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NEWS
Common Worship: Daily Prayer is best-selling ‘liturgical book’ after the Bible Archbishop of Canterbury to visit Rome Churches welcome VAT scheme extension and expansion This month’s PODCAST HIV/AIDS – do you know of any initiatives in your area? Alpha Course as popular as ever Christianity and Islam - religions of peace? Methodist Church backs call for right to clean water Traidcraft collects top social reporting award Archbishop - faith schools provide essential education Christian Resources Exhibition held at Esher this month Take action to stop sex trafficking, urge Methodists Poll shows widespread support for Church Schools Church of England opens virtual door on its documentary heritage
Common Worship: Daily Prayer is best-selling ‘liturgical book’ after the Bible Daily Prayer, part of the Common Worship series, was the top liturgical book in the UK in 2005 and came within the year’s top 15 biggest selling religious books.
Archbishop of Canterbury to visit Rome The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, is to visit His Holiness Pope Benedict XVIth in Rome later this year. The visit will mark the 40th anniversary of Archbishop Michael Ramsey's meeting with Pope Paul VIth in 1966 and the founding of the Anglican Centre in Rome in the same year.
Dr Williams met the Holy Father's predecessor, Pope John Paul II, in the autumn of 2003; he travelled to Rome in April 2005 for the funeral of Pope John Paul II and returned for the Inaugural Mass of his successor.
Churches welcome VAT scheme extension and expansion The Church of England has warmly welcomed Gordon Brown’s announcement to substantially expand the scope of the Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme and extend its operation for a further three years until 2010-11. The move will save churches millions of pounds on the cost of major repair and maintenance work.
This month’s PODCAST You can now hear about Prison Chaplaincy in the Urals, the latest on the aftermath of last year's earthquake in Pakistan, and the new Fresh Expressions DVD. Listen to the podcast at: http://www.methodist.org.uk/index.cfm?fuseaction=news.webradio You can also arrange to have the podcast downloaded automatically each month if you have iTunes or similar 'podcasting' software on your computer.
HIV/AIDS – do you know of any initiatives in your area? The URC/Methodist HIV/AIDS Working Group needs your help in identifying projects and groups around the country, not necessarily Christian initiatives, which are supporting people with HIV/AIDS and raising awareness of the issues.
The group would also like to hear from churches with a particular link with an overseas or local project involved in HIV/AIDS work.
The idea is to build a national picture of local initiatives in HIV/AIDS work so that people can find out more easily what's happening in their local community. E-mail Steve Penrose, London's HIV Community Chaplain: mailto:hivchap@btopenworld.com with your local information.
Alpha Course as popular as ever Alpha Course take-up continues to increase, according to the latest research of Alpha courses just carried out by Christian Research. The number attending courses in the UK during 2005 went up by four percent to 182,000. Nearly two million people have now done the course.
There is also encouraging take-up of courses for established Christians from organisations like York Courses who estimate that up to 50,000 people use their materials each year. Their website is http://www.yorkcourses.co.uk
Christianity and Islam - religions of peace? The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, has said that the claims of both Christianity and Islam to be religions of peace need to be demonstrated through practical trust.
Addressing the Sudan Inter-Religious Council in Khartoum recently, Dr Williams said that trust was essential when people with different views had to work together for peace. Both religions, he said, pointed to peace with God as a necessary starting point.
"To be at peace with God means knowing that we do not have to strive all the time for power over each other". He warned that trust had to be built: "Among these things which most stand in the way of peace is the suspicion that comes from the way people exercise power; when power is shared then trust is built."
Dr Williams said that Sudan's own situation pointed to being honest with one another; to face their failings, to listen to one another's fears. "So peace comes when we are at peace with God; we are at peace with God when we face our failings with honesty, we are at peace with one another when we share our power and resources…”
Methodist Church backs call for right to clean water The world is facing a growing water crisis, with one billion people currently lacking access to safe, clean and sufficient water. Annually over 1.4 million children - more than the population of Birmingham and Newcastle combined - die of diseases caused by unclean drinking water.
At the same time, economic growth is often dependent on increasing the availability of water to agriculture and industry. And so, as the 4th World Water Forum (WWF) was recently convened in Mexico, the Methodist Church warned that the need for a safe, reliable water supply for everyone is one of the major issues of our time.
An initiative of the World Water Council, the WWF forum brings together a variety of organisations, including water companies, water engineers, academics, NGOs and various United Nations agencies, all seeking to influence water policy at a global level.
Key issues addressed this year were access to water in rural communities and the privatisation of water in developing countries.
Traidcraft collects top social reporting award Christian-based Traidcraft’s approach to social reporting has earned top honours in the prestigious 2005 ACCA UK Sustainability Awards.
In a 22-strong field which included some of the biggest names in the City, industry, the public sector and the media, Traidcraft plc collected the award for the best social report - the fourth year in succession its name has appeared on the trophy list.
“After three years in which we have been joint runner-up, joint winner and sole runner-up respectively, it is wonderful to be sole winner of the award at last,” said Traidcraft chief executive Paul Chandler.
Archbishop - faith schools provide essential education The Archbishop of Canterbury has launched a strong defence of faith schools as helping to provide the 'broadest possible access to ideas' for young minds.
In a speech given at the recent National Church Schools Conference in London, Dr Williams argued that faith schools offer an essential contribution to the development of strong and integrated communities. He rejected accusations that they encourage divisiveness, exclusivity and irrationality.
Rejecting the misconception that faith schools offer mostly middle class families an alternative to paying for private education, Dr Williams says that the Church of England educates children from a diversity of social backgrounds and regularly provides a faith based education for those living in deprived areas:
"The often-forgotten fact that church schools are the main educational presences in some of our most deprived communities means that it simply cannot be said that these schools somehow have a policy of sanitising or segregating."
Dr Williams also believes that an avowedly secularist approach to the provision of public education has serious implications for good community relations in the future:
Christian Resources Exhibition held at Esher this month The National Christian Resources Exhibition returns to Sandown Park this month (9 to 12 May) with several new features - and a special focus on mission.
‘The Sharing Show – Good News and how to give it away’ will introduce visitors to a wide range of mission projects impacting church, family life, community and the workplace.
Other features at this year’s CRE include:
* The Da Vinci Code - Cracking or Cracked? A special debate, hosted by Ruth Gledhill of The Times, on the significance of Dan Brown’s ‘religious’ blockbuster
* UK Christian Book Awards - presented by Northern Ireland’s former political leader, David Trimble with an informal interview with author Jonathan Aitken
* Worship 2020 - an innovative, futuristic service with an international congregation taking part via the web
The National CRE 2006 will be officially opened by Bible teacher, author Jeff Lucas who will also give keynote talks each day.
The event will bring together some 350 suppliers, charities and missions under one roof. Dozens of seminars and presentations will help churches and individuals to be more effective in their ministry. More information - www.creonline.co.uk
Take action to stop sex trafficking Sex trafficking, where women and children are forced or coerced into prostitution, is one of the most tragic and alarming products of today's society. Each year several hundred thousand women are trafficked across Europe.
In their Social Action Project, the Women's Network of the Methodist Church is now calling for people throughout the Methodist Church in the UK to take action against this modern-day slavery.
A major resource pack, designed to support this project, draws together a variety of different resources from organisations such as Amnesty International and the Conference of European Churches as well as three practical action guides produced by the Women's Network.
The aim of the pack is to support individuals and groups as they campaign through letter writing and other means to urge the government to sign up to the European Convention on Human Trafficking which will encourage the government to do more for victims of trafficking.
The practical action guides also highlight concerns about the creation of temporary brothels for the 2006 Football World Cup in Germany. Many foreign sex workers are expected to arrive for the tournament. Some will be victims of forced prostitution or of people trafficking. A key objective of this pack is to discourage those attending the World Cup from visiting brothels. You can sign a petition opposing the prostitution of women during the World Cup at the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women website http://www.catwinternational.org
The Trafficking resource pack is available from The Women' Network Office, Methodist Church House 25 Marylebone Road London NW1 5JR Tel: 0207 467 5175. Price £10.00 + P&P £3.20. E-mail: mailto:womens.network@methodistchurch.org.uk
Poll shows widespread support for Church Schools Seven out of ten people believe that Church of England schools play a positive role in educating the nation’s children, according to a poll by researchers ORB released last month.
Further research, by the National Institute for Christian Research Education, points to the ‘added value’ that Church schools offer their students and to the diversity of their learner populations.
Support for inclusive schools run with a Christian ethos remains widespread across all areas of the country and across different economic groups, with 74 per cent of respondents from rural areas supporting Church schools, and similarly high figures of 69 and 77 per cent of those surveyed from areas with predominantly Local Authority housing and separate towns respectively.
Figures also demonstrate a positive view of Church schools within other faith communities, with 62 per cent of respondents from non-Christian faith groups agreeing that Church of England schools have a positive role in society.
Church of England opens virtual door on its documentary heritage Information on the rich documentary heritage of the Church of England is now only a click away with the launch of a dedicated Libraries and Archives section on the Church of England's popular website.
Information about Lambeth Palace Library, the Church of England Record Centre and the Library of the Cathedral and Church Buildings Division, as well as links to the major ecclesiastical libraries and archives throughout England, have been brought together in the new section, creating a single portal to the documentary heritage of the Church of England.
While many of these libraries and archives have run their own websites for some time, only now can users visit a central starting point, appropriately hosted on the Church's main website that currently handles an average of more than 20,000 requests for pages of information each day.
Information on how to access a diverse range of material - from medieval texts such as the 12th century Lambeth Bible, through to documents on church architecture, or the history of free education in England - can all be accessed via the new section.
"I hope that these pages will provide a gateway to the many and varied collections in the Church," said Declan Kelly, Director of Libraries, Archives and Information services. The new section is available at: http://www.cofe.anglican.org/about/librariesandarchives.
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