sermon in 2019 defending pupils’ rights to question the school’s introduction of LGBT policies. The school reported him to Prevent which dismissed the referral. Dr Randall subsequently lost his job and is claiming unfair dismissal. A 12-day hearing was scheduled for July but has been adjourned until September 2022 because Trent College had failed to produce witness statements seven months after they were due. Dr Randall said he is ‘extremely disappointed’.

A new resource to help evangelical churches respond to spiritual abuse allegations is under development.

A group of Affinity churches is to produce a booklet and videos this autumn to provide a toolbox for churches, with suggested ‘robust processes’ to enable allegations of ‘spiritual abuse’ and ‘pastoral malpractice’ to be taken seriously. Affinity said abuse of power in church leadership needs a healthy culture and a Biblically-faithful process for dealing with wrong behaviour. Affinity’s director Graham Nicholls said: ‘We want to equip the local church to care wisely for God’s people in these complex situations and hope this work will be widely used by evangelical churches.’

A drive to identify and train evangelists and ‘evangelism enablers’ in Wales over the next decade has begun.

It is the vision of a partnership between the Wales Leadership Forum and churches to identify and train 40 evangelists/evangelism enablers at the rate of four a year. Individuals will be placed in a Welsh church to work alongside their training, including up to six mission weeks in the church and supporting other churches’ mission work. The first cohort will start this September with the Welsh Evangelical Church, Cardiff; Monmouth Baptist Church; Swansea’s Waterfront Community Church; and Grace Church, Cardiff.