Trust in Church will be 'regained slowly'
Last year the Archbishop of Canterbury quit his role after a review found that he "could and should" have reported a prolific child abuser to police in 2013.Dr Croft himself previously apologised after a review found that he did not act sufficiently when in 2012 Matthew Ineson told him he had been raped. During an interview with Adam Ball on BBC Radio Oxford the bishop said: "I've done all I can to learn from that and to behave differently, and also to bring about a change in safeguarding where I have that responsibility."An independent review last year into the safeguarding work at the Diocese of Oxford praised it as "exceptionally well-led".He said: "We're absolutely not complacent about that and there's still a huge amount of work to do, and in many ways that's the safest place for us to be as a church, knowing that we have a great deal to learn, and that we can still continue to set the voices of survivors at the heart of all we're doing."
In a wide-ranging one-hour interview the bishop restated his support for same-sex marriage."From everything that we've learned from listening to LGBT people there's something profound and deep in their identity, which means that those relationships and loves ought to be affirmed by the church," he explained.Dr Croft also said he was opposed to the assisted dying bill, saying his stance was "about the sanctity of human life", "to stress the need for good palliative care everywhere" and "partly the sense that we are crossing an important line as a country if this bill is passed".He added: "For the first time our National Health Service will be proactively involved in ending life not saving life, and that's a really significant thing for the medical and healing professions."
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Telegraph
2 days ago
- Telegraph
Church admits it was wrong to let biological men use girls' lavatories
The Church of Scotland has admitted it was wrong to allow a biological male to use female facilities. A mother said she 'froze' when she picked up her 11-year-old daughter from a drama class at a church-run community centre in Cupar, Fife and encountered a man from an LGBT club in the female lavatories. The mother was initially told by the church that it was 'lawful and often appropriate' for 'women-only spaces to include trans women'. However, Kirk leaders later admitted that their advice contravened the Supreme Court's gender ruling in April that a woman was defined by biological sex under equality law. The disclosure prompted a backlash from opposition politicians who accused the church of putting the young girl in an 'appalling' situation. It comes as the SNP government was criticised by the equalities watchdog for failing to issue updated trans guidelines in the wake of the Supreme Court decision. Tess White, the Scottish Conservative shadow equalities minister, told The Times: 'It's appalling that a young girl was put in this intimidating situation – and it should never have happened. 'The law is clear and there's no excuse for the Church of Scotland or any other organisation not to be following it. 'But SNP ministers are largely to blame for this mess – first by allowing lobby groups to dictate gender policy across the whole of Scottish public life and then by refusing to produce clear, updated guidelines following the Supreme Court ruling.' The church had claimed that its trans-inclusive stance was based on the advice of 'legal experts' such as Stonewall, the activist group, and the Good Law Project, run by the barrister Jolyon Maugham, which is seeking to overturn the Supreme Court ruling. It admitted that its advice to the parent was incorrect and it should not have relied on positions taken by partisan groups. It said it now 'supported the right' of women and girls to access single-sex spaces and suggested that trans people should be provided with gender-neutral facilities. The incident coincides with a warning by the UK's equalities watchdog for Scottish government ministers to update policies to reflect the Supreme Court's landmark ruling on the definition of women without delay. The EHRC issued interim guidance in May related to trans people's use of single-sex facilities and launched a consultation on changes to parts of its code of practice for services, public functions and associations, which closed in 30th June. The updated code is due to be published later this year. Dr Lesley Sawers, the Deputy Chair and Scotland Commissioner for the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said ministers had 'a responsibility to ensure their adherence to the Public Sector Equality Duty' - the legal requirement for public authorities in Scotland to consider protected characteristics, including biological sex, when carrying out their functions. She warned that the current 'climate of uncertainty and widespread misinformation serves nobody'. 'An urgent need for clarity' John Swinney, Scotland's First Minister, initially welcomed the 'clarity' provided by the ruling but the Scottish Government has repeatedly said it is waiting for further guidance before issuing new advice of its own to Scotland's public sector - including prisons, schools and the NHS. Dr Sawers said the government should already be following the law: 'We appreciate there is an urgent need for clarity, as a climate of uncertainty and widespread misinformation serves nobody, particularly those with protected characteristics. Ms White added: 'The EHRC is effectively telling SNP ministers: no more excuses. 'The Supreme Court's verdict was delivered over two months ago, yet John Swinney and his colleagues are still dragging their heels on telling public bodies in Scotland to comply with the law.' Kelly, the mother of the 11-year-old, who did not want her surname published, said the incident happened at the Old Parish Centre in May. She later spoke to the church minister, who was initially supportive, but in a second email last week, he said advice from the church's central office meant he had to 'rescind' his first email. It had been made clear to him that 'a trans woman's use of the women's toilet aligns with her gender identity, and this is lawful and consistent with best practice'. The Church of Scotland expressed 'regret' that its initial advice was 'not correct' or aligned with EHRC advice. It said: 'We support the right of women and girls to access single-sex spaces and the right of trans women and trans men to access gender-neutral spaces, so that trans people are not put in a position where there are no facilities for them to use.'
The Herald Scotland
2 days ago
- The Herald Scotland
We are being softened up to no longer believe in the sanctity of life
Our priest told us: 'The broken body of humanity is presently not far from our eyes, including last week in the Westminster Parliament which has just passed legislation that an abortion up until birth is no longer liable to criminal prosecution: a beautiful baby expecting life but broken and killed. Or again, the bill to legalise assisted suicide being passed in the House of Commons, breaking the Hippocratic Oath that a doctor is called to save lives and comfort the dying.' Read more by Kevin McKenna As this priest was re-iterating a basic Church teaching, his bosses – the bishops – were living the high life while choosing to cower in the soft folds of their social media account. At Parliament last month, a majority of those we elected to represent us decided that the state could sanction assisted dying with little or no safeguards to prevent vulnerable people – especially those with mental health challenges – being coerced to end their lives. No matter that we have the resources to ease suffering at the end of life: the state had decided that their deaths would be more convenient and less costly than easing their pain. Almost all of the UK's main disabled groups opposed this. The state has effectively said to them that if you require state assistance to live then you are considered a legitimate target. The message to these people and their families is clear: your disability means you are a little less equal than us. It inadvertently highlighted one of the problems that authentic Catholicism has with abortion. If you justify it by saying that an aborted foetus can't exist independently of its mother then what does this say about those in society who are also unable to exist without the assistance of a third party? It begins to encroach on the same territory occupied by eugenics, the purest and most sinister form of capitalism: that you can arbitrarily be classed as undeserving to live if you don't garner enough points on a subjective scoring system in this human perfection procurement exercise. Perhaps it's only a curious quirk of history, but this inhuman and repugnant erosion of human dignity has occurred at a point when – for the first time in what we might loosely call civilisation – human beings are being forced to consider questions about what it means to be fully human. How much value do we set on this when machines can now replicate much of what we once believed to be indisputably and irreplaceably human? The development of Artificial Intelligence is in its infancy and growing faster than our ability to process it and to control it. It's thus reasonable to venture that we are the first stamp of human civilisation to be confronted with a question none before us has had to consider: how much value do we place on being human for its own sake? We are at the beginning of the post-work age and already some have decided that being fully human is now a privilege that must be earned and that a high bar must be set. Anti-abortion protestors pictured outside an Edinburgh clinic (Image: Newsquest) If you want to ask why the richest people and corporations on the planet are spending billions exploring the possibility of human settlements on other planets (for the right sort of people, of course) then perhaps you need to look about you and start paying attention. In truth, the softening-up process has begun. We are already being primed to accept this new normality. Part of this was in accepting that healthy babies can be killed in the womb. Meanwhile, elderly and infirm people must now live with a new jeopardy: that the state's patience and forbearance about their physical and mental state is finite and that when their government decides that critical measures must be taken to protect the economy then they'll quickly become an expensive indulgence. After this, who knows who else the state will deem to be a luxury it can no longer afford? The German philosopher, Karl Jaspers, who was himself persecuted by the Nazis, wrote after the war: 'that which has happened is a warning. To forget it is guilt. It was possible for this to happen and it remains possible for it to happen again at any minute.' Kevin McKenna is a Herald writer and columnist. He is Features Writer of the Year and writes regularly about the working-class people and communities of Scotland.
Spectator
3 days ago
- Spectator
Being a Christian isn't easy
Spare a thought for Chris Coghlan, who has learned to his horror that not only is the Pope a Catholic, his own priest is one too. The Liberal Democrat MP, who voted to legalise assisted suicide, attends St Joseph's Catholic Church in Dorking. He complains to the Observer that Father Ian Vane 'publicly announced at Mass that he was… denying me Holy Communion as I had breached Canon Law'. Coghlan believes this represents a 'completely inappropriate interference in democracy by religious authorities'. If you're not a Catholic, at this point you're thinking one of two things: 'No thanks, I'll leave the Papists to their internal disputes', or 'Canon Law would be a cracking name for a courtroom series about a priest turned barrister'. But stick with me, there's something for everyone here. By his own admission, the Dorking and Horley MP was well aware of the Church's opposition to Kim Leadbeater's Bill. He was 'deeply disturbed to receive an email from my local priest four days before the vote… saying if I voted in favour I would be 'an obstinate public sinner' [and] complicit in a 'murderous act'.' Now, that's how I like my priests. Spitting doctrine like fire, not some hippie-boomer Father Mulcahy type spouting happy-clappy 1970s nonsense. Father Vane explicitly told Coghlan that, were he to vote for Leadbeater's Bill, it would be 'a clear contravention of the Church's teaching' and would 'leave me in the position of not being able to give you Holy Communion, as to do so would cause scandal in the Church'. This man has never come within a mile of an altar with an acoustic guitar. Coghlan claims that Father Vane 'weakened his argument by wrongly characterising assisted dying' as 'direct euthanasia, which is putting an end to somebody else's life'. It is Coghlan who is wrong. The distinction he posits is not recognised by the Catholic Church. The Catechism says: 'Intentional euthanasia, whatever its forms or motives, is murder. It is gravely contrary to the dignity of the human person and to the respect due to the living God, his Creator.' Suicide, meanwhile, is 'seriously contrary to justice, hope, and charity' and 'forbidden by the fifth commandment'. Saint Pope John Paul II, in Evangelium Vitae, defined euthanasia as 'an action or omission which of itself and by intention causes death, with the purpose of eliminating all suffering'. He termed it 'a grave violation of the law of God' and listed it, along with abortion, as 'crimes which no human law can claim to legitimise'. He acknowledged the concept of 'assisted suicide' but turned it over to Saint Augustine, who held that it was 'never licit to kill another: even if he should wish it, indeed if he request it… nor is it licit even when a sick person is no longer able to live'. John Paul concluded that 'any state which made such a request legitimate and authorised it to be carried out would be legalising a case of suicide-murder'. Even so, was it really necessary to deny Coghlan Holy Communion and announce said decision? Father Vane has faithfully guarded the Eucharist in accordance with Canon 915 and the teaching of Cardinal Ratzinger (as he then was) in 'Worthiness to Receive Holy Communion'. The legacy of Pope Francis, however, complicates matters a little. As Cardinal Bergoglio, he drafted the Aparecida Document issued by Pope Benedict XVI, which stated that Catholics in public life 'cannot receive Holy Communion and at the same time act with deeds or words against the Commandments', specifically citing euthanasia as an example. However, as Pope Francis, he preached that 'the Eucharist is not the reward of saints, but the bread of sinners'. He also waded into the controversy over pro-abortion US politicians receiving the Blessed Sacrament, saying he had 'never' refused anyone Communion and exhorting priests and bishops to 'be a shepherd' with 'closeness, compassion and tenderness'. Did Coghlan cast his vote with this in mind? If so, even those of us who favour doctrinal soundness over Jesuitical cleverness might wonder if there could have been a way around a eucharistic sanction. Unfortunately, Coghlan puts paid to that when he says he 'supported assisted dying in accordance with my conscience'. He is entitled to his conscience, but it is by definition not a Catholic one. Catholicism is composed of three strands: scripture, tradition and the magisterium, the latter being the instructional authority given to the Church by Jesus Christ. All three are as one on the question of man's creation in the image of God and the sanctity of human life. If you don't believe in these doctrines, then Catholicism is not the religion for you. Coghlan is halfway to that realisation when he says: 'My private religion will continue to have zero direct relevance to my work as an MP'. Catholicism is not a hobby, it's a living witness shaped by rites, dogma, and authority. If it has 'zero direct relevance' to your work, whatever that work is, you're in the wrong church. I hear the Anglicans put on a nice service. This sounds harsh, but it should not be mistaken for a saintly passing of judgement on a reprobate. Like Coghlan, I too am a sinner, perhaps sometimes a public one, and while I hope that I'm not too obstinate I cannot shed my birthright as a Scot. I would be in no position to judge him anyway, for I have recently returned to the Church only to learn that this Christianity business is much harder than I remember. So I speak not with the zeal of the convert but with the unbearable burden of the prodigal son drawn home in the full knowledge of his iniquity and his inadequacy. Catholicism is a struggle, it's meant to be a struggle, but it has to be a struggle you want, not one you merely inherit, or identify with, or thole to get your children into a Catholic school. I had never heard of Chris Coghlan before now. He might be a fine man and a hard-working MP, but he seems very confused about both freedom of conscience and democracy. If an MP was a member of the National Secular Society, was told he would be sanctioned if he voted to send a Bible to every household in Britain, did so anyway, then had his membership suspended, would Coghlan consider this an 'interference in democracy'? If he would, he belongs in neither the Church nor the Commons.
