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The frenzy over the participation of BNP leader Nick Griffin on Question Time this week has been a classic case of failing to identify the real elephant in the room.

As the dust settles over the Question Time BNP appearance, one thing is certain – the programme’s editors broadcast an atypical programme that was designed to attack Nick Griffin rather than explore (as it usually does) the issues of the day.

The participation on this Thursday’s BBC Question Time of the British National Party leader Nick Griffin is a priceless publicity coup for his party.

Theos Paul Bickley

According to reports, Communities Secretary John Denham has been calling on faith groups to nail the lie that the BNP is a “Christian party”. In fact, he’s joining a crusade against the far right that has been underway for quite a while. In February Anglican clergy were barred from joining the BNP and in July the Methodist Church passed a motion at its annual conference banning all its members from the Party.  On the issue of Nick Griffin’s controversial appearance on Question Time, most voices have been ‘anti-platform’, as they have been in the past with church-organised election hustings.

This is not to say that the antipathy of the churches has in any way successfully prevented the BNP from seeking to engage religious symbols and language in an effort to win support from amongst the Christian community.  They have put to use three particular tropes: the ‘Christian nation’ under threat, the growth of an assertive Muslim presence, and the rise of ‘political correctness’.  There are enough people within the Christian community who identify strongly with these themes for the BNP – or at least individuals associated closely with it – to set up a faith-based group, the ‘Christian Council of Britain’, the name of which presumably consciously mirrors the Muslim Council of Britain.

Existing public institutions and networks – political parties, the military, anti-fascist organisations, and faith groups – seem to have only a limited set of tools to employ in their struggle against the BNP.  These are essentially protest, on the part of the anti-fascists, and polemic: both were seen at the BBC before and during the filming of Question Time.  Neither seems to be particularly effective.

The furore over the Question Time debate has focused renewed attention on the question of the motivation of the 6% of the voting public who supported the BNP in the European elections. It doesn’t take a genius to realise why BNP rhetoric is marked with a heightened and very negative communitarianism. Its most important political strategy is to feed, and then feed on, the fear and frustration that results when communities feel embattled, under-represented, left behind, isolated. These may include Christians with a ‘Christian-nation’ view faced with an increasingly plural society, or deprived white communities who project their lack of opportunity, jobs and access to public services onto immigrant and minority communities and the liberal political elite who favour them to ‘indigenous’ Britons.

For the BNP, it doesn’t really matter whether or not these fears are well founded – some of their recent electoral successes have been in communities that are marked by ethnic homogeneity and parochialism rather than diversity – though they all suffer from a degree of deprivation. What is important is that there is a sense of discontent onto which they can latch. Into that economic, social and spiritual malaise, the BNP throws the concept of ‘them and us’, and trusts in human nature and our propensity to look to the well being of those closest to us to do the rest.

Right or wrong, no one should feel a sense of satisfaction about the nature of the Question Time debate. It will have done nothing to persuade those who have voted BNP in the past, or may do so in the future, to change their minds. Such is their sense of isolation and victimhood that the ill-tempered verbal lynching of someone with whom they have already begun to identify, by politicians whose reputation is seriously tarnished, is likely to harden existing support.

Unhelpfully, religious themes lurked under the surface of the debate. Muslims should accept that “Britain is a Christian country”, said Nick Griffin. Why did Griffin attack only Muslim views when Christian views were so repugnant, asked a member of the audience.  How can churches and other faith groups serve the wider community in this?

In this territory, ideas matter. The theological reason why the churches have opposed the BNP is that the Christian tradition aspires to a uniquely broad view of the community. In the Christian story, ethnic and national markers are relativised. This represented a substantial break from the Jewish cultural context and, in fact, a substantial break from the default human view.

The Christian nation position on which the BNP trades is theologically incoherent because it divides the Christian community on national and ethnic lines. This view of extended community, when put into visible practice, promises a powerful antidote to the isolationism and fear on which the BNP feeds. The church should be careful not to think it has done its job by speaking out against the BNP. It needs to be the community which vitiates it.

Paul Bickley is senior researcher at Theos.

Cross-posted from the Rosh Pina Project by Yeze

Shlomo Moran holds the Bernard Elkin Chair in Computer Science. He has been speaking out for Messianic Jews, following Yuval Azulai’s devastating article in Haaretz about persecution and bigotry faced by Israel’s Messianic Jews by Yad L’Achim.

The Caspari Center notes:

Prof. Shlomo Moran wrote to Haaretz (October 16), saying that prior to reading the original article, he had visited the Stasi Museum in Berlin which documents the activities of the East German secret police. “Despite the difference in the scope of activity, a close resemblance exists between the methods of the Stasi and Yad L’Achim. The former’s goal was to ensure the continuation of the rule of the Communist Party; the latter’s aim is to ensure the continuation of Orthodox Jewish hegemony over the right to determine who belongs to the Jewish people and who does not. Similar to the Stasi in its day, all methods are kosher in the eyes of Yad L’Achim – including following up on people, informing on them, harrassment, incitement, and the denial of the ability to earn an income from citizens whose beliefs the organization does not like. Today, we are ‘only’ talking of Messianic Jews. But the past teaches us that other streams of Judaism are also not immune. It appears as though we are approaching the time when every decent Jew – especially Israeli citizens – will need to carry a sign on his body signifying, ‘I too am a Messianic Jew.’”

It is worth bearing in mind and repeating that most Israelis already do feel the pain of Messianic Jews under attack.

In 2008, 15-year old Israeli teenager Ami Ortiz was nearly blown to pieces by a bomb disguised as a Purim package.

Following this week’s news that a man has been arrested under suspicion of carrying out this heinous crime, Leah Ortiz writes:

We can testify that the nation as a whole condemns this man’s actions. We have received telephone calls and communications from Israelis throughout this past year and a half, from every town, city, and village in Israel. They have been secular, orthodox and ultra orthodox Jews, and the message has been the same – shock, grief and anger over the incident, and the need to let us know that they condemn this vicious act. They all blessed Ami with wishes for a full recovery, and hopes that he would succeed in life and fulfil his dreams.

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Yad L’Achim complains about persecution by Haaretz

Haaretz: Israeli government officials complicit in Yad L’Achim hounding of Messianic Jews

Cross-posted from the Rosh Pina Project

Michael Decker, senior legal activist for the Jerusalem Institute of Justice, has appealed to the State Comptroller with the request that an investigation be opened into the relationship between Yad L’Achim and the Ministry of Interior.

The Caspari Center notes a Haaretz report in which Decker is quoted as writing:

“‘As a government office established on the ashes of those persecuted for their belief and their religious affiliation, the Ministry of Interior cannot be allowed to depend upon a factual basis whose source derives from a dubious third party whose express purpose is to engage in religious persecution’ [...] ‘The Ministry cannot be allowed to adopt the narrow and primitive worldview of members of an organization which bears a striking resemblance to the secret police.’”

John Piper

Unconditional election delivers the harshest and the sweetest judgments to my soul.

That it is unconditional destroys all self-exaltation; and that it is election makes me his treasured possession.

This is one of the beauties of the biblical doctrines of grace: their worst devastations prepare us for their greatest delights.

What prigs we would become at the words, “The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth” (Deuteronomy 7:6), if this election were in any way dependent on our will. But to protect us from pride, the Lord teaches us that we are unconditionally chosen (7:7-9). “He made a wretch his treasure,” as we so gladly sing.

Only the devastating freeness and unconditionality of electing grace lets us take and taste such gifts for our very own without the exaltation of self.

by Chuck Colson with Catherine Larson  – Christianity Today (Hat-tip Virtue Online)

In recent years Great Britain’s chief export to the U.S. has been a payload of books by atheist authors such as evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins and literary critic Christopher Hitchens. They contend that faith is irrational in the face of modern science. Other prominent British atheists seem to be having second thoughts. Is there some revival sweeping England? No; they are examining the rationality of Christianity, the very beliefs Dawkins and others are so profitably engaging, but are coming to opposite conclusions.

Well-known scholar Antony Flew was the first, saying he had to go “where the evidence [led].” Evolutionary theory, he concluded, has no reasonable explanation for the origin of life. When I met with Flew in Oxford, he told me that while he had not come to believe in the biblical God, he had concluded that atheism is not logically sustainable.

More recently, A. N. Wilson, once thought to be the next C. S. Lewis who then renounced his faith and spent years mocking Christianity, returned to faith. The reason, he said in an interview with New Statesman, was that atheists “are missing out on some very basic experiences of life.” Listening to Bach and reading the works of religious authors, he realized that their worldview or “perception of life was deeper, wiser, and more rounded than my own.”

He noticed that the people who insist we are “simply anthropoid apes” cannot account for things as basic as language, love, and music. That, along with the “even stronger argument” of how the “Christian faith transforms individual lives,” convinced Wilson that “the religion of the incarnation … is simply true.”

Likewise, Matthew Parris, another well-known British atheist, made the mistake of visiting Christian aid workers in Malawi, where he saw the power of the gospel transforming them and others. Concerned with what he saw, he wrote that it “confounds my ideological beliefs, stubbornly refuses to fit my worldview, and has embarrassed my growing belief that there is no God.” While Parris is unwilling to follow where his observations lead, he is obviously wrestling with how Christianity makes better sense of the world than other worldviews. While we can’t reason our way to God, I’ve long believed that Christianity is the most rational explanation of reality.

Could this signal a trend? Well, not yet. But it does illustrate something I have been teaching for years: Faith and reason are not enemies. We are given reason as a gift. And while we can’t reason our way to God (only the power of God can transform fallen men-I’ve seen that in prisons for over 32 years),I have long believed that Christianity is the most rational explanation of reality. And that fact, winsomely explained, can powerfully influence thinking people to consider Christ’s claims.

A strong empirical case can be made to show that Christianity is the only rational explanation of life. For the past six years, I’ve been teaching students in the Centurions Program to draw a grid listing the four basic questions that most people ask about life: Where did I come from? What’s my purpose? Why is there sin and suffering? Is redemption possible? Then, on the other side of the matrix, we list the various philosophies and prominent world religions. By examining how each view answers the four questions, we can determine which worldviews conform to the way things really are. This is the correspondence theory of truth-a thoroughly rational test.

Students quickly see that only Christianity teaches that humans are created in the image of God, thus protecting their dignity. It’s no coincidence that Christians have waged most of the great human rights campaigns.

Or take the question of sin. If people are good, as French political philosopher Rousseau argued, problems can be solved by creating a utopian state. Yet all of history’s utopian schemes have ended in tyranny. Meanwhile, Eastern religions see life as an endless cycle of suffering. There’s no way for sin to be forgiven. And grace is an unknown concept in Islam.

This is nothing particularly novel. A long history of prominent atheists, interestingly concentrated in Britain, have traveled back to faith. These doubters began to examine the rationality of Christianity’s claims. Whether in the Victorian era, with Thomas Cooper, George Sexton, and Joseph Barker, or in the 20th century, with T. S. Eliot, Graham Greene, and C. S. Lewis,all of them concluded that the Bible speaks most accurately to the human condition-the very definition of a rational choice. It is rational to choose the worldview that provides the best choice for living, consistent with the way life works.

What does this tell us? People today have a caricatured view of Christians, seeing us as followers, often hypocritical and judgmental, of an outdated book of mere illusions. But if we can explain why Christianity is so reasonable, our faith becomes a very winsome proposition, which will at least open the mind, if not the heart, of many a doubter.

Oh this is excellent, I wasn’t the only one who found this “news” darkly funny

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There’s no God say 96% in web poll ’sting’

By George Pitcher – Telegraph

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Dawkins Refuses to Debate Intelligent Design Scholars – Atheist author Richard Dawkins has made it loud and clear that he believes faith has no place in science and that a public debate between him and a creationist – of any type – is out of the question.

By Andrew Halloway

The world’s leading Intelligent Design (ID) think tank has announced that prominent Darwinist Richard Dawkins has refused to debate his own evolution book with ID author Stephen Meyer.

Dawkins’ new book, ‘The Greatest Show on Earth’, claims to be overflowing with irrefutable evidence for evolution. But the Discovery Institute has found that apparently Dawkins is not so confident of his case that he is prepared to debate it with a leading opponent.

Although he has debated atheism many times, Dawkins has a history of avoiding clashes over evolution.

Dr Stephen C. Meyer, author of the acclaimed ‘Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design’, has challenged Dawkins to defend ‘The Greatest Show on Earth’. Meyer says: “Richard Dawkins claims that the appearance of design in biology is an illusion and claims to have refuted the case for Intelligent Design. But Dawkins assiduously avoids addressing the key evidence for intelligent design and won’t debate its leading proponents.”

Dr Meyer, who received his PhD in the philosophy of science from the University of Cambridge, continues: “Dawkins says that there is no evidence for intelligent design in life, and yet he also acknowledges that neither he nor anyone else has an evolutionary explanation for the origin of the first living cell. We know now even the simplest forms of life are chock-full of digital code, complex information processing systems and other exquisite forms of nanotechnology.”

In ‘Signature in the Cell’, Meyer shows that the digital code embedded in DNA points powerfully to a designing intelligence and helps unravel a mystery that Darwin did not address: how did the very first life begin? The book was only launched this year yet has entered its third printing, according to publisher HarperOne, an imprint of Harper Collins. It has been endorsed by scientists around the world, including leading British geneticist Dr Norman Nevin, US National Academy of Sciences member Dr Philip Skell, and a former Inspector of Schools for Science in Scotland – Alastair Noble (PhD, chemistry).

Meyer challenged Dawkins to a debate when he saw that their speaking tours would cross paths this autumn in Seattle and New York, but Dawkins declined through his publicists, saying he does not debate “creationists” because he doesn’t want to give credence to their position.

But Meyer, although a committed Christian, denies that he is a creationist: “Dawkins’ response is disingenuous. Creationists believe the earth is 10,000 years old and use the Bible as the basis for their views on the origins of life. I don’t think the earth is 10,000 years old and my case for ID is based on scientific evidence.”

According to Discovery Institute, where Meyer directs the Center for Science & Culture, the debate challenge is a standing invitation for any time and place that is mutually agreeable to both participants.

But Dawkins is unlikely to take it up in the future. Since a few skirmishes with creationists early in his career, he has resolutely refused to debate evolution. One wonders what it is he fears? If evolution is as irrefutable as he claims, then he should win every such debate. Surely it’s better to defeat his opponents’ arguments in public than to let them develop unopposed?

It’s no use saying that debating anti-evolutionists will give them the oxygen of publicity that they don’t deserve. ID and creationism are already well-known and growing alternatives to evolution, especially in America.

Perhaps the real reason is that the former Professor for the Public Understanding of Science is worried that debating an ID scientist might give the public a better understanding of the shaky foundations of evolution.

Cross-posted from Get Religion by Mollie

We’ve looked a bit at some of the hyperbolic coverage of the major Vatican news this week. Previously, for instance, the Times (U.K.) ran headlines about Catholic tanks parked on Anglican lawns, then Vatican gambits and Papal poaching.

But this story shows that there was quite a bit of movement on the Anglican side that led to the Catholic Church’s new provision. And the headline is still pretty dramatic:

400,000 former Anglicans worldwide seek immediate unity with Rome

You wouldn’t know from the story, however, that the Vatican had been working on how to receive the Traditional Anglican Communion, which has (not coincidentally) an estimated 400,000 people, for years and that what was announced this week were the early details for how that will happen.

Compare that coverage to religion reporter Peter Smith’s analysis in the Louisville Courier-Journal headlined “Limits to Rome’s Anglican plan.” Smith argues that the new overture to Anglicans may have significant consequences on Roman Catholics but he doubts it will draw many Anglicans who weren’t going to convert already. He thinks the liturgical distinctions between the two church bodies aren’t that major. Here’s the gist:

As for the Anglicans, there’s no push for the majority of Anglicans in Africa and Asia to bolt for a more conservative church. They already have conservative national churches. Why should any conservative break away from a church where the moral conservatives represent the overwhelming mass of opinion, such as in Nigeria? Philip Jenkins, a scholar on Global South religion, told the Times.

For Anglicans in the United States and other liberal Western countries, well:

1. There aren’t that many of them, of any ideology, except in England, and even there many of them are members in name only. As I noted earlier this week, Episcopal membership is down nationwide and in Kentucky and Southern Indiana. Catholics outnumber Episcopalians and Anglicans in the United States by something like 20 to 1.

2. A minority of conservative Episcopalians has already broken off to form a rival denomination that claims to be the true Anglican representative in America. But as the network itself says, it believes most members won’t accept Rome’s overtures.

So, one would have to be: a) conservative enough to want to leave the Episcopal Church, b) unwilling to convert to standard Roman Catholicism, c) then willing to change one’s mind because the pope would permit worship under Anglican-style liturgies and married priests.

He goes on to quote — I know, I know — the omnipresent Father Thomas Reese saying the move is much more significant for Catholic clergy. There’s a discussion of whether Roman Catholic men will try to join the Anglican ordinariate, just so they can marry.

Anyway, the move is significant, it is bold, it is major. But journalists need to be asking some of the questions Smith looks at in his coverage.

It’s true that there’s very little push in the Global South. And even the major news about parishes and dioceses breaking away here in the States isn’t about groups looking to go to Rome. So the move should be kept in perspective. Who exactly, other than those in the Traditional Anglican Communion, will be joining the Catholics? It’s a question that deserves ongoing coverage.

by Joseph Puder – Pajamas Media

Russia, it seems, has effectively used the Iranian nuclear issue to its advantage. On his visit to Moscow this past July, President Obama agreed to scrap U.S. plans to deploy interceptor missiles in Poland and a radar station in the Czech Republic as part of a U.S. missile defense system in Europe. The Obama administration insisted that it did not expect a quid pro quo from the Russians on Iran, but “hoped” that Russia would not oppose tougher sanctions on Iran if it fails to live up to its international obligations.

Although Russian President Medvedev seemed to have expressed a change of heart at the recent G-20 summit in Pittsburgh regarding sanctions against Iran, Russia has consistently vetoed UN Security Council resolutions against Iran’s nuclear program. Does the new rhetoric coming out of Moscow signal a strategic about-face by Putin/Medvedev?

Unlikely.

At a joint press conference in Moscow with visiting U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton on October 13, 2009, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated: “The threat of sanctions against Iran would be counterproductive.” He resisted U.S. efforts to win agreement for measures if Iran fails to prove its nuclear program is peaceful. Lavrov’s boss Vladimir Putin — the real power in Russia — declared while on an official visit to China: “There is no need to frighten the Iranians.” He added: “We need to look for a compromise. If a compromise is not found, and the discussions end in a fiasco, then we will see.”

Iranian proximity to the Russian border on the Caspian Sea should make Moscow at least a little edgy about Tehran’s quest for nuclear arms — and yet to date, Russia has shown no signs that it is willing to go along with Western actions against Iran. Moreover, Russia continues to supply Iran with nuclear technology and weapons, and together with China it has opposed tougher sanctions against Iran.

It certainly appears that Russia is not as apprehensive about a nuclear Iran as Israel and the U.S. are. Nor, for that matter, is it as worried as America’s European and Arab allies are. And as we know, Russian nuclear scientists, technicians, and specialists are operating inside Iran on the construction of an Iranian nuclear site. It should come as no surprise if we learn that some of these specialists are employed by the Russian intelligence services, and that they have been reporting back on the progress Iran has made. It is conceivable that from the inside it may appear that the Iranian technological progress is slower than imagined.

The Russians — who occupied northern Iran during WWII — may very well feel confident that they can control Tehran’s actions if and when it becomes necessary. Naturally, just as the Iranians deceived the world about the existence of the uranium enrichment facility in Qom, they might very well fool the Russian snoopers of their real progress.

Moscow views the prospect of a nuclear Iran as a threat to Israel and Saudi Arabia in particular, and less of a threat to itself. And while a nuclear Iran would create tension in the Middle East and likely lead to the nuclearization of the region, Russia would use the opportunity to reemerge as the major mediator between the various countries — i.e., Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the Islamic Republic of Iran. Russia would then enjoy replacing the U.S. as the primary mediator in the Middle East.

While Russia’s economy is dependent largely on oil and gas exports (something it shares with Iran), Russia values the economic relations it has with Iran. In addition to being a major weapons supplier to Iran and being involved with the construction of Iran’s nuclear site, Russia also depends on the trading of consumer goods with Iran. From Moscow’s vantage point, increased tension over Iran’s nuclear program would help oil prices to rise. Conversely, UN sanctions may make it harder for Russia to trade with Iran.

Another factor related to Moscow’s protective shield over Tehran relates to its problems with Sunni Islamic radicals in Dagestan and across its northern Caucasus. The growing influence of a Salafi Sunni Muslim movement, which draws its inspiration from the Saudi Wahhabis and the Taliban, has drawn Russia and Iran together as they face a perceived common enemy. Ironically, when it comes to fighting the U.S. and Israel, the Sunni-Muslim Salafists and the Shiite radical mullahs of Iran have banded together.

What does Russia really want? Does Moscow prefer its relationship with Iran over a warming relationship with the West? Not necessarily. Putin’s Russia just seeks to be treated as it once was — as a superpower.

The Iranian nuclear issue has put Moscow where it wants to be. The Americans, Europeans, and Israelis are flocking to Moscow to persuade its leaders to come around on Iran and join them in a united front against Iran. Other leaders, such as Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, arrive in Moscow with an opposing message. All of which is making the Russians feel important once again.

But as Masha Lipman — a political analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center — pointed out, “If Russia delivers, it’s losing an important trump card. Hence, Russia is consistently avoiding making firm and formal commitments on Iran.”

In the near future, Russia will seek additional American concessions, while here and there it releases a statement supporting tougher measures against Iran. But in the end, if the U.S. or Israel seek to prevent the Iranian ayatollahs from acquiring nuclear weapons, they cannot look to Russia for meaningful support.

Joseph Puder, a freelance journalist, is the founder and executive director of the Interfaith Taskforce for America and Israel (ITAI).

Cross-posted from Biased BBC – By Robin Horbury

As the dust settles over the Question Time BNP appearance, one thing is certain – the programme’s editors broadcast an atypical programme that was designed to attack Nick Griffin rather than explore (as it usually does) the issues of the day. I used to publicise the programme for the BBC. The then editors would never have permitted such a change in format, which they would have seen as a compromise of their independence and integrity. Meanwhile, the Daily Mail has an editorial which says it all about today’s BBC. Read and enjoy:

Talk about bare-faced hypocrisy.

Amidst the furore over the BBC’s decision to invite Nick Griffin on to Question Time, its director general, Mark Thompson, claims that he had no choice because of the Corporation’s ‘central principle of political impartiality’.

What a pity that the BBC for years has comprehensively trampled this so-called ‘central principle’ into the dirt.

This is an organisation that’s utterly in thrall to the left-wing agenda of the majority of its staff.

Until very recently, the BBC systematically censored any debate about immigration into Britain, a nation which, as was revealed yesterday, is on its way to a population of 70million.

It also treats global warming with the fervour of a religion, and is so pro-Brussels that even a report commissioned by the BBC itself found that it was hopelessly biased against the Eurosceptic position.

It’s an institution that by its very nature promotes alternative lifestyles and minority groups at the expense of traditional values, and it doesn’t have much time for Christianity, capitalism, or the countryside either.

Whatever the rights and wrongs of letting Mr Griffin onto Question Time, the BBC can’t pretend that some sacred principle of political impartiality had anything to do with it.