The right to wear the cross

Photo: Rex Features

A belated post after my memory was jogged on seeing this article repeated in the Catholic Herald. See previous posts here and here. 

"In a Telegraph report of 28 April, David Barrett relates that Michael Nazir Ali, former Bishop of Rochester, has written to the European Court of Human Rights in support of Christians who are claiming that they have suffered discrimination at work because they have been banned from wearing a cross. In his submission, Bishop Nazir Ali writes: “We have reached a stage where Christians in the United Kingdom risk their employment if they wear a cross. However, the United Kingdom courts have permitted the wearing of a Sikh bangle, the Islamic headscarf and even a corncrow haircut.”

The Government plans to argue at the same Court that employers have the right to ban the wearing of the cross because it is not a requirement of the Christian faith. Archbishop Rowan Williams, in what seems an embarrassing own goal, appeared to support (or at least not protest against) the Government’s position, by stating at a church service in Rome in March that the wearing of a cross had become something “which religious people make or hang on to” as a substitute for true faith. I disagree with him. “Religious people”, those who publicly profess their Christian faith, wear a cross as a sign of this faith (and who is he to judge their motives anyway?) It is non-religious people – often celebrities – who affect a cross simply as decoration or jewellery, but the Archbishop didn’t say this.

He should have said what was left to retired Anglican Bishop Nazir Ali to say: Christian employees should have the right to express their faith by wearing a cross. The Bishop went on to state, “Any policy that regards the cross as just an item of jewellery is deeply disturbing… It is disrespectful and insulting to practising Christians…The cross is ubiquitous in Christian devotion from the earliest times… The cross is the most easily recognisable Christian symbol in architecture, church furnishing and the dress of the clergy.” He added: “I am aware that many Christians wear the cross and would be distressed to be required to remove it.”

Bishop Nazir Ali echoes what Cardinal Keith O’Brien said in his Easter Sunday homily when he urged Christians to “wear proudly a symbol of the cross of Christ on their garments each and every day of their lives”, adding, “I know many of you do wear such a cross of Christ, not in any ostentatious way, not in a way that might harm you at your work or recreation, but a simple indication that you value the role of Jesus Christ in the history of the world, that you are trying to love by Christ’s standards in your own daily life.”

I was once given a pair of black earrings in the shape of crosses. I have never worn them. They couldn’t be seen as anything but items of jewellery; very different from the little silver Celtic cross, given to me by my mother, which I have worn round my neck for years. Perhaps it is time for parish priests to follow the example of Bishop Nazir Ali and Cardinal O’Brien, and preach about the importance of wearing a cross as a symbol of faith – and not as a style accessory.

The Church doesn’t make a “rule” about wearing a cross, rightly giving people the liberty to choose. But reverence for the cross and what it symbolises concerning the price of our redemption is “a requirement of the Christian faith”. If Christian employees choose to wear one, the Government should recognise this as an expression of deeply held beliefs – beliefs that have shaped the history, laws and culture of this country."

A step too far

"Margaret Thatcher deserves every honour – apart from a state funeral" runs the headline in Peter Oborne's piece for the Telegraph. As David Cameron says, 'let me be absolutely clear', I have no problem with the second part of that headline. Where are the unifying acts that warrant the distinction of a state funeral? Despite some lingering resentment of his use of troops against miners in 1910/11, that Churchill deserved the honour is beyond dispute in reward for a nation's gratitude for leading us to victory in what was our greatest time of need .

Oborne perpetuates the myth implied in Thatcher's triumphant pose with the union flag with his assertion: "our former prime minister remains magnificent: brave, impervious, indomitable, the giantess of our time". 

The reality for others in the myth-making process is different. Her dead heroes lie far from home in the cold, distant Falkland Islands while others feel the shiver here. We may no longer be held to ransom by devastated industrial muscle but that has been replaced by the tyranny of bankers. Our manufacturing base has been replaced by an over praised service sector with its financial muscle. The result? Pauper's funerals increasing at an alarming rate, millions unemployed including over a million young people with little if any hope of a job, home ownership beyond the reach of increasing numbers of young people while out of control bankers ruin the lives of our people, something Herr Hitler failed to do, thanks to Churchill.

The unity that a state funeral would imply is absent. Many whose lives were ruined by Mrs Thatcher would happily picket a state funeral. Common sense should prevail but that is something else in short supply these days. A state funeral is not something to be devalued. Value for money was one of Mrs Thatcher's main tests even if often flawed, but a legacy admirably expressed in this e-petition. 

Words, words, words

The words that resonated with me most in the first ordinations I attended many years ago were from Isaiah 6:8

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”

And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”



Profound words but time has moved on. Some of the men I witnessed answering God's call now find themselves in the episcopate in a radically different church. Damien Thompson's recent piece for the Telegraph reminded me that different words resonated in consecrations I have attended. In the Church of England, before the Prayers of Penitence, the Archbishop introduces the service for 'The Ordination and Consecration of a Bishop' with the words:

God calls his people to follow Christ, and forms us into a royal priesthood, a holy nation, to declare the wonderful deeds of him who has called us out of darkness into his marvellous light.

The Church is the Body of Christ, the people of God and the dwelling-place of the Holy Spirit. In baptism the whole Church is summoned to witness to God's love and to work for the coming of his kingdom.

To serve this royal priesthood, God has given particular ministries. Bishops are ordained to be shepherds of Christ's flock and guardians of the faith of the apostles, proclaiming the gospel of God's kingdom and leading his people in mission. Obedient to the call of Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit, they are to gather God's people and celebrate with them the sacraments of the new covenant. Thus formed into a single communion of faith and love, the Church in each place and time is united with the Church in every place and time.

Much of this sounds rather hollow in a new liberal church which often seems divorced from spirituality, especially the words: "Bishops are ordained to be ..... guardians of the faith of the apostles... . In the Preface to the Declaration of Assent the Archbishop reads:

"The Church of England is part of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, worshipping the one true God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It professes the faith uniquely revealed in the Holy Scriptures and set forth in the catholic creeds, which faith the Church is called upon to proclaim afresh in each generation. Led by the Holy Spirit, it has borne witness to Christian truth in its historic formularies, the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion, The Book of Common Prayer and the Ordering of Bishops, Priests and Deacons. In the declaration you are about to make, will you affirm your loyalty to this inheritance of faith as your inspiration and guidance under God in bringing the grace and truth of Christ to this generation and making Him known to those in your care?"

To my mind, after the decision of the Church of England to depart from the orthodoxy of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, the ordinand somewhat hypocritically responds:

"I, AB, do so affirm, and accordingly declare my belief in the faith which is revealed in the Holy Scriptures and set forth in the catholic creeds and to which the historic formularies of the Church of England bear witness; and in public prayer and administration of the sacraments, I will use only the forms of service which are authorized or allowed by Canon."

Coming to the Liturgy of Ordination, among the declarations the ordinand is required to make, I find two particularly irksome as a traditionalist:

"Will you teach the doctrine of Christ as the Church of England has received it, will you refute error, and will you hand on entire the faith that is entrusted to you?" I suppose under its own rules the Church of England now receives only what it wants to receive but when it comes to:

"Will you promote peace and reconciliation in the Church and in the world; and will you strive for the visible unity of Christ�s Church?", the ordinand Answers "By the help of God, I will" when clearly he should say 'No'!

Deficit Dave drops another one.

Deficit, deficit, deficit. No matter what the problem, the cause, the effect, the Prime Minister's response is unwavering: stick to the deficit reduction plan. When you are in a hole stop digging is generally good advice but such an analogy is unlikey to register. David Blanchflower has laid out the problem facing us in an article for the New Statesman in which he says: It is becoming increasingly apparent that Cameron is a) totally out of his depth when it comes to the economy; b) has no clue what to do to fix the problem; c) has little sympathy for those who are less fortunate than he is. He just doesn't care. But it is extremely unlikely that Deficit Dave will take any notice as illustrated in an earlier article for The Telegraph by Damian Thompson.  


Dave's latest gem to be dropped on the working classes is to advise parents to take their children to work during strikes. I can only assume he shot that one from the hip without giving any thought to child protection, health and safety or even the logistics of trying to work with an eye on the kids after possibly doubling the occupancy in the workplace - "when it is safe for them to do so" of course. A useful get out!  For people in a less privileged position struggling to make ends meet, life is not that simple especially for the elderly. 


Today's shocking report on care of the elderly at home illustrates how detached from reality politicians have become. 'Care' has been downgraded in hospitals and at home to the extent that many 'carers' just don't care any longer. Hospital nurses and District nurses have been elevated to the status of semi-medical professionals no longer soiling their hands on menial tasks yet it is precisely the intimate care that made 'nursing' what it was before accountants re-defined 'care'. Without proper care the entire system is in a state of collapse in hospitals, care homes and in people's own homes where 'home care' has become a 15 min visit. Today's carers are among the poorest paid with an undervalued status. This must change. If carers were better rewarded financially and in their status, genuine caring people may be attracted to what much of nursing care was all about. This is one deficit that cannot be ignored.

Political correctness gone mad.

"Happy Hollyday!"

"Happy Christmas Holiday Thomas!" This is the latest effort of those who prefer to call persons chairs and make everyone feel thoroughly guilty if they don't conform to their overbearingly harsh regime of political correctness.

I missed an earlier report in the Telegraph which broke the news that the television company which is recording new adventures of Thomas the Tank Engine is re-branding Christmas as "the holidays" to comply with “politically correct” thinking.

The fact that the creator of Thomas the Tank Engine was a priest who said that he was a clergyman first and a children's author second would have little effect on persons who regard political correctness as all. This comes on the top of a bizarre decision by the BBC to drop BC and AD in favour of the non-Christian, BCE and CE – Before Common Era and Common Era.


Irritating as these stories are, for pure crassness the pulpit storming, Peter Tatchell takes the biscuit. In a piece for the Guardian he writes: 

"How would you feel if the government banned black people from getting married and made them register their relationships through a separate system called civil partnerships? Most of us would condemn it as racist to have different laws for black and white people. Well, black couples are not banned from marriage but lesbian and gay couples are. We are fobbed off with civil partnerships." 

Also, "Don't get me wrong, civil partnerships are an important advance. But they are not equality. Separate laws are not equal laws. Civil partnerships are a legal form of sexual apartheid. They create a two-tier system of partnership recognition: one law for heterosexuals (civil marriage) and another for same-sex couples (civil partnership)."

I guess this all started because our way of life irritated feminists, then Islamists, now LGTB and so on. If I were an Islamist, feminist, lesbian I may be happy but being none of them, like many others I am becoming more and more irritated by these PC persons. I regard civil partnerships as a sensible levelling for those in stable relationships outside marriage and to condemn them as the sexual apartheid of racists is a new low in political correctness but they want it only their way, never mind the rest of us, including children used to looking forward to their Christmas stories.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Photo: PA/EPA

This weekend the Archbishop of Canterbury hopes to meet President Robert Mugabe to discuss the ugly situation in Zambia. The difficulties Archbishop Rowan face were highlighted in a Telegraph article on 30 September. 

The former Anglican bishop Nolbert Kunonga has his own way of doing things in the name of the lord, not Our Lord, but Robert Mugabe, a Roman Catholic! Pope Benedict XVI rightly remarked "the church is a net of the Lord which pulls in good fish and bad fish". Apparently dying of prostate cancer Mr Mugabe shows no sign of softening his stance before he meets his maker.

Nice try Rowan but be prepared for yet another disappointment unless the president is called much earlier than his prognosis suggests.

Head in the clouds?

As the Telegraph rightly reported, the 'last-minute' conference speech change on "households paying off their credit card debt" was an embarrassment" but not the only embarrassment for the Prime Minister as he appeared for his keynote speech at their Party conference in a cross-wire against a backdrop showing him with his head in the clouds.

When the average food bill for couple is £60 a week and the PM's wife turns up wearing an outfit in which just the trousers cost £89, is it surprising that someone with no concept of living within his means could come up with the idea of slowing the economy even further by people spending even less - if they could!

In her Telegraph piece Janet Daley appeared to muddle her headline: "David Cameron shows his leadership – with just a hint of the PR man showing through". For me it wasn't 'just a hint of the PR man showing through' it was the complete PR man showing through and with the conference slogan "Leadership for a better future" it looks more like "No leadership, no future!". The image of a man trying to sell me a time-share in Spain was inescapable and that's not just my opinion. Here is the verdict of four top writers.

Sorry Your Grace

My next Blog entry was to have been a tale of the 'Three Wise Persons' travelling from the East to the land of His Darkness to sort out the troubles that Ab Rowan's sidekick has created there but that will have to wait, although in reality the stories are not unrelated. It's all about women in the Anglican church today or, as my wife prefers, 'some' women.

Ab Rowan ruined my dinner this evening. My wife seethed throughout after reading the Telegraph article 'Women bishops would humanise priesthood'. As Pope Benedict remarked recently there are good fish and bad fish but it hadn't occurred to either of us that the priesthood was 'inhuman'. Such talk encourages false accusations of misogyny when in fact many women are against women's ordination. 

A great admirer of Rowan's spirituality her final comment as I went to wash the dishes was, "Rowan has lost me. I have been unhappy for a while but this is the end; he should return to academia." A noted disciple of Dostoevsky, The Observer Review section carried this comment in Ab Rowan's review of Philip Pullman's The good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ. "Alluding to Dostoevsky's point that 'Jesus was too radical for ordinary human consumption, and for his memory to survive at all, you have to lie about him". I am not suggesting that His Grace lies about Jesus but is he following the Jesus of 'ordinary humans'  or some academic person moulded to fit current fashion ?

An Ordinariate in Wales (2)

Way back in December 2010 anyone interested in exploring the development of an Ordinariate in Wales was asked to register on a new blog. Since then, nothing! But it appears that the seeds planted may be about to germinate.

Before leaving for his Summer holiday, Fr Michael Gollop left this tantalising comment on his Blog:

"While the blog is quiet for the next few weeks, you could do worse than keep an eye on the Welsh Ordinariate site (link on the right). A usually reliable source tells me to expect some kind of announcement about future developments after the middle of the month. See you in September!"

In February 2010 the Telegraph's Damian Thompson published an article under the title "Why it doesn't matter if the Pope's Ordinariate for ex-Anglicans is small at first". Since then there have been many developments In England with those in Wales apparently left out in the cold. Perhaps things are about to change. From little acorns....!

As suggested, I for one shall be watching this space.

Carry on nursing

Newspapers are reporting today that nurses have been banned from wearing outfits showing “excessive cleavage” or too much leg. Coming on top of constant reports of poor hygiene among nurses and medical staff one has to ask what has gone wrong with the nursing profession. 

I confess that I found Susan Stephen sufficiently attractive in her regulation uniform without showing what was underneath but in my day, mystery had its own attraction. In my more advanced years I can also see that Joan Hickson, in her pre-Miss Marple days, had something about her in her starched apron and lace cap! Showing "excessive cleavage" would have been impossible in those regulation uniforms and the sight "too much leg" would certainly have been counter-balanced by the regulation black shoes nurses were obliged to wear. 

From 2013 nurses will need a degree in a move that is is "aimed at improving patient care". What absolute twaddle. That is an insult to the older generation of nurses who entered the profession with a vocation to nurse and care for the sick. I have not spoken to one State Registered Nurse who trained on the ward who thinks patient care has improved since the system was changed. More stories like this appear inevitable unless nurses carry on nursing as they used to.


Postscript

An interesting account from the Telegraph here. Some of the comments are as good if not better than the article in highlighting the problems faced. 

The NHS

As the Telegraph correctly predicted, yesterday the Health Secretary admitted at the dispatch box that his personal crusade to change the Health Service was having the brakes applied by the Prime Minister. While most questioners on the government benches did their valiant best to support Mr Lansley, the most interesting intervention came from Stephen Dorrell, tory Chairman of the all-party Health Select Committee with counter proposals reported here. 


The Government came badly unstuck when a BMA survey showed that doctors are "uncertain whether the benefits of the government's plans to reform the NHS in England outweigh the risks". When Liberal Democrats rebelled big changes were indicated. Others have now taken-up the fight including the campaigning group 38 Degrees encouraged by their success in the forestry sell-off campaign. 


Why Mr Lansley thinks that GPs are best placed to spend £80 billion of tax payers money because 'they know their patients' is a mystery after many have spent years getting as remote from patients as possible with nurse-led clinics and 'out-of-hours' care handed to God knows who.  As for patient choice, if Mr Lansley wants to base the case for change on his personal experience, his is unlikely to be mirrored by others. How many patients have sufficient independent advice to be able to make a judgement and if they do, would they want to upset their GP by claiming to know better? Personal experience suggests not.


There are problems in the NHS but there is no mandate from the electorate for the major changes being proposed. For most people the NHS, despite its failings, is amongst the best of what is left of Great Britain. If not signalled in party manifestos major changes should be made only with all party agreement not driven through as part of a personal crusade.
  

Parliamentary interference in the Christian faith

According to The Telegraph "A group of influential MPs will tomorrow call for Parliament to intervene over the historic reform as fears grow that the Church will reject plans allowing female bishops." For 'intervene' read 'interfere'. I am not surprised to see Sir Peter Bottomley involved. He lost my respect some time ago but I am disappointed to read that Frank Field has tabled an early day motion, which could abolish the Church's current exemption from equality laws relating to gender discrimination and ultimately force it to consecrate women.

Why is it that MPs tread so softly on the faith of Muslims yet when it comes the Church of England some see the Vicar as someone doing just another job in the workplace? Men and women are equal in the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church but not interchangeable. Faith in Christ's example, the tradition of the church and the overwhelming opinion of Christians is not discrimination. That is something manufactured by Women and the Church (WATCH) to suit their cause. MPs should know better.

Racial discrimination

To their great credit, I heard two prominent members of the Muslim community speak on the BBC 6 o'clock News about their disgust that Muslims could perpetrate the sexual predatory crimes currently in the news. This is in stark contrast to the report in The Telegraph that charities and agencies working with victims of sexual abuse have been accused of covering up the role of British Pakistani Muslims in sexually exploiting young white British girls.

Meanwhile The Independent reports today that according to the Coalition for the Removal of Pimping (Crop) "On-street grooming is a well-established, lucrative and successful method of coercion of young people that has been around for more than a decade. Part of the problem of discussing the practice was that some organisations were accused of racism when many of the alleged perpetrators of such child sexual exploitation turned out to be of Asian descent. 

Evil is evil. Holding-up the race card serves no-one, least of all children solicited for sex regardless of race, creed or colour.

Stung!

No doubt The Telegraph thought itself rather smart luring one of the few trusted politicians into a trap by sending undercover journalists to Vince Cable's surgery. Having had their bit of fun at Dr Cable's expense The Telegraph sought to close the matter by publishing a 'transcript' of the meeting. While some will be surprised at the Minister's candour, others will find it a refreshing change from the devious outpourings the public is used to hearing.

What The Telegraph didn't bargain on was a whistle blower who knew that the full facts had not been published. They left out the bit about Rupert Murdoch's News International proposed take-over of the satellite broadcaster BSkyB which he already partly owns and which The Telegraph, among others, opposes.

Many see the proposed take-over as an unwelcome concentration of media influence so the revelation may result in disappointment for them. While retaining his cabinet post as Business Secretary, Dr Cable has lost responsibility overseeing media, telecom and broadcasting companies to the now well known Jeremy Hunt the Culture Secretary who may find it difficult to follow Dr Cable's example. At least it should give the giggling 'reporters' something else to laugh about.

We were warned!

Back in 2008, the then Bishop of Rochester, the Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, created a bit of a stir when he claimed that "Islamic extremists have created "no-go" zones across Britain where it is too dangerous for non-Muslims to enter". Some agreed while others differed to the point of rubbishing his remarks, most notably the Muslim Council of Britain. From the evidence presented in a recent French TV broadcast, Bishop Nazir-Ali was correct in his warning.

Although I am not familiar with the London Borough of Tower Hamlets itself, I have no reason to think that the programme was biased. Other media coverage, particularly of the Mayoral election process, highlights worrying influences. More information can easily be found on the internet, including a reference to "the loathsome Andrew Gilligan" indicating the amount of politicking involved there. Manipulation for political advantage aside, the more one reads, the uglier it looks with echoes of the reference to taqiyya in the video highlighted in my previous post.

Bishop Nazir-Ali, the only Asian bishop in the Church of England, warned in The Telegraph "that attempts are being made to give Britain an increasingly Islamic character by introducing the call to prayer and wider use of Sharia law, a legal system based on the Koran." Looking around I see plenty of evidence to support his view from the now familiar Muslim dress and occupation of redundant churches and chapels to the defence of their faith at the cost of others. Is that a sign of our religious tolerance or our complacency?

Link (Note the first comment). Link2 (Blog) Link3 (Video)

“One Church, one Faith, one Lord”

In my youth, our church choir used to sing the last line of each verse of Thy hand, O God, has guided, with great gusto: “one Church, one Faith, one Lord”, lingering lovingly on those last words.

The fifth verse said much:

And we, shall we be faithless?
Shall hearts fail, hands hang down?
Shall we evade the conflict,
and cast away our crown?
Not so: in God’s deep counsels
some better thing is stored:
we will maintain unflinching,
one Church, one Faith, one Lord.

Rather than ‘maintain our church unflinching’, the Anglican church has become irrelevant to most British people except for rites of passage. Ecumenism has given way to inter-faith dialogue while Christians are persecuted abroad. Our tolerance has become our undoing. From The Telegraph: “In non-faith state schools, Christian assemblies are being dropped in favour of multi-faith worship, despite a legal requirement for Christian collective worship, and children are no longer taught the Lord's Prayer” according to an Ofsted report:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/7805772/Schools-failing-to-teach-children-the-core-beliefs-of-Christianity-says-Ofsted.html

Reports from Wales indicate that their politically obsessed Archbishop is to dine out in celebration of inter-faith dialogue "aimed at promoting understanding and tolerance across the country in the wake of international terrorism fears."

http://www.churchinwales.org.uk/dynamic/press_releases/display_press_release.php?prid=4955

Tolerance and understanding are fine but we are not all playing by the same rules. Christianity is being undermined in our own country.

In some predominately Muslim schools mentioning Jesus is now regarded as unacceptable. The God of Abraham has to be the same God for Jews, Christians and Muslim or there would be three gods so if “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” why do we deny that truth by not proclaiming the Christian message? As another hymn aptly puts it:

The Church’s one foundation
is Jesus Christ, her Lord;
she is his new creation’
by water and the word;
from heaven he came and sought her
to be his holy bride,
with his own blood he bought her,
and for her life he died.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Legendry101#p/a/F374EFA5EB9DCAD5/0/WtZ5JrDd8OE

Our church is dying while her leaders play politics. Faith needs to be nurtured; it is much more than a history lesson. Our ministers both sacred and secular must act quickly before it becomes no Church, no faith, one Lord.

Turn the Other Cheek David

While The Daily Telegraph continues to take its few pieces of silver for disclosing what it judges to be wrongdoing, there is news from The Guardian that David Laws could play an informal role in advising Danny Alexander who replaced him as Chief Secretary to the Treasury. Good news indeed putting our recovery above self and a good lesson for The Daily Telegraph as it continues to put profit above the stability of the coalition Government in its struggle to put the country back on its feet.

This solution was first suggested to me by an old friend after The Telegraph ran its story but I thought the notion too unlikely an outcome. The idea has many attractions not least for David Laws who has been considering whether to stand down as an MP. That would be disastrous not only for his supportive constituents but also for himself in losing a second chance of an input to the job he felt called to do.

If he goes the country will the loser. He made no profit from his financial arrangements, in fact the tax payer could have paid out more if other arrangements had been made, and he was not living in a partnership in the way the rules were drafted. As ever in this country people are so obsessed with what others do in the bedroom that they are blind to the important things in life.

David Law’s resignation speech was a model of integrity. If he can be persuaded to turn the other cheek and stay on as an advisor the slap would be felt by his accusers.

The Telegraph Fiddles while Britain Burns

How much more expenses poison will The Telegraph drip-feed in its attempt to kill off ministers and derail the coalition Government’s attempts to sort out our economic mess? Not satisfied with getting rid of possibly the best person for the job they are now after his successor. Who next? We must draw a line under the expenses saga.

If The Telegraph has evidence of wrong doing why have they held it back? We need to move on. If there are further stories which they think the public should know about, keep them until the economy is back on its feet. Then they can try to recoup the £110,000 they reportedly paid through a middle-man to the mole who illegally obtained the stolen data on MPs expenses.

Happy to profit from their stolen goods I heard one Telegraph columnist on Sky News suggest that they couldn’t not print a good story. Why? There are precedents, the Duke of Windsor’s affair and Churchill’s drinking to name but two. This is not to cover up wrong doing but to see the broader picture. We are at war with our financial crisis but the small minded in our midst continue to look at the minutia. Let’s have a sense of proportion please.

Bedroom Farce

Pity poor David Laws, the latest victim of British stone throwing.

He sacrificed a lucrative career as a city banker for public service. In doing so has become the latest victim of the Thatcher government’s MPs Expenses scheme. The rules were open to interpretation and many MPs have already paid the price. In a statement Laws said "At no point did I consider myself to be in breach of the rules which in 2009 defined partner as "one of a couple ... who although not married to each-other or civil partners are living together and treat each-other as spouses".

Those with the great British gift of hindsight are already screaming for his scalp but here is a man with a Cambridge double first in economics and top level experience in the financial sector who was admired on both sides of the House for the mastery of his brief in the Queen’s Speech debate. In a time of severe national crisis should we sacrifice a highly competent Chief Secretary in response to another journalistic scoop by The Telegraph over a technicality? If the same attitude had prevailed during the war no doubt Churchill would have been ousted.

Any doubt over the interpretation of the rules could have been sorted out by having a quiet word to resolve the matter without its sensationalist accompaniment. In their exposure The Daily Telegraph claimed that there was no intention to disclose Mr Laws' sexuality, but in a statement issued in response to questions from this newspaper, the minister chose to disclose this fact”. How very noble of them.

The wolves are now in full cry. From Times Online: “David Laws ‘should step aside as minister’ after claiming for rent paid to lover”. The innuendo is clear when in fact David Laws is paying the price for being the model of discretion in his private life. Contrast that with the overt lifestyles of US Bps Gene Robinson and Mary Glasspool who have rocked the Anglican Communion by the open celebration of their sexuality. What people do in the bedroom is a private matter. Leviticus and feminism are no substitute for the Gospel. If the church and the media grasped that message many would be spared unnecessary heartache.

Postscript

So David Laws has resigned with honour and humility, a lesson not just for the Telegraph but for us all:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/10191673.stm

Muslim Extremist Outrage

In The Telegraph today:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/7657600/Muslim-walks-free-as-court-told-Osama-bin-Laden-graffiti-not-religiously-motivated.html

It is intolerable that brave heroes who gave their lives for our freedom should have their memorial treated with such utter contempt. The freedom they died for was not to allow extremists to do as they please but that we should enjoy freedom from extremists.

If the law is inadequate it needs to be changed and quickly.