Magic Statistics

It's been a busy year for the state-owned Russian natural gas monopoly Gazprom, which Vladimir Putin has developed into a tool for pressuring small neighbouring countries to turn against the West and forge closer relations with Moscow.

At the beginning of 2006, Gazprom put Ukraine through the wringer by radically hiking the price of gas exports to the pro-Western former Soviet republic.  The gas supply was shut off on 1 January after Ukraine refused to pay, then restored three days later after an agreement was reached.

Now at the end of the year, it's déjà vu all over again—but with a twist. Gazprom has rounded on perhaps Russia’s closest ally: Belarus, a country that already supports Russia's foreign policy.  Gazprom has reiterated its decision that, as of tomorrow, the price charged to Belarus for Russian natural gas will more than double.

"All this means destruction of our relations" with Russia, Belarus's president, Aleksandr G. Lukashenko, said in comments carried on state television on Friday.

Mr. Lukashenko, often referred to as Europe's last dictator, called Gazprom's position "blackmail" and said Belarussians would rather live in unheated dugouts than pay the higher price.

Russia's deputy prime minister, Dmitri Medvedev, who is also chairman of Gazprom, retorted that Belarus was "blackmailing" Europe by threatening the transit pipelines that cross that country.

The latest price increases have added to concerns about the reliability of the oil and natural gas flowing from Russia, which is a major supplier to Europe but has increasingly wielded its energy resources for political leverage.

Why would Russia strong-arm a close ally?  Some analysts believe that Russia's motivation this time is not political imperialism, but simple greed.  It just wants the money.  Welcome to the world of the real Russian mafia.

Gazprom has given Belarus the option of paying for gas with small unmarked bills shares in Beltransgaz, Belarus's state gas company.  In a few short years, Gazprom could be majority owner of Beltransgaz.

Gazprom has also infuriated residents of St Petersburg.  It is planning to erect a 300-metre glass office tower that would profane the city’s historic skyline so badly that some Russian bloggers have started a campaign against the company.

The graphic at right shows a monster named Gazilla threatening St Petersburg’s Smolny Cathedral.  If you click on the graphic, you will be taken to a flash game created by the St Petersburg branch of the Yabloko [Russian Democratic] Party.  The page is entirely in Russian, but the game isn’t hard to figure out: When Gazilla appears, point and fire ASAP.

h/t: Global Voices Online

Previous related posts:

• Russia on the ascendant against divided West
• Belarus: Europe’s most oppressively anti-religious nation
• Russia no longer a politically free, democratic country
• Europe beholden to Russian energy supplies

UPDATE (31 Dec.): Belarus avoided freezing in the dark with only seconds to spare.  Two minutes before midnight, a deal was signed for a price marginally below what Gazprom had originally demanded. The deal also calls for Gazprom to purchase 50% of Beltransgaz over the next four years.

Award-winning children's writer and former Children's Laureate Michael Morpurgo finds it "utterly extraordinary" that half of British mothers with children under five work outside the home.  He is convinced that daycare (“nursery” in Britain] damages children’s development and life prospects.

He said lack of contact between children and parents was directly to blame for rising levels of mental health problems, sleep disorders and anorexia in young people.
. . .
"We pack our children off to care groups or even to school, but many countries in Europe do not send their children until they are seven," he said. "They live in the bosom of their family. That is where they are nurtured – within the nest. That is where they can grow their wings, they can learn to fly." He added: "I don't think it is an accident that one in 10 of our children is suffering from mental health problems, from sleep disorders, from eating disorders and things like that."

Evidence has accumulated in the past few years indicating that children placed in daycare are more likely to have behavioural and other problems.  British think tank Institute for Public Policy Research reported last summer that infants and toddlers sent to nursery are more likely than other children to have learning difficulties and poorer health.  An in-depth study of Quebec’s universal daycare program found that daycare tends to have “extensive and significant negative impacts on child behaviour and parental anxiety and unhappiness”.

At least one Labour cabinet secretary has expressed serious misgivings about putting infants and toddlers in nursery.  Beverley Hughes, Minister for Children, Young People and Families, recently said that placing very young children in nursery is contrary to their best interests.

Other high-profile British child-care experts have spoken out against nursery for the very young.

Previous related posts:

• Mothers: Stash those kids in daycare and get back to work
• What does society lose when women choose work over family?
• Daycare: Bad for children, bad for parents

The collect for today, the Sunday After Christmas-Day, from the 1662 Book of Common Prayer:

Almighty God, who hast given us thy only-begotten son to take our nature upon him, and as at this time to be born of a pure Virgin; Grant that we being regenerate, and made thy children by adoption and grace, may daily be renewed by thy Holy Spirit; through the same our Lord Jesus Christ, who llveth and reigneth with thee and the same Spirit, ever one God, world without end.  Amen.

The Epistle: Galatians 4:1-7
The Gospel: St Matthew 1:18-25 

Stirling is one of Scotland’s most important historic cities.  The site of a high volcanic castle rock and located strategically at the lowest crossing point of the River Forth, Stirling has been key to any force wanting to control central Scotland.  Legend says King Arthur built a castle here, but the earliest definite evidence of fortification dates from the reign of Alexander I of Scotland (1078-1124).

Reflecting its military and strategic importance, the castle has been attacked or besieged at least 16 times.  Two crucial battles in Scotland’s history were fought in its immediate vicinity, and a third a short distance away.

Stirling Castle was a flash point in the Wars of Scottish Independence.  Edward I of England took the castle in 1296, but the following year Scottish forces led by Sir William Wallace defeated the English at the Battle of Stirling Bridge and re-captured the castle.  The following summer, however, Wallace and his soldiers were defeated at the Battle of Falkirk, a few miles south of Stirling.  Wallace was later captured and brought to London where he was executed for treason at Smithfield Market in 1305.

The Scottish King Robert the Bruce won a great victory over numerically superior English forces at the Battle of Bannockburn, just south of Stirling, in 1314.  By 1336, however, Stirling was again under English control; it was finally retaken for the Scots in 1342.

The Church of the Holy Rude (meaning “Holy Cross”) is the second oldest building in the city, after Stirling Castle.  The church would probably be more widely known and admired were it not located almost adjacent to the magnificent castle.

The photo at left shows the church’s west tower and south-west porch entrance.

Click on all photos for larger views.

The church was founded in 1129 during the reign of David I (king 1124-1153) as the parish church of Stirling under the jurisdiction of Dunfermline Abbey .

The original church building was destroyed along with most of Stirling in a great fire in March 1405.  The present church was built in two stages.  The oldest part, including the nave and the lower portion of the west tower, was completed around 1470, and the second half around 1555.

The photo at right was taken from the back of the nave looking east through the crossing toward the choir and apse.  The church was built on a slope so that the choir is higher than the nave.  It was intended that the nave roof would be raised to match the height of the choir, but the Reformation halted this and other planned work, including a central tower above the crossing.

The most remarkable part of the nave is the rare medieval oak-beam roof held together with oak pegs (pictured at left).  The beams show the marks of the adzes used to carve them.  Now over 500 years old, this is one of the few medieval timber-roofs left in Scotland.

About twelve years after the choir was completed, on 29 July 1567, the 13-month-old son of Mary Queen of Scots was crowned James VI King of Scots.  The boy’s Roman Catholic mother had been forced to abdicate only five days earlier.  The sermon was preached by John Knox and, for the first time, the rites were Protestant and not, as at James' baptism, Roman Catholic, while "the whole ceremony was made and done" in the Scottish tongue and not Latin.  The subject of the great Reformer's coronation sermon was the slaying of Queen Athaliah and the crowning of young King Joash.

(Only seven months earlier, James had been baptised in the Chapel Royal at Stirling Castle, in a lavish Roman Catholic ceremony.)

A commemorative plaque in the floor of the choir marking the spot where the infant was crowned is shown at right.  Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II unveiled the plaque during a visit to the church about 430 years after her ancestor’s coronation.

This is the only surviving church in Scotland, and apparently the only active church in the United Kingdom apart from Westminster Abbey, to have witnessed a coronation.

The photo at left shows the entrance to St Andrew’s Chapel, the only one of four chapels still extant.  Above the glazed screen door is a carving of the royal arms of Scotland with the collar and badge of the Order of the Thistle.  These arms, dating from the 17th or early 18th century, were originally placed in a King’s (or Queen’s) Loft, now long removed.  They now serve as a reminder that kings and queens of Scotland have worshipped here frequently.

Two important figures in Scottish church history are buried in the churchyard.  Both were ministers at Church of the Holy Rude.

Rev James Guthrie, a prominent Covenanter, was inducted here in 1650 and hanged in Edinburgh in 1661 for denying Charles II’s authority over the Church of Scotland.

The other is Rev Ebenezer Erskine, founder of the Secession Church in Scotland, who served here from 1731.  Shortly thereafter, he preached against a proposed patronage system because he was convinced that it took away the right of Christian people to call and elect their minister.  He was suspended in 1733, whereupon he and four others founded an “Associated Presbytery”, which soon developed into the Secession Church.  Ebenezer’s brother Ralph ministered at Dunfermline Abbey until 1740, when he too was deposed and joined the Secession Church.

The website of Church of the Holy Rude includes a fine photo album.

Links to all my blog posts about British churches and Christian sites can be accessed through the box located at the top of the page.

In the past week, Hindu extremists in India have burned down a church, arrested carol-singers, and broken up Christmas services in several incidents of harassment and violence against Christians.

Extremists burned down a thatched church in Boriguma area, Koraput district of Orissa state on Saturday night (December 23), preventing church members from celebrating Christmas there. The congregation had already decorated the building for Christmas festivities, but everything was destroyed in the fire.

Asit Kumar Mohanty, state representative of the Global Council of Indian Christians (GCIC), said GCIC was investigating the incident to determine who was responsible.

On Christmas Eve, about 45 jeeps full of Dharma Sena members circled through the streets of Raipur, the capital of Chhattisgarh state, announcing that they would close down all church services held on Christmas Day.

“Dharma Sena is a Hindu fundamentalist group supported by the VHP and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party state government,” Arun Pannalal, general secretary of the Chhattisgarh Christian Forum, told Compass.

In the remote town of Jalampur (about 80 kilometres south of Raipur), Pastor James Ram and ten missionaries were beaten and arrested after singing Christmas carols on Christmas Eve.  Elsewhere in the town, Hindu militants attacked a church and assaulted those worshipping inside.  Five Christians were injured; one suffered a broken hand and another lost his hearing after being struck on the head.

Read the whole thing for many more reports of Indian Christians being harassed this Christmas.

Two days ago, Glenn Penner of Voice of the Martyrs Canada, said that, during the past year, India has built up perhaps the most troubling record of persecution in the world.

As the editor of The Persecuted and Prayer Alert, I work with the rest of my staff in determining what stories we are going to run from week to week. Sadly, in 2006 one country seems to have come up far too often for anyone's liking. Would you like to guess which one it is?

What might surprise you is that it is not a Muslim country, nor a Communist one. Nor is it a totalitarian regime. In fact, it is a fully functioning democracy. Its Prime Minister is a member of a religious minority and the country has generally good relations with the west.

And yet, throughout 2006, we have received numerous reports each week of Christians being attacked, killed and thrown into jail on various false charges.

My proposal for the persecution story of 2006 is the continuing and increasingly violent persecution of Christians in India.

In Kerala state, southwest India, earlier this month, Pastor Paul Ciniraj Mohammed, a Christian convert from Islam, was threatened with death by an Islamic militant group.  Pastor Ciniraj, who now heads Salem Voice Ministries, has been threatened and attacked many times for his evangelistic and pastoral activities.

h/t: Persecution Blog

Previous related posts:

• Multiple reports of persecution in India
• Hindu militants want conversions prohibited while they “re-convert” Christians
• Catholic MP tossed from Indian Parliament for “misusing religion”
• Freedom of Religion Act restricts conversion

This clearly qualifies as cutting-edge research.

After an in-depth study of injuries reported by sword-swallowers, a British radiologist warns that sore throats (or "sword throats") are the least of their worries.  Sword-swallowers face a gruesome array of occupational hazards, including perforated intestines and major haemorrhages.

Brian Witcombe became fascinated by the subject after seeing an X-ray of an injured sword-swallower’s throat.

“I see patients with swallowing disorders and was sent an X-ray of a sword-swallower, which got me interested in what medical side-effects they have,” he said.

“I started to wonder how it worked, like does the sword go right through to the stomach, whether they get injured, and it went from there.”
. . .
“They try to out-do each other by swallowing lots of swords — the record is 16 — or swallowing swords while riding a unicycle, or belly dancing.”

The findings were published by the British Medical Journal in an article entitled “Sword swallowing and its side effects", co-authored by Mr Witcombe and Dan Meyer, executive director of Sword Swallowers Association International.

For more information, visit To the Hilt.

A week before Christmas, it was reported that authorities in Iran have jailed fourteen former Muslims who had converted to Christianity.  The Christians were arrested while trying to arrange Christmas celebrations.  The authorities confiscated all their Bibles and other religious materials.

In a breath-taking display of hypocrisy and mendacity, an official Iranian news agency now claims the country’s Christmas has been ruined by the UN Security Council.

Iranian Muslim nation is happy to wish all Christians a merry Christmas and happy new year.

On the eve of the auspicious birthday of Jesus Christ when all Muslim and Christian believers extend best wishes to each other on the onset of the new year, leaders of Christian states took an unacceptable action toward Iranians by passing a resolution against national nuclear program which surprised every individual in Iran.

If the Islamic Republic of Iran knew the first thing about Christmas, citizens would not be arrested merely because they’re Christian.

The offer of “best wishes” is clearly bogus, given that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has publicly called for death for all Iranian Muslims who convert to Christianity.

The Iranian president has also stated his conviction that the Mahdi, the anticipated messiah who will come to conquer the world for Islam, will be accompanied by Jesus.

"God willing, Jesus would return to the world along with the emergence of the descendant of the Islam's Holy Prophet, Imam Mahdi and wipe away every tinge of oppression, pain and agony from the face of the world," Ahmadinejad said.

h/t: Ynet News and Dhimmi Watch

Previous related posts:

• Christian converts arrested in Iran
• Iran calls for death of “blasphemous” journalist
• Middle East “locus of the final war” between Islam and the West
• Beleaguered Christians in Iran

At last, more photos from our Summer 2004 vacation in Great Britain.  On 26 July, we drove a short distance north from Edinburgh to spend a day in Fife, where we stopped for a few hours in Dunfermline.  This ancient and historic town, located four miles northwest of the Forth Road Bridge, has two sites of interest to Christians: Dunfermline Abbey and Saint Margaret's Cave.

The origins of Dunfermline are unknown, although its name, meaning "fortress by the crooked stream", indicates that it was a fortified settlement.  For centuries, it played a central role in Scottish political life.  King Malcolm III, also known as Malcolm Canmore, made it his capital after he married Queen (later Saint) Margaret there about 1070.  The city remained the capital of Scotland until the 1603 Act of Union.

Queen Margaret (1045-1093) was married to Malcolm for almost twenty-five years; her death followed his by only a few days.  She bore six sons and two daughters.  Three sons ruled as kings of Scotland—Edgar, Alexander I, and David I (later saint)—while a daughter, Matilda, became the queen of Henry I of England.

Margaret, an inspirational monarch of great Christian devotion, undertook many works of charity.  She protected orphans, provided for the poor, visited prisoners in her husband's dungeons, cleansed the sores of lepers, and washed the feet of beggars.  She encouraged and enabled the founding of monasteries, churches, and hostels.  Her excellent education served Scotland well, for under her influence the Scottish court became known as a place of culture and learning.

An advocate of church reform, Margaret supported revival of observances that had lapsed into disuse, including Lenten fasts, Easter communion, and refraining from work on Sundays.  She also had Iona re-built following its destruction by Viking raiders.

Queen Margaret frequently retired to a secluded cave on the banks of a stream near the royal residence for private prayer and mediation.  A (possibly apocryphal) story has it that King Malcolm began to imagine his wife was seeing a lover.  Full of suspicion one day, he followed her to the cave, only to overhear her praying for his safety.

Located near the bottom of a small ravine, the site known as St Margaret's Cave has been a place of pilgrimage for centuries.  It was threatened with destruction in 1962 when the Town Council proposed to bury the stream and fill in the ravine in order to build a car park.  After a public outcry, the cave was preserved and is now located 84 steps underground from the adjacent parking lot.  The pathway is lined with panels displaying information about her and the fortunes of the cave over the centuries.

The photo at right shows the StatWife and StatDaughter outside the stone building that marks the cave's entrance, adjacent to the Chambers Street car park.

Click on photos for larger views.

This is the text of the cave's first information panel.

Margaret, a Saxon princess, married Malcolm Canmore King of the Scots about 1070, soon after she came here with other members of her family following William the Conqueror's successful invasion of England.  Queen Margaret had a profound impact on the Scottish church and is still venerated for her piety and good works.

Margaret was born in Hungary where her father lived as an exiled member of the old English royal family.  Her grandfather was King Edmund Ironside of England who died in 1016 after years of dynastic conflict.

Her father Edward, then a young boy, was exiled by Ironside's rival Cnut.  He spent some years in Scandinavia, then traveled to the Russian court of Kiev before settling in southern Hungary about 1047.  He married Agatha, a relative of the Holy Roman Emperor Henry III; their first child, Margaret, was born about this time.

Her great uncle Edward had become King of England in 1042 and fifteen years later, as part of complicated dynastic manoeuvering, Margaret's father was able to return to England because he had a strong claim to the English throne.  Margaret thus experienced the English court and received education from her uncle, later saint, Edward the Confessor, who built Westminster Abbey.

Margaret's father died soon after their arrival in England, leaving her younger brother Edgar as "atheling" or prince.  When the Confessor died in 1066 there were several claimants to the throne, and the situation was resolved only after William the Conqueror defeated his rival Harold at the Battle of Hastings.  Edgar and his family, including Margaret, had to leave; they went to Scotland where Margaret was to marry Malcolm Canmore, at Dunfermline.

The next photo shows the terminus of the underground pathway, a chamber 10 feet long by 8 feet wide by 8 feet high with a statue of Margaret in prayer.

Saint Margaret was canonised by Pope Innocent IV in 1250.

Margaret loved Dunfermline so much that she decided to establish a religious community there.  She endowed a Benedictine Priory and the Archbishop of Canterbury sent some monks to form its initial core.  Her son King David I expanded and enriched the priory, raising it to the status of an abbey.  In 1128, he commenced construction of a magnificent abbey church.  The only part that survives today is the Norman nave.

In 1303, King Edward I of England destroyed the original monastery buildings, but the church was not touched.  Scotland’s King Robert the Bruce provided generous financial support for re-building the monastery.

Malcolm and Margaret also built a royal palace adjacent to the abbey.  It has now fallen into ruins, but the remaining walls indicate the magnificence of the royal residence.  Three kings were born there: David II and James I of Scotland and Charles I of England; the latter was the last monarch born in Scotland.

At the Reformation, the church and monastery were sacked and then allowed to fall into disrepair.  The medieval nave was restored for use as a parish church in 1570, when large flying buttresses were added to stabilise that part of the building.  The rest of the church gradually collapsed during subsequent centuries.

A new parish church was built in 1821 on the end of the Norman nave.  The east tower, shown in photo at left, has the words "King Robert the Bruce" around its crown.

Dunfermline Abbey is the final resting place of many of Scotland'