Skip to content

Archive site notice

You are viewing an archived copy of Christian Concern's website. Some features are disabled and pages may not display properly.

To view our current site, please visit christianconcern.com

In the News

  • Gatestone Institute: The Muslim Who Died Saving Christians
    April 23rd, 2017

    When a 25-year-old, known just as Riyanto, entered the Eben Haezer Church of Pentecostal Assembly in East Java on Christmas Eve of 2000, he did not know that his life was about to end. He had been aware, however, of the risk he was taking by being there altogether, particularly on Christmas Eve. As a member of the Banser -- the youth wing of Indonesia's largest Muslim cultural organization, the Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) -- he had already made the choice to sacrifice personal safety to protect Christians from falling prey to radical Islamists.

    Shortly after mass, as parishioners began to exit the Protestant house of worship, the reverend handed Riyanto and other guards at the entrance an unattended bag he had found among the pews. Looking inside the package and realizing that it contained a bomb, Riyanto took swift action. "Get down!" he called out to all those who were still inside the building.

    But Riyanto himself did not duck. Instead, he clutched the explosive tightly to his chest, in an effort to prevent mass casualties. Within seconds, Riyanto was blown to bits.

    Read more.

  • Mail: African and Asian church leaders threaten to defy Welby
    April 23rd, 2017

    Conservative Anglican archbishops from Africa and Asia are plotting to create a new 'missionary' bishop to lead traditionalists in the UK – after warning that the Church of England is becoming too liberal on homosexuality.

    The rebel archbishops are set to give the green light to the controversial plan at a crucial meeting in Africa this week in defiance of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby.

    Insiders said the move was the 'nuclear option' as it would represent a highly provocative intervention into the Church of England by foreign archbishops and a direct challenge to the authority of Archbishop Welby, who is nominal head of Anglicans worldwide.

    Read more.

  • Mail: The gay dads getting rich from rent-a-wombs
    April 22nd, 2017

    Britain's first 'gay dads', Barrie and Tony Drewitt-Barlow are not just charismatic advocates of same-sex marriage, but also of the often secretive world of surrogacy that allowed them to become parents.

    Since they began building their family – five children by an assortment of egg donors and surrogate mothers, with triplet daughters planned soon – they have become the industry's best known ambassadors.

    The men are blessed with money, looks and a loving relationship. They have used all three to place themselves at the heart of Britain's national debate about the legality and morality of this sensitive subject, the donation of eggs and the renting of a womb to create new life.

    Read more.

  • Mail: Jailed Muslim extremist Nadir Syed wins human rights case
    April 22nd, 2017

    A jailed jihadi was put in segregation for plotting to behead prison guards – but a judge has ruled that the move breached his human rights.

    Nadir Syed, 24, was placed in isolation at the top-security Woodhill jail after he led other Muslim inmates in chanting 'Allahu Akbar' ('God is Great'), banging on cell doors and threatening to decapitate warders.

    Documents seen by The Mail on Sunday reveal that staff were warned not to be left alone with him to 'prevent the risk of hostage-taking', while Syed had also claimed he would 'radicalise the whole unit' in another prison.

    Read more.

  • Premier: 'I gave my homosexuality to God'
    April 22nd, 2017

    As a young gay man, David Bennett believed Christianity stood in the way of progress. That was before he had his life transformed by an encounter with God inside a pub

    I grew up in Australia and had an amazing childhood with two wonderful parents. I was a very spiritually sensitive person; always asking the deeper questions of life. But I found the Christian world deeply uncompelling. Coming out at the age of 14 and facing the fact that I was exclusively attracted to men – the Church really signified a space that wasn't safe for me.

    I had relatives who had strong views on homosexuality and would say things that were disparaging. All I really saw was moral codes that I had to live up to – "you have to be this, in order to be accepted and loved by God". I thought, "I'm in this category of people that can't do that, and so I hate this religion because it deletes me out of existence."

    Read more.

  • BBC: Irish abortion law: Citizens Assembly vote favours change
    April 22nd, 2017

    A body set up advise the Irish government on constitutional change has voted to replace or amend the part of Ireland's Constitution which strictly limits the availability of abortion.

    Abortion is only legal in the Republic of Ireland if the mother's life is at risk.

    The Citizens' Assembly - made up of 99 members and a chairperson- voted in favour of the change on Saturday.

    Read more.

  • PinkNews: Education Secretary: Faith schools must find 'common ground' on LGBT issues
    April 22nd, 2017

    Education Secretary Justine Greening has said that "common ground" must be reached with faith schools on LGBT sex ed.

    The Education Secretary last month passed a bill to make SRE mandatory in all schools, after pressure on the issue from sexual health and children's campaign groups.

    She announced plans "to put Relationships and Sex Education on a statutory footing, so every child has access to age appropriate provision, in a consistent way".

    Read more.

  • Engadget: YouTube fixes Restricted Mode issue censoring LGBTQ+ videos
    April 22nd, 2017

    YouTube says it has fixed the issue that made Restricted Mode a bit too restrictive. The option was supposed to make the website more suitable for minors when switched on, but its older version also filtered out millions of harmless videos, including hundreds of thousands featuring LGBTQ+ themes. It affected Canadian indie pop duo Tegan & Sara's music videos, a recording of someone coming out to his grandmother and a lesbian couple's wedding vows, among numerous other perfectly wholesome content. People rightly called out YouTube, which apologized for what it said was a mistake its system made.

    While YouTube doesn't delve into the details of what it had to fix, it assures everyone it has already corrected whatever it was that was "incorrectly filtering videos for [the] feature." The team also manually reviewed a bunch of censored videos and will use them to train its algorithms. It took a while for the platform to address the problem, but as a result, Restricted Mode now has access to 12 million additional videos.

    Read more.

  • LifeNews: Government Official Demands Nuns Allow Abortion Clinic at New Maternity Hospital on Their Land
    April 21st, 2017

    The Irish Health Minister has called on an order of nuns to agree contracts allowing abortion and contraception in the new National Maternity Hospital being built on their land.

    Irish Health Minister Simon Harris has intervened in a row about ownership and control of the proposed new National Maternity Hospital in south Dublin where the new 300 million euro facility is planned next to St Vincent's Hospital.

    The decision by the government to "hand over" control of the new hospital to a religious order has caused a furore in the Irish press, and thousands have signed a petition opposing it. The outrage is centred around historic allegations of child abuse by the order, as well as fears that the nuns would prevent abortion and other practices contrary to Catholic teaching taking place on the premises.

    Read more.

  • Christian Medical Fellowship: New study threatens midwives' freedom of conscience on abortion
    April 21st, 2017

    In the latest bid to circumvent the increasing number of younger doctors being unwilling to perform abortions, a new report has challenged the need for some surgical abortions to be undertaken by doctors at all.

    Sally Sheldon, a Law Professor at the University of Kent, has published a study into the 1967 Abortion Act and subsequent legal opinions to argue that in the case of vacuum aspiration (VAs), midwives or nurses should be able to carry out the procedure.

    This, she argues is congruent with 'recognition of nurse competences, follows government policy that patients should receive the right care, in the right place at the right time by appropriately trained staff, fits with guidance offered by relevant professional bodies, and offers the potential for developing more streamlined, cost-effective abortion services'.

    Read more.