BlackPhi Webitorial Ramblings

Comment & Opinion From A Christian's Perspective

School Rambles - Posted 30th March, 2006

My daughter is in year 5 at Caversham Primary School, and yesterday was their school production: a musical about pirates entitled Silver & Gold. The photo on the right doesn't do it justice, between low light levels and deliberate blurring of faces, so you'll just have to accept my word that it was a wonderful production. There was music, drama, Bollywood, humour, even swordfighting (and a moral at the end). Amazingly it was all written by one of the teachers there, Miss Hodder. This was a wonderful creative opportunity for the children, and great fun too. It worries me that the Gradgrinds in the Department of Education and Skills seem to want to squeeze this sort of thing out of the school curriculum.

On the subject of schools and enthusiasm: Highdown School in Emmer Green recently had a parents' evening for parents of year 9 children, who were about to make their choices of which subjects study to GCSE. The (admittedly small) hall was packed to overflowing - far more than in previous years, we were told. I reckon this is down to the school's efforts to involve parents as far as possible, which really seem to have taken off when the current Y9's started.

Highdown School has had a real turnaround: among Caversham locals it used to have really quite a bad reputation, yet a new headmaster and many new, and enthusiastic, teachers and department heads (as well as many older and enthusiastic teachers - I had no involvement with Highdown before we went on the dreaded Y6-visits, three and a half years ago, but the impression I get is that generally the ablest and most enthusiastic of the older teachers were kept and the less enthusiastic moved on to somewhere quieter) have changed perceptions dramatically. I gather Highdown is now first choice for many applicants from all over the borough, and is becoming oversubscribed. My son joined just as the teacher turnover began to stabilise, and I have to say that I have been really impressed by the positive atmosphere, the enthusiasm and the determination to help the kids achieve their best. I reckon it shows what good leadership and positive enthusiasm can achieve.

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Afghan Christian to be Martyred? - Posted 22nd March, 2006

Abdul Rahman (Abdur Rahman according to Reuters, but it's probably a misprint) is a 41-year-old Afghan who converted from Islam to Christianity at least 14 years ago. He is now on trial in Kabul charged with rejecting Islam. If he is found guilty he faces the death penalty.

The new Afghan constitution is supposed to uphold Islamic law (Sharia), which is generally held to require that any Muslim who converts to another religion is guilty of apostasy and should be put to death. It is also supposed to uphold the UN Declaration of Human Rights, article 18 of which explicitly allows a person to change their religion. The new Iraqi constitution is similarly split.

Many of the articles about this affair, eg on the BBC and in The Times have focused on the political aspects of this case. To me there are two elements which are more important. At the 'big picture' end is the question of whether Islam and human rights can ever be compatible. If Afghanistan, supposedly freed from the totalitarian grip of the Taliban, chooses to judicially murder a Christian in this way, what hope is there? At the personal end is the life of a Christian brother, facing the same sort of justice as his Saviour, Jesus:

“The Attorney-General is emphasising he should be hung,” Judge Alhaj Ansarullah Mawlawy Zada, who will be trying his case, told The Times. “It is a crime to convert to Christianity from Islam. He is teasing and insulting his family by converting. In your country (Britain) two women can marry; that is very strange. In this country we have the perfect constitution, it is Islamic law and it is illegal to be a Christian and it should be punished.”

Prayer and/or letter writing seem like appropriate responses to this situation.

Update 27th March: Apparently Abdul Rahman is to be released from jail while his case is reviewed. Meanwhile more than a thousand protestors took to the streets in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif this morning to demand that Mr Rahman be executed.

Update 30th March: According to the BBC, Abdul Rahman has escaped to Italy, where he has been fast tracked for asylum. They add that almost all MPs in the Afghan parliament wanted to prevent him from leaving Afghanistan. Praise God for Mr Rahman's escape, but don't forget the many other Christian converts in Afghanistan (and throughout much of the Islamic world) who remain under threat from these 'apostasy' laws.

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South Park Loses 'Chef' - Posted 21st March, 2006

So, Isaac Hayes has left South Park because it is offensive. Excuse me? That's like saying French cheese is smelly. Of course South Park is offensive, it always has been - that's the only point to it, so far as I can see (I'm not a fan). According to Hayes: "There is a place in this world for satire, but there is a time when satire ends and intolerance and bigotry toward religious beliefs ... begins."

How has he managed to stay for so long? South Park started ten years ago with two short films: Jesus vs Frosty and The Spirit of Christmas, the latter featuring a martial arts duel between Jesus and Father Christmas. According to series co-creator Matt Stone, "In ten years and over 150 episodes of 'South Park,' Isaac never had a problem with the show making fun of Christians, Muslim, Mormons or Jews," adding "He got a sudden case of religious sensitivity when it was his religion featured on the show." Hayes is a Scientologist, and South Park recently did an episode poking fun at Scientology. Apparently he is happy to dish the mockery out, but not willing to take it when it's his beliefs being mocked.

Many, many years ago, when I was 21 and considering becoming a Christian, I thought I would look around several other religious groups first, to see what they had to say. It was an interesting exercise, I met a lot of very pleasant people, heard a lot of ideas - some flaky, but then you get those in mainstream churches too - and generally found it an enjoyable and useful experience. Except for one group. I found a Scientology 'church' offering a free introductory session. This involved a very paranoid film about how horrible psychotherapists are, plus a free session holding a pair of tin cans and being told how much my life could be improved if only I could lose my engrams, all with the pervasive sense that everything came with a price tag. The atmosphere of the place was really cold and dead; all-in-all it was a highly unpleasant experience.

Scientology was founded by L Ron Hubbard, a science fiction writer who had been involved in black magic. He is quoted by fellow sci-fi author Lloyd Eshbach as having decided "I'd like to start a religion. That's where the money is." So he did. Essentially a modern variant of gnosticism, Scientology uses L Ron Hubbard's sci-fi talents to draw people into ever-deeper levels of hidden knowledge. When that 'hidden knowledge' is exposed it reads more like very bad space opera, but once devotees have been sucked into spending all their money and years of their lives they are in no position to be critical. Rolling Stone recently did an excellent, if long, in-depth article on Scientology and L Ron Hubbard.

Update: according to a report on FOXNews Isaac Hayes didn't quit South Park at all, someone quit for him whilst he was in hospital. The plot thickens.

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How do you like the new page icon? There is a page to generate them at http://www.chami.com/, so I thought I'd give it a go. Hmm, Internet Explorer doesn't show the icon unless you add the page to your favorites. Crummy! Why not get Firefox: it's a much better browser anyway?

Website Problems Update - Posted 15th March, 2006

I do apologise for the problems with accessing the webitorial website over the last few days, particularly since yesterday afternoon when it just went catatonic. The problem should be fixed now (do please let me know if not).

For the sake of anyone with the same problem, here comes a techie bit. The culprit was Google Desktop, the older version of which does have a number of strange incompatabilities with other programs, particularly firewalls and the like. On its own with Apache web server there was no problem, but when I upgraded F-Secure Anti-virus to F-Secure Internet Security then Apache locked up. In the Apache error log there were thousands of lines all saying "[warn] (OS 87)The parameter is incorrect. : winnt_accept: Asynchronous AcceptEx failed." Eventually the PC ground to a halt, slowing down the network, with a series of errors in the system log: "The server was unable to allocate from the system nonpaged pool because the pool was empty. " Logically F-Secure should have been the problem, as that is what had changed, but the problem continued even with F-Secure turned off. Uninstalling Google Desktop worked like magic. I rebooted once to get Apache working, reset F-Secure to its normal configuration, rebooted again and everything was fine.

Update 22nd April: Hopefully we're now sorted. Removing Google Desktop reduced the problem, but the web server was still going AWOL every few days. The fix was to set the Win32DisableAcceptEx parameter in Apache's httpd.conf file. According to the Apache writeup, using AcceptEx() instead of Accept() brings performance improvements but is vulnerable to bugs in certain popular virus scanning packages. Presumably F-Secure Internet Security 2006 is one such.

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Justice and Forgiveness - Posted 14th March, 2006

By one of those strange 'coincidences', I was watching the next Nooma in the series today. It is called Luggage, and it is about forgiveness. One thing it says, which I missed in last week's post, is that sometimes people are toxic, harmful. We can forgive them but they come back to do more harm. Sometimes we need to just not be there - maybe they have to come back, but we don't have to wait for them. Violence, abuse, sometimes the first step is to just leave, to get out.

Anthony Walker tried to do that. It must have been really hard for his family to sit through the trial of his murderers, yet they did. Forgiveness is vital, but justice matters too. Not the 'revenge' type of justice, certainly not the 'recompense' idea of justice, but justice as cleansing the wound, as protecting the community from the toxic, as allowing healing.

That is why places like Yeldall Manor are so important. You can lock away, for a time, those who harm the community (and themselves), you could kill them or deport them, but how much better to heal them. How much better if the poison could be removed and they, and the community, could be set free.

This is the message of the cross, of course. God could have simply destroyed mankind, wiped us out as being too toxic to live. Instead He sent Jesus. Through Jesus' life, death and resurrection we can be cleansed. Our toxins can be removed: we can be set free to do good instead of harm. That is God's justice.

May you forgive as you've been forgiven, may you give to others what's been given to you, may you set someone free and find out it was you, and may you do it today, because you might not have the chance tomorrow.

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Website Problems - Posted 10th March, 2006

I apologise if you have been having problems accessing the webitorial website. I am having hassle with my firewall which means I have to upgrade a whole host of other software, which is likely to take a few days. Hopefully most of the site will be available most of the time, so if you do have a problem, please try again later.

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Forgiveness Isn't Easy - Posted 8th March, 2006

It's been a year of high profile for Christian witness in appalling circumstances. Back in May last year, Benoit Witchalls, husband of stabbing victim Abigail Witchalls, gave an interview saying that they felt no anger against her attacker and giving glory to God.

Then, in November, we saw the amazing Gee Walker speaking of the need for Christian forgiveness even after the appalling racist murder of her son, Anthony. She had some important things to say:

Why live a life sentence? Hate killed my son, so why should I be a victim too?

Unforgiveness makes you a victim and why should I be a victim? Anthony spent his life forgiving. His life stood for peace, love and forgiveness and I brought them up that way.

I have to practice what I preach. I don't feel any bitterness towards them really, truly, all I feel is... I feel sad for the family

This week we have had a rather different, but complementary, take on Christian forgiveness from Reverend Julie Nicholson. She has resigned as priest-in-charge of the parishes of St Aidan and St George, in Bristol, because she cannot forgive the terrorist who killed her daughter, Jenny, in the Edgeware Road bomb attack last July. She plans to continue with Christian ministry, working with young people, but believes that forgiveness and reconciliation are too integral a part of Christian worship for her to lead services with integrity. She too had important things to say:

I rage that a human being could choose to take another human's life. I rage that someone should do this is the name of a god. I find that utterly offensive. We have heard a lot in the media about things causing certain groups of people offence and I would say that I am hugely offended that someone should take my daughter in the name of a religion or a god.

Can I forgive them for what they did? No I cannot. And I don't wish to. I said in the early weeks and still now say the name of my daughter's murderer Mohammed Sidique Khan every day. I believe that there are some things in life which are unforgivable by the human spirit. We are all faced with choice and those four human beings on that day chose to do what they did.

The witness that forgiveness is central to the Christian life is common to all three; Jesus commanded it and then set the example on the cross. The Witchalls and the Walkers show that Christian forgiveness is possible; Julie Nicholson shows that sometimes it is very, very hard.

I think Gee Walker's point about not being a victim is spot-on. Someone has done something awful to you once: being chained by hatred, bitterness and unforgiveness only allows them to hurt you again. If we can only let go, then we can be freed from their power. Yet, as an EA campaign said back in 2002, "God knows, it'll take a miracle to forgive". Maybe a first step is to see if you can pray for them ... or at least pray that one day you'll be able to pray for them.

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Easter Activities Preview - Posted 4th March, 2006; updated 7th March

I have had a lot more details about the Easter activities at Caversham Baptist Church. I have set up a separate webpage with the latest info, and trimmed this posting down to the highlights.

During the week before Easter, there will be a children's holiday club called Seaside Rock from Monday through Thursday, 10:15-12:30.

On Good Friday there will be a family-friendly joint service at South Street with the Methodist church in the morning then the Methodists are running a children's afternoon over at Caversham Heights Methodist church.

On Easter Saturday the Prospect St/South St. building will be opened up to all for a huge display about Jesus' life and death, with different areas and different activities, and all sorts of things going on (including refreshments, of course). Do come along to have a look. After that there will be a hurried clear-up and reorganisation ready for a concert, led by Rob Newey, in the evening.

On Easter Sunday there will be our usually Easter Family Service in the morning at 10:30am at Prospect St., and a service of evening worship at 6:30pm at North Caversham.

Finally, on Easter Monday in the early evening there is a 'Dads & Lads' get-together (rumoured to be activities designed for fathers and sons to enjoy together). I heard suggestions of Scalextric and pizza, which sounds a messy combination ... but fun.

If you live in the Caversham area (or beyond), do come along to one or more of these events. They look like they should be really good, and I am glad that there will be more of a choice of Easter activities in Caversham this year. If you are a church member, please get involved! There is a tremendous amount going on, which will involve a huge amount of work; your involvement will make a big difference.

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Posting Guidelines

If you have any ideas for a posting, please send it to me: mailto:webitorial@cavbaptist.org.uk. The ideal length for a posting is around three to four hundred words (3-4 paragraphs). There are bad examples of my postings which are a lot longer than this, and I think it is clear that they lose impact as a result. The basic style is intended to be friendly and fairly informal: try to keep sentence and paragraph lengths down, and please avoid religious jargon.

This is an opinion column so it is fine to be opinionated, but it is not good to be destructive. These pages are attached to the Caversham Baptist Church website: opinions expressed here need not necessarily reflect the views of the church as a whole, but they must be appropriate for a church website. Courtesy, responsibility and common sense are key.

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