Meanwhile, in Toxteth, a Catholic priest has been arrested for giving directions to looting youths telling them that, “there is a massive range of hi-tech goods and trainers a mile down the road at the local abortion clinic, now go get them.”
Restrictions on religious beliefs and practices rose between mid-2006 and mid-2009 in 23 of the world’s 198 countries (12%), decreased in 12 countries (6%) and remained essentially unchanged in 163 countries (82%), according to a new study by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life.
Because several countries with increasing restrictions on religion are very populous, however, the increases affected a much larger share of people than of states. More than 2.2 billion people – nearly a third (32%) of the world’s total population of 6.9 billion – live in countries where either government restrictions on religion or social hostilities involving religion rose substantially over the three-year period studied. Only about 1% of the world’s population lives in countries where government restrictions or social hostilities declined.
Among the world’s 25 most populous countries – which account for about 75% of the world’s total population – restrictions on religion substantially increased in eight countries and did not substantially decrease in any. In China, Nigeria, Russia, Thailand, the United Kingdom and Vietnam, the increases were due primarily to rising levels of social hostilities involving religion. In Egypt and France, the increases were mainly the result of government restrictions. The rest of the 25 most populous countries, including the United States, did not experience substantial changes in either social hostilities or government-imposed restrictions.
[.....]
Among the five geographic regions covered in the study, the Middle East-North Africa region had the largest proportion of countries in which government restrictions on religion increased, with nearly a third of the region’s countries (30%) imposing greater restrictions. Egypt, in particular, ranked very high (in the top 5% of all countries, as of mid-2009) on both government restrictions and social hostilities involving religion. Egypt was one of just two countries in the world – Indonesia was the other – that had very high scores on both measures as of mid-2009.
Europe had the largest proportion of countries in which social hostilities related to religion were on the rise from mid-2006 to mid-2009. Indeed, five of the 10 countries in the world that had a substantial increase in social hostilities were in Europe: Bulgaria, Denmark, Russia, Sweden and the United Kingdom. The study also finds that social hostilities involving religion have been rising in Asia, particularly in China, Thailand and Vietnam.
Well, it would seem that the looting, burning and violence has reached as far as my quiet city of Gloucester.
It was a modest affair compared with the large cities, with about 50 rampaging youths, ten of whom were arrested.
For anyone in or around Gloucester who’s on Twitter, you can follow the discussion on the hashtag: #gloucesterriots.
You can view photo’s of the disturbance here.
There’s an interesting eye witness account from a Barton Street resident here.
There seems to be a bit of a theme online today, searching for the cause of these riots, which all major on the fathers of the youth, or more accurately, the lack of fathers.
My thanks go to Gloucestershire Constabulary, who by all accounts did a superb job last night.
In her blog post entitled: London Riots Symptom of a Deeper Malaise, Andrea Minichiello Williams – of Christian Concern – makes the following comment:
The riots which are taking place in London are a symptom of a deeper malaise. A heavier police presence tonight may bring them under control, but it will only be dealing with an expression of a far deeper problem.
Britain is a power-keg of frustrations. Despite the incredible increase in living standards in the last 50 years, UK citizens are increasingly unhappy. Mental health problems are on the rise and people are feeling lost and isolated without family, community and faith.
I hereby dispute Andrea’s baseless insinuation of a link between mental health issues and the outbreaks of rioting and looting currently blighting our nation.
The irony is palpable:
Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehman-Parast urged the British police to exercise restraint against protesters.
Mehman-Parast asked the British government to start dialogue with the protesters and to listen to their demands in order to calm the situation down.
He also called on the independent human rights organizations to investigate the killing in order to protect the civil rights and civil liberties.
Oh, and another thing, these thugs are not ‘protesters’ even if the BBC refers to them as such.
Over the last 2 days thousands of atheists have looted and set fire to the capital of England, can any of the resident atheists on this site enlighten the rest of us as to why this is happening.
So, what does the ‘soft-bigotry of low expectations’ look like in the context of recent events? Well, put plainly it is the drive toward rationalising behaviour that in all other stratas of society would be considered entirely beyond the pale, to the extent that the wholesale denunciation of such behaviour is often tempered by an appeal to a host of contextual factors. It usually comes dressed up in the guise of ‘understanding’, when in reality it is closer to ‘excusing’, whilst remaining careful to emphasise, of course, that excusing is precisely not what it is trying to do.
Joel – a prominent Protestant Christian blogger – has an intriguing blog post arguing for the need of a ‘Vicar of Christ’ sitting on the Chair of an Apostle, to combat heresies and ‘winds of new doctrine’.
Give it a read, it is indeed surprising and makes me thankful once again for the Catholic Church and the office of Pope.
Some US based researches certainly seem to think so, based on a small study:
One study of 332 Christians and Jews found that those who trusted in God to look out for them had lower levels of worry and less intolerance of uncertainty in their lives.
I was, of course, particularly satisfied to read this:
“The implications of this paper for the field of psychiatry are that we have to take patients’ spirituality more seriously than we do”
How long have I being saying this?
If you believe what you have to say is all that important, and I don’t approve your ‘witty’ comment, post it on your own blog where you and your cat can read it. That way you can have the satisfaction of it appearing online. But please, don’t get angry with me if I don’t share your delusion and ignore your comment as not at all witty or amusing or informative or whatever.
