Immanuel House of Worship Church may be Forced to Close over Muslim Neighbour Singing Complaint
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From The Christian Legal Centre
A LONDON Church was effectively ‘silenced’ by a Court after a decision by Magistrates to uphold a noise abatement notice, not to play excessive sound, after just one Muslim neighbour complained about noise levels of worship in a church which was next door to the house he purchased.
Singing Songs of Praise on a Sunday is normal Church activity. Using amplification is a normal part of Church life and it was argued at the Court hearing that the normal use of a Church building entails worship and cannot constitute noise nuisance.
Immanuel House of Worship Church has been meeting at 89 Vallentin Road in Walthamstow since it bought the premises in 2006. The Church was built in 1894 and was formerly used by the United Reformed Church, when the Church owned all the land on which the current properties are now built.
The property next door to the church, No 87, was formerly the Manse (vicarage) until 1989, when it was then sold by the United Reformed Church. In 2005, No 87 was sold to the current occupants. Mr and Mrs Baha Uddin. From 2005 – 2006, the property was empty and vagrants frequently hung around church. Currently, the IHOW church offers a nursery to serve the whole neighbourhood and has an impressive list of neighbours who welcome the church and who do not regard their worship as a problem.
However, Mr and Mrs Uddin complained about the level of noise of worship coming from the church for just 40 minutes a week and an Abatement Notice was served on the Church Trustees on 6 May 2009 under Environmental Protection Act 1990 section 79(1) (g). The church appealed to the magistrate court and the hearing took place on 5 and 6 October at Waltham Forest Magistrates Court.
Mr Ade Ajike, a Trustee of the church said: “When we moved into Valentinn Road in 2007, we had renovated the property and bricked up the three windows facing house No 87. We also double glazed all the windows, except one stained glass window, and spent £10,000 to carry out sound-reducing. In fact, the Council’s environmental department at the time said it would be enough just to brick up the windows.
“After moving in we invited Environmental Officers to visit the premises and we got the OK. We also visited neighbours and took them potted plants , and had no problem until Mr Uddin made his official complaint in August 2008.
“Gary Vickers, an Environmental health enforcement officer visited Mr Uddin’s house on 10th August (Sunday worship service time) and on 12 August issued a letter to us saying that in his opinion, the volume from the music was of statutory noise nuisance level throughout the neighbours’ property. He suggested to deal with matter through sensible negotiation, informing our Pastor that ‘the church had to keep the noise down so as not to offend the Muslims living in the area’. He told us ‘this is a Muslim borough, you have to tread carefully’.”
During August, IHOW took action. They reduced hours of Sunday worship from 4 hours to 2 hours 30 mins, of which music is played for about 45 minutes. They reduced their weekly services to one service on Sunday, and all mid-week services held are skeletal services without music. Sunday evening services were reduced to once a month. The Trustees also took the decision not to hire out the premises in case noise would aggravate Mr Uddin, a move which has cost the church additional revenue. However, the visiting officer changed and questioning got more hostile.
Mr Ajike said: “Officers questioned the church why they needed amplifiers when 50 years ago the Church would not have used drums and amplified music. On 6 May 2009, an Abatement Notice was issued against the church alleging an unreasonable level of noise nuisance caused by excessive loud amplified music and drums.
“Since then we have stopped using drums and further reduced our worship time to 20 minutes beginning from 11.30am on a Sunday morning. We have also restricted church services to once a week. Despite all our action, Mr Uddin, who actually lives in what was the former Manse (vicarage) to the church, would stand at church’s main entrance door and shout his complaints and demand our Pastor come out to speak to him during his sermon.”
The IHOW has sought the advice of the Christian Legal Centre over their plight and to appeal this week’s decision. CLC has instructed leading Human Right’s expert Paul Diamond to represent the church at the Appeal.
Andrea Minichiello Williams, barrister and director of the CLC said:
“The charge of nuisance in law must involve proving there is a substantial interference with comfort. Surely, any reasonable person would think that singing for 40 minutes or so once or twice a week would not cross this threshold. Worship in a Church is to be expected. The Environmental Health Officers do not seem to have taken this fact into account. This is a vibrant Afro Caribbean community of Christian believers whose worship of God is fundamental to the expression of their faith. The richness and vibrancy of groups like the London Gospel Community Choir is based on the Afro Caribbean expression of faith through music. ’
Tags: Church Life, Law Moral Ethical
October 17th, 2009 at 5:07 pm
I thought Britain was suppose to be a christian country, but it seems we are bending double to please the muslim but if it were the other way roound reverse will be the case. What is Britain afraid of, its only God that guides and protects, but it seems we have lost our faith in God now rely on pleasing the muslims so that they will not attack us. Its such a big shame. Wake up Britain God is on your side.
January 15th, 2010 at 11:52 am
I read about this first in “Barnabasaid” Magazine. Unbelievable! I was not aware that in the UK there were Muslim areas? If so then one must assume that in Pakistan etc there must be Christian areas. As I write this Christians in “Muslim” countries are being persecuted,killed and better not convert from Islam to Christianity. Your neighbour should be reminded what his happening to Christians in his country of origin and be happy that he can be blessed listening to Gods people worshipping, and he,NOT being persecuted for NOT being a Christian.
January 15th, 2010 at 11:57 am
Hi David, I wish all people knew more of how Christians are suffering in Islamic lands. There is a campaign by extremist folk to cleanse the Islamic lands of Christians and they are moving towards their goal quite well through terror and intimidation in certain countries like Iraq. If they succeed, these lands will not have Christian populations for the first time in 2000 years. The same is happening to the Jews of course.
I try to raise awareness of all of this on the blog, but it doesn’t seem to generate that much interest in the UK sadly.
January 15th, 2010 at 12:08 pm
I didn’t realise I was on a “blog”… I’m 69 years old and only recently stopped writing letters! I am going to forward this site to some of my contacts, including ones in Tanzania where I used to work as a missionary ( and still visit ). God bless you and your ministry and may you PREVAIL in this battle!
January 15th, 2010 at 12:14 pm
Thanks David, your encouraging comments have lifted my day
January 15th, 2010 at 12:23 pm
That’s very touching. God willing, I will come and visit your fellowship sometime this year. I live in Kent, just 40 minutes from the center of London by train.
January 15th, 2010 at 12:52 pm
Difficult situation for which we need more facts and less rhetoric.
David
The Muslim neighbour may not come from Pakistan of course. How can you live in Britain and not know that there are poor areas of our inner cities where the religion of most of the population is Islam just as there used to be Jewish areas in the East End of London at one time ?
It may also be a genuine noise issue not a Christian/Muslim issue. Many folk living in built up areas find the noise levels of the very “happy clappy” congregations difficult to cope with. There have also been some problems with Church bell ringing in rural village parishes where the complainants were very white and very middle class.
Simi,
Is God on Britain’s side? That seems a rather dubious statement although Tony Blair might agree with you.
Stuart
Yes there are some terrible things being done by Hindu and Moslem extremists in certain parts of the World but not only to Christians, they often persecute people of other Faiths too. Orthodox Christians too have been guilty of some dreadful actrocities in the Balkans in recent years. There are other countries where people of different Faiths live together in relative harmony and respect each other’s beliefs.
January 15th, 2010 at 1:14 pm
Well, it looks like there is some interest on your blog at last!Annie, you will notice that I am going to visit the church. I want to know more. I am not aware in my life time of the jewish community in the UK demanding to be treated differently, or even wanting to introduce jewish laws into our society. One of our most famous prime ministers……. was a jew!
Hopefully this debate will continue.
January 15th, 2010 at 2:26 pm
David
Do you mean Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881)?
” Benjamin Disraeli was born Jewish and is therefore sometimes considered Britain’s first Jewish Prime Minister. In fact, he was a practicing Anglican. In 1813, his father’s quarrel with the synagogue of Bevis Marks led to the decision in 1817 to have his children baptized as Christians (ironically, when Disraeli was 13 and eligible for Bar Mitzvah). Until 1858 Jews were excluded from Parliament; except for the father’s decision Disraeli’s political career could never have taken the form it did. ”
This is an over-simplification of course but I guess the Jewish population in the UK has simply asked for protection of its religion and traditions, which is reasonable, although there have been recent controversies about some of its Faith Schools. Many of the 19th century Jews who fled to the Uk , came as refugees from programs and repressive Christian regimes in Russia and Eastern Europe . Most of the UK population of Muslim descent seem to have been economic migrants moving here from parts of the former British Empire where Britain’s Christian military and colonial administrators certainly didn’t shrink from imposing it’s laws and Victorian social values of race and class on the local populations .
January 28th, 2010 at 1:19 am
We can be sure reports of Mr Uddin’s anti-social behaviour at the church door are not liable. He lives in its old vicarage, deliberately built in proxmity to the church, which at anytime could be reused. His comments about, “I’ve not been able to use my garden or living room on a Sunday because of the church services” followed by a list of anything that makes noise, infers xenophobia of Christian worship. The church expenditure on noise insulation is more than generous. He’d be laughed-off if he’d acquired airport staff property.
Annie, your citing “Christian regimes” in comparison to the socio-religious nature of Islam makes no sense, particularly given the thirst for persecuting Christian worship common to Muslim majority nations. It is unfair to cite countries where the Orthodox Church was a political puppet of un-believing regimes.
February 4th, 2010 at 8:34 pm
Mark
I have British Eastern Orthodox friends. While they wouldn’t actively support atrocities against Muslims they are certainly very Islamaphobic and sympathetic to the “Christian” regimes in the Balkans. I think the Orthodox Church in the Balkans and in pre-revolutionary Russia was always an active supporter of oppressive political systems to enhance their own power base and frequently used their special relationship as the State Religion against Muslims, Jews and Non-Orthodox Christians.