In the News

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who last year opened the door to nearly 1 million mostly Muslim migrants, staked out a tough new stance on conservative Islam on Tuesday by making her first direct call for a widespread ban on “full veil” religious coverings.

Her backing could add Germany to the growing list of European nations imposing restrictions on Islamic coverings as debates sharpen across the continent over religious tolerance, perceived threats to European identity and possible attacks by Islamists.

It also could signal a pragmatic shift to the right for Merkel, who is seeking a fourth term as Germany’s leader. In the wake of Britain’s vote to leave the European Union and the U.S. election of Donald Trump, the tolerant Merkel became seen as among the last guardians of liberal democracy in the West.

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Pro-life students at the University of Strathclyde have been making the media after their Students Union banned them from forming an official society.

Strathclyde Life Action have been struggling for official recognition for two years, and the University of Strathclyde Students Association (USSA) has now passed a motion banning "anti-choice groups", saying that they harass students and violate their "safe space".

The story has now been picked up by the BBC, the Times and other outlets. The Express ran with the headline University bans pro-life group as it would violate safe space of students with uteruses. 

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According to Bishop Philip North, writing in last week’s Church Times, the poor might hear the Church’s good news (not defined) when their voice is heard by the Church and amplified in the nation. Sadly, though, the Church hasn’t been listening, and so was surprised, even appalled and embarrassed when the poor finally spoke up and expressed their frustrations and aspirations by voting for Brexit.

Working class identity and focus revolves around family, place and work, says the Bishop. The educated middle classes who make up most of the C of E’s leadership take work for granted, are embarrassed by patriotism, and individualistic rather than family or community-oriented. The Church’s obsession with the sexuality debate is not the agenda of the poor. The solution is for the Church to re-engage with the neglected sectors of society, by setting up and revitalising churches on council estates with “the best leaders”, and put listening to the urban poor at the centre of its mission strategy. 

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In vitro fertilization is becoming an increasingly controversial fertility procedure because of its treatment of human life in its earliest form.

In the past decade, couples experiencing infertility or waiting until later in life to get pregnant have increasingly turned to IVF to conceive. The procedure involves harvesting sperm and eggs and using them to create living human embryos outside the womb; the embryos then are frozen or implanted in the woman’s womb.

While Catholics and others oppose the method itself because it creates human life outside of its natural setting, the key concern among most pro-lifers is the destruction of human embryos that are left over from IVF.

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