Christianity should be scaled down in public life and especially in education, a report has argued.
The report, by the Commission on Religion and Belief in Public Life, was issued on Monday, and called for the next coronation to have a multi-religious nature and for non-Christian representatives to sit in the House of Lords.
The report, called Living with Difference, was the work of a two-year-long commission, chaired by crossbench peer and former judge Baroness Butler-Sloss and put together by 20 “leading religious and academic thinkers”.
The report argued that Britain had changed hugely in recent decades and that half of the population identified as non-religious. Among its conclusions were that schools should hold an “inclusive ‘time for reflection’” rather than a Christian assembly, and that non-Anglican religious groups should be represented in the Lords.
Baroness Butler-Sloss said the recommendations amounted to a “new settlement for religion and belief in Britain” and were aimed at providing a role in society for all citizens, “regardless of their beliefs or absence of them”.
The report suggested that the Government should repeal the requirement for schools to hold acts of collective worship or religious observance, and instead hold “inclusive assemblies and times for reflection that draw upon a range of sources”.
A spokesman for the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales said: “Seeing faith as a problem that needs to be contained and managed is a mistake, failing to acknowledge the central role of religion in the integral human development of each person and the contribution religions make to society as a whole (eg in education, healthcare and care of the vulnerable).”
Priest to defend pastor who is on trial for Islam remarks
A Catholic priest from Northern Ireland has said he will join a Unionist MP and an imam this week in defending a Protestant pastor on trial for calling Islam “satanic”.
Pastor James McConnell, on trial at Belfast magistrates’ court, faces up to six months in jail if convicted over a sermon he gave last year in which he said Islam was “heathen” and “Satanic”. He was charged under the 2003 Communications Act with making “grossly offensive” remarks about Islam.
Fr Patrick McCafferty, a parish priest in Crossgar, Co Down, told the Belfast Telegraph he was “delighted” to give evidence on behalf of McConnell. “We don’t see eye to eye on many things but his prosecution is an absolute outrage,” he said: “There is no public interest in dragging a clergyman who is nearly 80 years of age and battling cancer into court.”
According to Fr McCafferty, Pastor McConnell has said “far worse things” about Catholicism in the past, “but it never entered my head to go crying to the police about it… [Instead] we sat down and had a cup of coffee together and talked it through.”
Bishops ‘say no married priests’
English and Welsh bishops rejected a proposal to ordain married men as priests at their plenary meeting last month, according to the Northern Cross newspaper.
The paper said Bishop Seamus Cunningham of Hexham and Newcastle proposed the motion on behalf of the Council of Priests in his diocese. The proposal was rejected after a “thoughtful discussion”, he told the paper.
Areas of Catholic Herald business are still recovering post-pandemic.
However, we are reaching out to the Catholic community and readership, that has been so loyal to the Catholic Herald. Please join us on our 135 year mission by supporting us.
We are raising £250,000 to safeguard the Herald as a world-leading voice in Catholic journalism and teaching.
We have been a bold and influential voice in the church since 1888, standing up for traditional Catholic culture and values. Please consider donating.