Magic Statistics

Hindu nationalists in India have been attacking both Muslims and Christians.  Because Hindu-Muslim clashes often involve widespread rioting by hundreds of people, while Hindu attacks on Christians are smaller in scale and public repercussions, the latter are often ignored.

Persecution India Update, a blog run by the Global Council of Indian Christians, reports that Hindu intimidation of Christians takes three forms.

The first is of violent assaults on Christian priests, rape of nuns of numerous denominations, destruction and desecration of churches and chapels, and burning of Bibles.

In the recent past, such attacks have increased in frequency and severity.  They are also tending to assume a common pattern: public vilification of and assaults against Christian leaders by mobs of Hindutva (Hindu nationalist) activists.

A second form of intimidation is when converts themselves are attacked. A people’s tribunal convened by Angana Chatterji and Mihir Desai painstakingly tracks the frightening sequence of such recent attacks for the state of Orissa alone. Their long and chilling litany includes: in 1999, 157 Christian homes were set ablaze in Ranalai village, and three people suffered gunshot wounds; in 2003, seven women converts and a pastor were forcibly tonsured in Kilipal village, and a socio-economic boycott imposed on them; 15 homes were burnt in 2005 in Gandhavati village, and so on.

The third strategy for intimidation is of mobilising large masses for ‘re-conversion’ ghar wapsi ceremonies, mainly in tribal regions, in which thousands of alleged Christian converts are welcomed ‘home’ to Hinduism.

Claims of re-conversion from Christianity to Hinduism are exaggerated.  Most of those said to be “re-converted” were not Christian converts.

Read the whole thing.

Earlier this week, a Carmelite priest and four Christians were set upon by Hindutva extremists in a hospital waiting room in Karnataka state, south-western India.  The assailants beat them up, causing injuries severe enough to require hospitalization.  The following day, a large crowd gathered to condemn the attacks and call upon state authorities to act against the rising tide of anti-Christian violence.

Gospel for Asia (GFA) missionaries and construction workers have been threatened while trying to build a Bible college in Maharashtra state, western India.  About 20 people squatting on land owned by GFA tried to force the building project to close down.  In this case, a government land inspector came by to explain the situation to the squatters, but they defiantly said they would return later.

In Andhra Pradesh, south-eastern India, Hindu extremists tried to force Christian Pastor John Peter to bow down before an idol in a Hindu temple.  When he refused, they tore his clothes, shaved his head, and beat him until he lost consciousness.  Pastor Peter declined to press charges, saying he had forgiven them.

In London, the Hindu Council UK has voiced objections to Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which protects “the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion“, on the grounds that it does not ban conversion through missionary activity.

The predatory religions seek the destruction of others faiths and cultures, others way of life, by sending missionaries whose religious freedom is enshrined in their mission to convert other God loving people into their own religious clubs, thereby seeking the destruction of other religions. Everyone has the right to convert through their own heart's persuation [sic] but MISSIONARY CONVERSION activity is a form of violence on the society it converts as it seeks to destroy their orginal [sic] way of life. History bears witness to it; when will the UN protect religions like the Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, Sikhs?

The statement does not say why those religions need protection.  Be that as it may, the statement would appear to challenge the fundamental principles of India’s secular democracy.

Another interesting tidbit from the Hindu Council UK:

Hinduism believes all humans are born as Hindus until they are baptized or circumcised.

Christians in India are bearing a very heavy cross.  Pray that our Lord will support them and give them wisdom and courage in an often hostile place.

Previous related posts:

• Victims of religious persecution gather in Bangalore, India
• 4000 Christians arrested in Delhi, India
• British Hindu tells Christians to stop evangelising in India
• Brutal attacks on Christian leaders in India

Well, that didn’t take long.  It’s been less than a week since General Synod voted against authorising same-sex blessings (SSBs) and already an Anglican Church of Canada rector has said he will go ahead and bless ‘em anyway.

Renegade B.C. priest to bless same-sex unions

Father Antonio Osorio is inviting lesbian and gay couples to be blessed at St. Saviour's Anglican Church this Sunday.

Rev Osorio’s intent to thumb his nose at General Synod is plain.

"The Anglican Church, in my opinion, needs to stop playing games," said Osorio, who attended the national meeting and voted in favour of the blessing of same-sex unions.

"I am very pleased the national church has said blessing same-sex unions is not in conflict with the doctrine of the church," he said. "I believe blessing these unions is a justice issue. Now is the time to start blessing same-sex couples. I have done it and I intend to keep doing it."

Saint Saviour’s Anglican Church is located on the west side of Victoria harbour.  That would be in the Diocese of British Columbia, The Rt Rev James Cowan, Bishop.

Bp Cowan admits to being a liberal on SSBs.  Despite that, he was one of two bishops to vote against authorising SSBs after voting that they do not conflict with core doctrine.  In defence of his voting pattern, he said he was still "asking for the theological rationale”.

So, did Rev Osorio provide that “theological rationale”?

"They [lesbian and gay couples] need to know they are not second-class Christians," said Osorio. "I am going to bless them as a group because they are faithful and beautiful Christians. And if they want to be blessed as individual couples, I will do it too."
. . .
Osorio will also ask his gay parishioners to bless him.

"It will mean in God's eyes they are equal to me," he said.

I don’t know if that qualifies as a compelling theological argument in Bp Cowan’s book, but it sounds mighty thin to me.

St Saviour’s has its own website, and there’s some very interesting stuff posted there.  The church has been promoting liberation theology for years, complete with trips to Colombia for first-hand indoctrination instruction at the Jesuit University of Colombia. A recent adult Sunday school class entitled “Social Justice and the Gospel of Christ” taught, you guessed it, liberation theology.  A page is devoted to tendentious and superficial discussion of “class struggle”, “imperialism”, “consciousness-raising”, “institutionalized violence of capitalist society”, and what not.

Bishop Cowan needs to pay attention to what’s being taught in his back yard.

Rev Osorio has a page on the homosexuality controversy in the Anglican Communion.  His discussion of the first chapter of Romans offers the usual justifications for avoiding the conclusion that St Paul rejected homosexual practice as sinful: Paul was talking about something other than what the church has always thought he was talking about; Paul didn't know what he was talking about; we don't know what he was talking about.

On top of that, he rightly points out, the dispute over homosexual practice is merely a symptom of a deeper disagreement over how to read and understand the Bible.  He then proceeds to replace his opponents with a straw man.  Some, he says, “take a simplistic view of a literally interpreted Bible as the basis for all belief and doctrine” while others “recognize the Bible as a book out of a cultural background which cannot be applied to modern culture without a process of translation and interpretation”.  Guess which view he considers righteous.

Translating and interpreting the Bible for modern culture apparently gives one carte blanche to overturn centuries of accepted Christian moral theology without supplying a “theological rationale”.

A few days ago, Bishop Michael Ingham accused those against SSBs of being motivated by homophobia.  The silence from new primate Fred Hiltz has been deafening.  Let’s see if Bishop Cowan has anything to say about his “renegade” priest—renegade in more ways than one.

The StatDaughter comments: "What's the point of having General Synod anyway?" 

h/t: Pat Dague at Transfigurations

Previous related posts:

• Michael Ingham hits a new low
• Primates likely to criticise Canada’s ambiguity on same-sex blessings
• It’s all the bishops’ fault
• SSBs consistent with doctrine, but not allowed anyway

UPDATE (28 Jul): Bishop Cowan says the media "misquoted" and "sensationalised" Rev Osorio's remarks.

Davender Ghai, president of Newcastle's Anglo-Asian Friendship Society, has been campaigning for years to have Britain's law banning open-air funeral pyres overturned or repealed.  Now he has gained the support of a very important Hindu spiritual leader.

A CAMPAIGN for open-air funeral pyres in the UK has won the backing of the Hindu equivalent of the Pope.
. . .
Shankaracharaya Swami Divayanand Teerth of Bhanpura, a revered figure in the Hindu community, visited Mr Ghai at his Gosforth home and praised him for his work and his efforts to establish an open-air funeral site in Pakistan.
. . .
"I fully support and praise his campaign for similar rights in Britain and other western countries. Cremation in the open air is the birthright of Hindus and Sikhs as well as their unalterable duty."

Mr Ghai has not only received permission to challenge the law in court, he has also been granted legal aid.

Sikh organisations have indicated that they wish to join the legal battle.  For Sikhs, open-air cremation is a preferred choice, not the religious requirement it is for Hindus.

h/t: Religion News Blog

Previous related post: British Hindu tells Christians to stop evangelising in India

New research by Canadian academics has found that teenagers who date older people, have sex, and use alcohol and other drugs feel older than they really are—and older than their peers who do not engage in those behaviours.

A University of Alberta study has confirmed what has long been suspected: teens who act like adults, especially having sex, feel older than they really are. And the older the adolescent, the wider the gap between their chronological age and their self-perceived age.

The lead researcher was Kelly Arbeau, a doctoral student in the University of Alberta’s psychology department.

"We found that specific behaviours do have an effect on adolescents' self-perceived age," said Arbeau, lead author of the study. "For example, having an older dating partner seems to give a teen a higher subjective experience of age."

Sexual activity, especially starting at an earlier age, was found to have an important relationship to teens' subjective experience of age. "Sexual experience is unequivocally the realm of adult behaviour," Arbeau explained. "So, when teens are having sex and their peers aren't, it can make them feel more adult, more mature than their non-experienced counterparts."

Psychologists had previously discovered that adolescence is the only time in life when we feel older than we really are.  The research took an in-depth look at teens to explore the dynamics of self-perceived age in that age group.

The study, based on a random sample of 664 male and female adolescents from a medium-sized North American city, is entitled “Dating, sex, and substance use as correlates of adolescents’ subjective experience of age”.  It  is published in the June 2007 issue of Journal of Adolescence.  The abstract is posted here, and the full text can be purchased for US$30 via this page.

h/t: MercatorNet

Previous related posts:

• Family instability correlated with poor behaviour in children
• Medical science vindicates church’s anti-condom stance
• Does marriage matter for the nurturing of children?

The Zimbabwe government is taking steps to implement the price rollback ordered earlier this week.  Ruling party thugs are encouraging recalcitrant shop owners to comply, and the government has launched a scheme to subsidise production of goods whose sale price is now controlled.  At the same time, retail sellers are protesting the price controls by removing goods from their shelves.  All in all, a complete—and entirely predictable—mess.

Zimbabweans are facing starvation as shop owners remove basic commodities from shop shelves ahead of police and soldiers' patrols to identify retailers who have defied government directives to reduce prices.

A survey conducted on Wednesday showed that most basic commodities were no longer available in shops as shop owners silently protested against the government directive.

Stores that complied with the rollback order were inundated with shoppers, so their shelves were cleared as well.

Public subsidies were necessitated because the controls cover only producers’ selling prices, not workers’ wages.  In order to keep producing companies afloat, the government has to underwrite wage payments.  Because the government has no funds available for this purpose, the financial support can only aggravate hyper-inflation.

The move however promises to plunge the economy deeper into crisis as the cash-strapped government will be forced to print money to finance the subsidies.
. . .
Government promised to sell flour to bakers at $10 million a tonne instead of the market price of $20 million while fuel will be supplied at $15 000 a litre instead of the prevailing market price of $150 000. All suppliers of basic commodities have also been assured of the cheap fuel.
. . .
Government has continued to scuttle the process of economic recovery. Its debt stands at over $2 trillion owing to huge borrowings to finance government departments and parastatals. The fiscal budget has become a dead letter owing to inflation.

Zimbabwe is becoming a cash-free society.  As soon as workers are paid, they rush to the banks to cash their cheques and then spend the cash as quickly as possible.  Here’s what can happen if you’re slow to get rid of Zimbabwean currency.

I popped out for a Z$25,000 loaf of bread last Friday. It had gone up to Z$30,000 dollars. I ran home for the extra, ran back to the shop - and the price of my loaf had risen to Z$44,000.

It’s easier and less aggravating simply to avoid holding that worthless paper.  More and more Zimbabweans are resorting to barter exchange at every opportunity.

Previous related posts:

• Price rollback ordered in Zimbabwe
• Can Zimbabwe’s economy get any worse? Just watch
• Zimbabwe’s latest dubious achievement: Hyperinflation
• More worthless Zimbabwean currency

Nigerian Pastor Nuhu Mamman was raised a Muslim but became a Christian as a young man.  His life has never been the same.  Rejected by his family, fiancée, and friends, he decided to attend Bible school, eventually earning a theology degree.  Several years later, he married a Christian woman.  As well, two of his brothers, influenced by his faithful perseverance, also embraced Christ.

Now he oversees a church with 16 pastors and over 2000 members.  He also serves as secretary of the Church Council of the Evangelical Church of West Africa in Kebbi state, a Muslim-majority state in northwestern Nigeria where Shariah law has been implemented.

Rev. Mamman, from the Hausa ethnic group of Kebbi state, says persecution of Christians is widespread in the state.

“In the northern part of Kebbi state, Christians face serious difficulties,” he told Compass. “We are always being forced to transfer former Muslims who have become Christians to other parts of this country in order to shield them from persecution.”

The church works hard to protect converts to Christianity from Muslim extremist attacks. After Adamu Muhammed, a Muslim from the town of Birnin Kebbi, became a Christian in 1997, Muslim radicals sought to kill him. As they hunted for him, Rev. Mamman said, the church moved him to Jos in central Nigeria, where he became a Bible student.

Many Muslim converts to Christianity must move to central or southern Nigeria for their personal safety.

Christians in Kebbi state face constant persecution from government officials, police, and the general populace.  Petty bureaucrats refuse to give permission for construction of church buildings.  Churches that are built anyway are liable to demolition as “illegal structures”.

Muslims sometimes rampage in anti-Christian riots in which churches are burned and believers attacked and killed.

Previous related posts:

• Nigerian Taliban
• Despite persecution, Nigerian church flourishes
• Nigerian Christian children kidnapped, forcibly converted to Islam

Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, the organisation representing Canadian Inuit people, declined to take part in today's Aboriginal Day of Action.  Likewise, neither the Nunavut government nor Nunavut Tunngavik, the organisation responsible for monitoring the Nunavut land claim, arranged any activities to celebrate the big day.

The Tr'ondek Hwech'in First Nation, based in Dawson, Yukon, observed the day by refusing to answer telephone calls from government offices.

Instead of setting up blockades, the First Nation's government office will be closed Friday, but only to federal and territorial government representatives whose phone calls will go unanswered, e-mails bounced back and mail left unopened.

Some wags may wonder how that’s different from any other working day (but I’m not going there).

Carcross (map at right) was the only Yukon settlement where any special activity was reported.  About 75 people marched through town and held a peaceful rally in front of the train station.

Previous related post: Nunavut facing crisis in Inuit education and employment

The Quebec Human Rights Commission reports that Inuit children living in Nunavik (northern Quebec) are “in constant crisis” because they do not have reliable access to needed social and health services.

More than half of Nunavik's children live in homes with an alcoholic or drug addict, and they are exposed to domestic violence at rates 10 times higher than the average Canadian population, conditions the report describes as disastrous.

But young people can't access help outside the home because services are overtaxed or don't exist, the report said.
. . .
Children have been referred to youth protection as often as 16 times, but have not received any followup, either because their parents wouldn't co-operate, or the child was related to workers at the agency, the report said.

Children and teens frequently develop drinking habits and drug addictions.  Cocaine and solvents are used by an estimated 10% of teens aged 15 to 19.

Previous related posts:

• Environmentalist power trip inflicts collateral damage on Inuit people
• Nunavut facing crisis in Inuit education and employment

The collect for today, the Feast Day of Saint Peter the Apostle, from the 1662 Book of Common Prayer:

O Almighty God, who by thy Son Jesus Christ didst give to thy Apostle Saint Peter many excellent gifts, and commandedst him earnestly to feed thy flock; Make, we beseech thee, all Bishops and Pastors diligently to preach thy holy Word, and the people obediently to follow the same, that they may receive the crown of everlasting glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

For the Epistle: