A Post-Election Prayer

When the new parliament gets going, you might like to pray this prayer from The Book of Common Prayer (Prayers and Thanksgivings upon several occasions, p41):

A Prayer for the High Court of Parliament, to be read during their Session.

MOST gracious God, we humbly beseech thee, as for this Kingdom in general, so especially for the High Court of Parliament, under our most religious and gracious Queen [at this time assembled]: That thou wouldest be pleased to direct and prosper all their consultations, to the advancement of thy glory, the good of thy Church, the safety, honour, and welfare of our Sovereign and her Dominions; that all things may be so ordered and settled by their endeavours, upon the best and surest foundations, that peace and happiness, truth and justice, religion and piety, may be established among us for all generations. These and all other necessaries, for them, for us, and thy whole Church, we humbly beg in the Name and Mediation of Jesus Christ, our most blessed Lord and Saviour. Amen.

Prospective MPs attitude to Christians

The Westminster 2010 Declaration people have been asking prospective MPs to "make the pledge" that they will 'respect, uphold and protect the right of Christians to hold and express Christian beliefs and act according to Christian conscience'. You can check out candidates in your area here.

Here's the blurb for our own constituency of Eastbourne. Waterston (Con) and Lloyd (Lib) have taken the pledge and Brinson (Lab)'s views are unknown.

Eastbourne (Held by Conservative, Majority 755, Swing required: 0.8%)
Nigel Waterson	Conservative	Eastbourne	England
Dave Brinson	Labour	Eastbourne	England
Stephen Lloyd	Liberal Democrat	Eastbourne	England

Westminster 2010

In church on Sunday we are encouraging people to sign the Westminster 2010 Declaration of Christian Conscience. You can find details and sign the petition here.

Is Health & Safety Giving British Farmers AIDS?

For Daily Mail type headlines: http://www.qwghlm.co.uk/toys/dailymail/

The Nationalist faith changed my life

Chanel 4's Young, Angry and White tonight had very interesting momemts. The 19 year old featured, Kieren, thinks the world is badly wrong and that Nationalism has good news. In a way he came across as quite intelligent, articulate and unagressive. He is unashamed of his views, which he thinks of as moral and does not want to compromise. The creed is inspiring to him and he is encouraged by the history of the movement and that some have been believers for 40 years. He is keen to live in accordance with his faith. He spoke explicitly about going to some BNP weekend as if it were like going to a Christian camp and finding an intense new faith. He spoke of Nationalists as a family that gave him purpose, optimism and hope. He spoke of comfort and belonging and the warm welcome that he received. The BNP does seem to have changed his life and made him take responsibility. He is studying for his A-levels, wants to go to university, succeed, have a good career and be the bread-winner of his future family.

Of course, his views are stupid and poisonous. They amount to a different gospel which is really no gospel at all.

Ministry of Truth?

Now, I'm against all government funding for education and so on, but don't you find it extraordinary that the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills is responsible for Universities? What happened to an Education Department? Oh, they abolished that so as to make the Government in charge of Children and Families! Are universities just about skills and economic competitiveness? Grump grump.

And doesn't the Department for Innovation and Skills begin to sound just a bit 1984 to you?

Broken Britain?

Fundamentally, yes, since there is such a failure to acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord.

Apparently not, in some places and in some ways.

Obviously so in others.

3 Cheers for the Bishop of Chichester

And 2 cheers for the Bishop of Winchester. Both of whom have been standing up for the Christian faith, integrity, Public Theology and good sense in the House of Lord's debate over the Equality bill - as reported in The Telegraph and highlighted by Christian Concern For Our Nation.

God the Supreme "Judicial System"

The true and living God is not only the perfect and supreme judge, we may also say he is the supreme judicial system:

(1) politician / legislator - he makes and defines the laws

(2) police - he controls the word, restraining wrong and promoting good

(3) jurry - he gives his true and just verdicts

(4) judge - his sentances are true and just

(5) prison guard / governer / executionor - he exectues the sentance

Of course, Jesus is also the perfect loving and merciful judge who pays for the crimes of others by his atoning death, he takes our sentance on himself, satisfying out debt.

HT: DR on Danehill 1 Camp

[State] schooling 'does not work for us'

Some home education stories from the BCC.

The Today Programme also reported that 20 000 children are registered with their local authority as home educated whereas it is thought that over 40 000 are taught at home.

Presently parents have a duty to educate their children and local authorities can intervene if it is thought a child is at risk. This seems to me to be an adequate system.

There have been calls to require parents to register as homeschoolers and to be subeject to inspections at home.

Education is essentially the responsibility of parents, not the state. Parents may choose to band together with other parents, even to form a school, or to make use of a pre-existing school but their responsibility is inalienable.

I would question both the right and the competence of the state to intervene. State education, the health service, in fact, all public services, MPs expenses and the nation's finances hardly suggest that one should trust Gordon with the most precious thing we have: our children.

Electoral Reform

I know next to nothing about electoral reform, and I reckon a proportional system would be a good thing, but I also very much want to be voting for an individual. A list of 6 where I like 1 and 3 but not 2 is not good. Is such a system possible? What's it called?

How to vote

I believe that the gospel, the fundamental reality, the most important truth in the universe, the first commitment of every individual and society is "Jesus Christ is Lord". That should be the guiding principle of all, including politics and public life. It should be the first line of our consititution.

So, faced with a ballot paper for the European elections that gave me the choice of:

"The Christian Party: Proclaiming Christ's Lordship"

I felt I ought to vote for them.

I've no idea if they have any chance of seat.

Their website was pretty hard to find. (They say their main site is having problems due to excessive demand).

They seem a thoroughly good thing. Here's a bit of their blurb:

Why a Christian Party?

The time has come for Christians of all denominations to stand up for their beliefs and resist the tide of secularism destroying our country. The Christian Party exists to fulfill this vital role. Under the leadership of Revd George Hargreaves, this non-denominational Christian political party provides a united Christian witness across the nation to ensure that the message of the Bible is heard and heard where it matters. The voice of the once mighty church may have been reduced to a mere whisper, but the Christian Party will not be – it will speak out and not be silent. Whatever your denomination or churchmanship, the time has come to unite and stand together for the Christian faith and all it represents. The more who join the Christian Party the louder our Christian voice will become. If you agree that this is so, it may be that God is calling on you to join together with other like-minded Christians throughout the country who are equally concerned about the state of the church and nation. Please read the statement of faith below and if you agree with it,

join us now!

Statement of Faith

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Statement of Faith

1. We believe in one creator God, eternally existent in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as stated in the historic creeds of the Christian church.

2. We acknowledge Jesus Christ as Lord over all creation.

3. We believe the Holy Bible to be the inspired, infallible, written Word of God to whose precepts, given for the good of nations and individuals, all man’s law must submit.

4. We believe all government to be under the authority of God and that the purpose of government is the maintenance of freedom and justice solely in accordance with biblical principles.

5. Jesus Christ will come again to the earth, personally, visibly and bodily to consummate history and the eternal plan of God.

Statement of Purpose

---

The primary purpose of the Christian Party is to proclaim the Lordship of Christ. The party also exists to empower those who confess “Jesus Christ as Lord!” to serve him in the political sphere.

Revd George Hargreves seems an interesting chap! He is anti-abortion, anti-practicing-homosexuality and anti-EU. His campaign to have the dragon removed from the Welsh flag seems a little barmy to me, though I have some sympathy with the idea. Much better to have a cross rather than Satan as your national symbol!

I voted Conservative in the local elections to stop the Lib Dems who I imagine want to tax everything in site and stand mainly for such things as pot-smoking, abortions and the promotion of homosexuality, but I could be wrong. I was a bit tempted by UKIP, though I don't imagine they could win and I'm not convinced by the prominence of their anti-imigration agenda. I respect those who feel they ought to spoil their paper by writing "JESUS IS LORD" across it, but its a shame that most people will think you just filled in the form incompitently.

P.S. It seems dogs and toddlers are welcome in our local polling station. Remeber you don't need your polling card and you don't have to give the fellas your number afterwards. Turning up at a random church hall worked for me.

The Red Tory

This morning Radio 4 profiled The Red Tory, Philip Blond. He believes in a small state and is socially conservative. He is for the local and the little man participating in the economy. He is worried about the decline of the family and critical of the fading liberal consensus. He rejects both socialism and hardline economic Thatcherism. His post-grad work was under John Milbank at Cambridge and he is an expert on Thomas Aquinas! All very interesting.

Slippery "Saviour"

This Times Online article includes the video clip from Sky News where Gordon Brown says, "we not only saved the world..."!

The Rock

I have just heard a clip of Mr Brown in which he said that the "we must in an uncertain and unstable world be the rock of stability on which the British people can depend." Fortunately, the position is already taken.

Illegal War?

I've heard a number of politicians say that we are engaged in an illegal war in Iraq.

But I've not heard any of them take the next step that seems to me to be a logical consequence of such a view: urging British service personel to refuse to obey what must be an illegal order to serve in an illegal war?

SOR & writing to your MPetc

I didn't know that one could sign petitions on the PM's own website like this:

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/SexOrientation/

If you want to contact your MP, may I reccomend again:

http://www.theyworkforyou.com/

which lets you find out what your political representatives have been saying.

And then:

http://www.writetothem.com/


which allows you to contact Councillors, MP, MEPs, MSPs, or Northern Ireland, Welsh and London AMs or members of the House of Lords easily and for free.