The difference between expenditure and investment - and which the Church should cut

One of the central planks of New Labour thinking which led to its election in 1997 was that public services had been starved of investment, and that situation should be put right. What has happened since has been the confusion of expenditure and investment. Building and staffing a new hospital is undoubtedly investment. Giving staff a good pay rise is debatable. Flushing billions down the toilet on a failed IT system is simply expenditure. What we've seen in the public sector is massive increases in expenditure, but questionable return on investment by way of increased productivity. The lesson is not to confuse investment with expenditure and to ruthlessly control expenditure, whilst maximising investment.

So we turn to the good old CofE. The church has been hit just as much as anyone else by the recession. The Church Commissioners have managed to lose £1.3bn of the Church's investments, whilst the new pensions scheme, set up in 1998 to stem the bleeding from the old scheme, has also managed to lose a quarter of its value. Diocese across the country are struggling to deal with budget deficits, and some are resorting to cutting ministerial roles.

The Times published an article on Saturday highlighting the problem, including that of rural parishes which are increasingly asked to get by with a single ordained member of the clergy covering multiple parishes through united benefices. Whilst some argue that this is due to a lack of ordinands, this seems to Mouse merely coincidental if they cannot be paid for in the first place. (The Ugley Vicar has a good discussion on the topic).

And this creates real tough choices. What do we cut. Winchester Diocese has taken some flack for their decision to cut the role of University Chaplain to Southampton University out of their £12m budget. 24,000 students will now have no pastoral provision from the Church of England.

This cuts right to the heart of what builds the church. Mouse would draw the analogy of a company who cut out their sales and marketing budget in an attempt to make the budget balance. That will undoubtedly balance the books in the first year. Loyal customers will probably stay for some time. But without investment in sales and marketing, the company is ultimately doomed to failure, as it has given up on winning new customers.

So what is the answer? Mouse has a little suggestion.

Mouse's theory starts with the position that investments have a payback. Whilst the church does not like to talk about such grubby things as money when deciding on ministry provision, it is an important part of the equation. In this context it means that when putting a minister into a role, part of that is to grow the church in that context, and this will lead to a congregation which will give.

So the answer is simple. A Church Growth Fund should be established which pays for specific roles, for specific periods of time. Those roles have specific objectives to establish the church in areas where it is currently weak. These roles would be self funding in a few years, but would reduce the burden on Diocese in these difficult times who are currently providing clergy to simply man the alter once every few weeks, with no real hope of effective parish ministry. The source of funds for this could be from a number of places, but the Church Commissioners should take a big share of it.

The other side of the equation, of course, is for everyone else to pick up the church growth agenda. If all parishes were really focused on mission and were able to grow the church overall by any noticeable amount financial worries would disappear.

Nick Griffin to represent the EU at Copenhagen climate conference

Mouse cannot think of an individual less suited to the job. Really. Not a single person on the planet less suited to this role.

Nick Griffin, leader of the racist British National Party, believes that climate change is "essentially a hoax" and a "global marxist conspiracy". The idea of Nick Griffin representing Europe on anything is pretty upsetting. Whilst he was democratically elected to represent a slice of Britain in Europe we can't avoid his presence on the political scene for the time being, but for him to be part of a delegation at the UN Climate Conference at Copenhagen in December representing the European Parliament really is a joke.

Griffin has got himself onto the European Parliament's Environment Committee, and so will be at the conference in that capacity. In reality there's nothing really to worry about. He won't have the right to speak at the conference, and the European Parliament's presence at the conference is really not much more than symbolic.

And it is this whole situation that shows up the European Parliament. It has absolutely no authority at the conference, so cannot do much more than sit on the side-lines and try to look like they're there for a reason. The fact that people like Griffin get themselves involved in these things shows just how undemocratic the whole thing is. He really doesn't represent any significant slice of public opinion either in Britain or across Europe on this issue.

The whole affair is completely unsatisfactory.

Do faith schools divide? Lets see what Ofsted say

The Church of England is absolutely chuffed to bits with a report it commissioned into faith schools and community cohesion. The headline finding from Professor David Jesson from York University is that faith schools are better at it than other schools.

This has been a bit of a problem for those who argue that faith schools are socially divisive. Not surprisingly, therefore the British Humanist Association, who campaign against the involvement of any religious organisation in education, and Ekklesia, who oppose faith based admissions criteria, both rushed out responses arguing that the report doesn't actually prove anything, and that faith based selection criteria make everything else irrelevant.

So, lets look at the report and see what it really says. The approach taken is simply to review the findings from the Ofted inspectors who are now required to evaluate schools on their contribution to community cohesion based on three criteria:

• teaching, learning and curriculum – promoting common values and understanding
• equity and excellence – ensuring equal opportunities for all
• engagement and ethos – promoting meaningful interactions between people from different backgrounds.

The study looks at the Ofsted reports for around 700 primary schools and 400 secondary schools. For primary schools the average scores were exactly the same for CofE schools, other faith schools and community schools. For secondary schools, however, the average score for faith schools was notably higher than for community and foundation schools.

The report concludes:

For secondary schools, however, there is clear evidence that Faith schools are awarded substantially higher inspection gradings on this characteristic than Community schools. Faith school grades are similar to those in Foundation schools, but with no Faith schools being graded 'inadequate'.

This finding is particularly relevant to the debate about schools' contribution to community cohesion - and runs completely counter to those who have argued that because Faith schools have a distinctive culture reflecting their Faith orientation and are responsible for their admissions that they are 'divisive' and so are so [sic] contribute to greater segregation amongst their communities. This is clearly not supported by the most recent Ofsted inspection evidence reported here.

The report goes on to look at how Ofsted rated the schools on how well they promote equality of opportunity and eliminate discrimination. Once again it is the faith schools which come out on top.

The argument being used by the BHA is that the Ofsted criteria are inadequate. Andrew Copson from the BHA said, "The study ignores that, as a result of admissions policies based on religious discrimination, faith schools have a much greater need to promote community cohesion than others with a wider intake. As a result, faith schools get rewarded for holding exchanges with other faith schools whereas community schools by their non-selective intakes have pupils from different backgrounds who therefore learn from and about each other by their daily interaction without the need for special steps."

Similarly Ekklesia say that the report does not show that faith schools promote community cohesion, but "gives church schools credit for the extra work they have to do as a result of their religiously restrictive admissions policies."

These arguments that faith schools have a greater need to promote community cohesion sound to Mouse like a pretty big piece of speculation. The Ofsted criteria is to promote 'meaningful interactions between people of different backgrounds'. It is up to the Ofsted inspectors to determine whether this is happening. Just as it is true that a school with a very uniform intake may have to work hard to demonstrate this criteria, it is also true that a school with a mixed intake may itself be deeply divided. It is the job of the Ofsted inspectors to work out whether the school is fulfilling its obligations, and it seems wrong to imply that they have been hoodwinked by faith schools on this issue.

For Mouse, this report confirms his view that schools based on clear values and which actively live out those values are effective in promoting community cohesion.

Mouse would conclude with a final piece of advice for the good old CofE on this issue. In his experience it is a fallacy that faith schools have a highly uniform intake. Whilst there is clearly a greater proportion of children from Christian families in church schools, for example, they also tend to have a strong ethos of serving the local community, and often have a high proportion of children with special educational needs. Perhaps another myth could be debunked by doing some research to find the facts in this area.

80,000 come back to church - so what?

Mouse was rather luke warm on the idea of Back to Church Sunday when it was coming round in September. The main reason for this was that there is no point inviting people back if you haven't dealt with the reasons why the left in the first place. However, Mouse was very keen on the idea of a collective effort to grow the church.

And so it now seems that Back to Church Sunday has been a pretty stunning success. 83,000 people came to church as a result of an invite, of which 53,000 came to Anglican churches. This was achieved with just 20% of Church of England parishes taking part in the initiative.

Now lest just work out the impact of that.

Figures from 2007 showed that 12-15% of those who returned during the initiative became regular worshippers. The Church's press release takes 12% as a 'conservative' estimate, but Mouse would be rather more prudent in his estimates - say 5-10%. So for the Church of England that means around 5-10,000 more regular worshippers.

Not bad going when everyone around is talking about the decline of the Church of England.

Mouse remains of the opinion that this is merely a drop in the ocean of what could be achieved with concerted effort and focus over a period of time (years, not weeks or months). These numbers should be seen as a reason to really push the evangelism and church growth agenda.

Introducing the micro-blogging bishops

After Bishop Tom Wright's comments on social media and blogging, Mouse thought he'd counter-balance things by highlighting the rather more innovative micro-blogging from the Bristol Diocese.

Mike Hill, Bishop of Bristol, joined Twitter a little while ago, and has been joined by Lee Rayfield, Bishop of Swindon. However, what's a little more innovative is they way they have introduced 'micro-blogging' to their Diocesan website. Mouse had heard that this was on its way, but suspects a low key launch has kept it off his radar.

Both Bishops post regular short posts. Mouse is sure their style will develop with time. Personally Mouse finds the website a little tricky to navigate round, but since he uses Google Reader to aggregate his feeds, that doesn't really matter. However, if you visit blogs directly you may find this one a little less user-friendly than a traditional blog platform.

While Mouse is on the subject of blogging Bishops, Mouse should also bring Bishop David Hamid's Eurobishop blog to his readers' attention. Its another excellent read. Bishop David is the Church of England's Bishop of Europe - yes, the Church of England really does have a Diocese in Europe.

Swine flu advice - back to normal

The Archbishops have issued updated advice on swine flu, which basically says they recommend returning to normal with the administration of communion. Mouse suspects most people got there ahead of the Archbishops.

Dear Bishop,

In July, during the first wave of the Swine Flu pandemic we issued national advice with regard to the administration of Holy Communion.

This advice was based on information and guidance received from the Department of Health which was geared to the situation at that time and the projected levels of risk suggested by the potential course of the pandemic. Since then the scientific understanding of the Swine Flu virus has advanced, further experience of the course of the epidemic has been gained, and the first stage of a vaccination programme, targeted at those most at risk from the virus, is nearing completion.

Throughout this period, our advice has been driven by the interests of public health, particularly for the protection of the vulnerable.

In the light of continuing consultation with the Department of Health, and with updated information on the course of the Swine Flu pandemic, we believe that we can now advise that the normal administration of Holy Communion ought to resume. This recommendation is subject to the guidelines issued in June which set out good hygiene practice for public worship and which allows for local discretion in the event of outbreaks of pandemic flu in particular centres of population. We shall also continue to monitor the situation.

We wish to thank you for your patience and cooperation during this challenging period for both Church and Community. We are thankful that the pandemic has so far proved less severe than was feared.

Please pass this on to your colleagues in the diocese.

With every blessing,

+Rowan Cantuar +Sentamu Ebor

Friday round up

Here's my round up from the blogosphere. Ten of the best from the blogs this week.

1. Eurobishop David Hamid on how good relations are with the Catholic Church

2. Clayboy is pretty sceptical about Jesus' trip to Glastonbury

3. Tall Skinny Kiwi is made redundant by CMS - will there be anyone left there?

4. The Benedictine Nuns of East Hendred get political

5. David Keen on the Back to Church Sunday stats

6. Mike Peat on assumptions made about clergymen

7. Greenbelt Blog plugs Esquire Magazine

8. Catherine Meyer on lessons from the Baha'i on keeping the faith whilst remaining unjudging

9. The Beaker Folk of Husbourne Crawley on the poor history quoted about Stonehenge

10. Phil Ritchie on a paperless Christmas

Massive Hindu animal sacrifice in Nepal

Mouse feels rather naive at not realising that this sort of thing goes on. He was rather surprised to read that a Hindu festival in Nepal slaughtered 15,000 buffalo and 'countless' goats and birds. The festival, in honour of Gadhimai, the goddess for power, takes place every five years. This latest slaughter was condemned by animal rights activists, including Brigette Bardot.

"It is a tradition and people's faith. How can any protests stop that," asked Mangal Chaudhary, chief priest of the temple, adding there were no protests.

H/T FaithWorld

Obama and Hu to go to Copenhagen

Mouse is chuffed to bits to hear that President Obama and President Hu Jintao of China are both to attend the UN Climate Change Conference at Copenhagen. The presence of these two is sure to draw out any remaining laggards who will get a domestic PR boost simply from being in the same room as them.

President Obama looks set to sign up to carbon cuts, and the possibility of a really meaningful deal is rising by the day. It is still imperative that pressure is kept up on all world leaders, as nothing is definite yet. But we can campaign with a great sense of hope.

Archbishop Nichols and the Hindu gods

Damian Thompson is not impressed that the Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, and leader of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, has offered flowers to Hindu deities during Inter-Faith Week.

It seems that the Archbishop was visiting a Hindu temple as part of Inter Faith Week, and during his visit his press office say,

Yogvivek Swami guided the Archbishop around the Mandir complex, including the sanctum sanctorum where the Archbishop offered flowers at the altar to the deities. He then moved to the deity of Shri Nilkanth Varni (Bhagwan Swaminarayan) where he joined Yogvivek Swami in praying for world peace and harmony.

Interesting. Thompson thinks this is a blunder, and Mouse has some sympathy with that view. Mouse is generally impressed by Archbishop Nichols, but this sounds dangerously close to the veneration of pagan gods, which of course the Archbishop would not do and does not believe in. It is probably just sloppy wording from the press office that has caused this, however.

For Mouse this comment points to some of the issues when dealing with other faiths. The Archbishop has left himself open to criticism that he may appear to be 'going soft' on his own faith when he relates to another. This is totally unfair, and Mouse hopes this will not impact on Archbishop Nichols' work in this area. To be honest, Mouse is sure it won't have the slightest impact, and is glad about that.

NT Wright on 'cultural masturbation' - blogging & social media!

There's actually not much new to Bishop Tom Wright's comments in this video clip. Although the rather startling phrase 'cultural masturbation' is bound to grab attention and provoke a reaction, what he's really saying is that it would be worrying if people spent all their time blogging and if that was the only social contact people had.

One minor point that Mouse noted was that he comments that blogs might help people if they pointed to good books to read. No mention of the danger of spending all your time reading books in isolation without engaging with 'real warm blooded hugable people'.

Mouse's view on all this is that there have always been people who spend lots of time alone, either through choice, or because they struggle with relationships. It is not blogging or social media that creates this situation.

On the wider point, Mouse will simply say that it sounds rather like a generational difference. Mouse blogged on the concept of Digital Natives, and the idea that young people now are not just familiar with social media, but have grown up since their earliest memories using the technology, and cannot imagine living without it. Social media supplement 'real' relationships, rather than replacing them, and blogs are .... well, great.

NT Wright on Blogging/Social Media from Bill Kinnon on Vimeo.

H/T Onehandclapping

Oh dear - morons threaten vicar if his parish goes to Rome

Damian Thompson recites, perhaps with just a little relish, how the vicar of an Anglo-Catholic church has been threatened with violence, should his parish convert to the Catholic Church. St Saviour's, Walthamstow, is a Forward in Faith parish, which does not accept women priests, and Fr David is seriously considering the Pope's offer of a new home. Fr David Waller also found the noticeboard of St Saviour's daubed with 'CofE No Pope'.

Mouse despairs that morons of this order exist. However, it seems they do so we have to figure out how to respond. From the report it sounds like the threat of violence was a drunken answerphone message, and it is highly likely that the graffiti was done by the same idiots. Surely the only worthy response it not to take this incident seriously, as Thompson and others have, but to put it down to childish stupidity.

The broader issue is that we should treat the whole issue of whether to leave the Anglican Church to join the Catholic Church not as some kind of land grab by the Pope, not as some kind of power-play and not as a bitter falling apart of the church. We should look at it, as Rowan Williams has tried to lead us, as simply a way for people to find a place to worship in the way they feel called to do.

Copenhagen and climate change conspiracy theories

Iain Dale has brought to a slightly wider audience the story doing the rounds on some blogs about leaked emails from the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit (known as the CRU emails). It is not entirely clear whether these emails have been leaked or hacked, but the result has been a bit of a storm either way.

The central accusation is that these emails reveal that scientific evidence central to the climate change consensus has either been faked, or that it is weak and has been presented as fact when there are holes in the data. Devil's Kitchen gives the emails a pretty thorough exam.

This couldn't come at a more important time, as increasing numbers of world leaders agree to attend in person for the UN Conference on Climate Change at Copenhagen. It is hoped that world leaders will reach an agreement at Copenhagen as a successor to the Kyoto protocol which will, in effect, become a solution to climate change. The stakes are enormous.

Mouse's view is that these emails prove nothing. They are so complex that only a handful of scientists could actually attempt to explain them. And they have already done so, by publishing papers setting out their views on climate change. The discussion around these emails that they are a smoking gun remind Mouse of moon landing conspiracy theories which have numerous 'smoking guns'. They point to flaws in the photos from the moon, which are simply the misunderstandings of amateur scientists, for example.

Just like moon landing conspiracy theories, for climate change science to be bogus would require scientific fraud on a gargantuan scale. If it were all bogus, these hacked emails would not be the only available evidence. It is simply not conceivable that it is all a great big conspiracy, not least because there is absolutely no-one who benefits from this. The climate change sceptics argue that the scientific community benefits from increased funding. All Mouse can say is what absolute rot. They would be much better paid if they worked for polluting companies who pay their scientists well to produce contrary evidence.

So, Mouse's view is that we don't take guff about these emails any more seriously than we take those loonies who think the US government organised 9/11.

On the other hand, the looming catastrophe which will destroy the lives of millions of people, according to the consensus view of the scientific community and almost all governments world-wide, really should be taken seriously.

Mouse argued some time ago that a single common platform would be the best way to apply pressure on world leaders to reach a credible deal in Copenhagen. It now seems that The Wave is becoming that focal point, so please check it out. Mouse will blog on The Wave a little nearer the time.

Thierry Henry and the ethics of our times

Those of you who do not follow football may just need a word of explanation on this one before Mouse gets going. Last week Ireland were playing France in a play-off to decide which of the teams would go to the next world cup. The match was all square when, deep into extra time, Thierry Henry handled the ball to control it and set up the winning goal.

Naturally there was pretty universal outrage.

Henry immediately admitted that he handled the ball, but did not quite seem to go as far as to admit that he actually did anything wrong. His defence seems to have been that although he did not handle the ball, it is up to the referee to decide whether to blow the whistle or not, and so it is not cheating if he continues playing on. His reaction when asked whether he considered stopping and telling the referee that he handled the ball was, 'You're very funny'.

Mouse will leave it up to you to decide whether you think Henry should have stopped and explained to the referee that he handled the ball, or whether he is justified in celebrating France's victory with a clear conscience.

For Mouse's part, he's rather sad that Henry's approach seems to be the dominant approach in the world today. Matt Dawson, a world cup winner with England's rugby team, said that Henry had done “what any professional sportsperson would have done in his position”. Mouse's view is that the morality that says 'winning is everything' and accepts whatever you can get away with to get whatever you want is ultimately very destructive.

Should we have an affordable Christmas or a generous one?

Mouse notes a slightly contradictory message going out from Christians this year. The good old CofE is obviously worried about people feeling the pressure for lavish celebrations and getting themselves into financial difficulties. In response, it is urging an 'affordable Christmas', along with a Christmas present budget planner. Probably right, but rather dull.

Greenbelt, however, are encouraging a generous Christmas. Sounds much more fun. They provide podcasts and links to lots of places where your generosity would be most joyfully received.

Mouse suspects a bit of both is sensible this year.

You know the Archbishop of Canterbury has played a blinder when ...

Mouse was impressed by Rowan Williams' speech in Rome earlier in the week. Yes, it was done in Rowan's own way, couched in academic terms and with complex and subtle trains of thought. However, the central thrust was direct and hard hitting. For a full account of what he said, Mouse recommends Ruth Gledhill.

Mouse will only add the following to the analysis already out there:

1) Riazat Butt in the Guardian notes that Rowan appeared nervous, biting his finger awkwardly whilst listening to other speakers. This shows that he had no intention of ducking away from saying it how it is

2) Praise for the speech has been almost universal, and includes some from people who do not regularly offer that to Rowan - Archbishop Cranmer and The Ugley Vicar are notable examples.

Mouse has been praising Rowan in increasing measure recently, and we may well look back and remember Rowan Williams as the Archbishop who led the Anglican Communion through one of the most difficult times in its history, and lived to tell the tale.

Parents of 'Humanist Billboard' children are Pentecostals

Ruth Gledhill has the rather delicious scoop. The posters erected by the British Humanist Association as part of a campaign ostensibly against labelling children, show two rather happy looking children. Presumably the imagery is intended to show how joyful children can be when they are free of labels and from the pernicious intervention of Christians who brainwash children and don't let them make their own decisions.

The parents of Charlotte and Ollie Mason, however, may beg to differ. As members of New Frontiers church, Mouse is sure they have every intention of bringing up their children to know and love God.

It means nothing, of course, that these children's parents are Christians. The humanists would be the first to should 'I told you so' if anyone was to write that they were 'Christian' children. That would rather prove their point. They, like everyone else, must make up their own minds what to believe.

However it is rather funny. Ruth Gledhill offers up the rather lovely image of Richard Dawkins trawling the internet for picture of children who look happy enough that they couldn't possibly be churchgoers.

Update: The BHA has responded to the criticism of the billboards. They must be rattled.

Friday round up

Here's my round up from the blogosphere. Ten of the best from the blogs this week.

1. Phil Groom on the future of Christian bookshops in the UK

2. Bishop David Thomson on Copenhagen and climate change

3. Anna Drew wonders whether she's failed the feminist test

4. Dizzy reckons Twitter is only used by Guardian reading liberals (surely Mouse's readers wouldn't fall into that category)

5. Cranmer on the most wanted Twitterers from history (Churchill in first place, Jesus in second)

6. Mike Peat on world toilet day

7. The Beaker Folk of Husborne Crawley provide some advice to Anglican's who have difficult decisions to make

8. The Ugley Vicar on Anglicans, Anglican'ts and Anglicuckoos

9. Thinking Anglicans on Rowan Williams in Rome

10. Bishop Nick Baines on Thought For Today and the Humanist Billboards

Update on the blog police story

The story that the new chairman of the Press Complaints Commission was considering extending the organisation's remit to include the regulation of blogs caused quite a stir.

Pretty much every blogger who posted it was outraged at the idea, and added in a fair amount of mockery that the remit would need to include discussion boards and comments threads as well to have any meaning whatsoever. Liberal Conspiracy took it seriously enough to draft up a letter of complaint ready for circulation around the blogosphere and distribution to the government.

However, Guido took a different approach. He checked the story. What followed was a denial, claims of a misquote, and much gloating from Guido that he saw through the guff when everyone else bought it.

Mouse is not so sure, however. It looks to Mouse like a classic politician backtracking, rather than a straightforward misquote. At no point is Baroness Buscombe claiming she was mis-quoted. Instead she is claiming that her comments were taken out of context. At no point has she denied that she would like to extend the PCC's remit to cover blogs, which was the central point which everyone was objecting to. Instead she is claiming that she was talking about a voluntary code. Lets not forget that she was speaking privately to Ian Burrell at the time, so we'll never know precisely what was said.

Mouse wonders whether this is a classic case of a politician (and Baroness Buscombe is primarily just that) testing out a policy, then backtracking when its unpopular. It would hardly be the first time, would it.

After the atheist bus its now the humanist billboard

Doesn't quite have the same ring, does it. The people behind the atheist bus campaign have used the spare cash left over from their dramatically better than expected fund-raising to put new billboards up around Britain.

This campaign, now bearing the banner of the British Humanist Association, carries a picture of two children, with various faiths and belief systems in light text in the background. The caption reads, 'Please don't label me. Let me grow up and choose for myself.'

The BHA proudly trumpet the billboards, timed to coincide with Universal Children's Day on 20 November and appear in London, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast. Richard Dawkins, not surprisingly, had something to say in support of the campaign. "We urgently need to raise consciousnesses on this issue. Nobody would seriously describe a tiny child as a 'Marxist child' or an 'Anarchist child' or a 'Post-modernist child'. Yet children are routinely labelled with the religion of their parents. We need to encourage people to think carefully before labelling any child too young to know their own opinions and our adverts will help to do that.'

Well if he really believes that these posters will make the slightest difference to anyone, Dawkins really is deluded. Not least because they will be up for just two weeks.

How interesting, however, that the BHA has launched a fundraising campaign off the back of the billboard campaign using the same image and text style. The campaign is to raise £30k to oppose faith schools.

Mouse thinks this is pretty shocking use of other people's money. The cash was originally given to pay for cheeky adverts on buses to stick one in the eye to Christians who put adverts on buses. It is now being used as a front for a BHA fundraising campaign.

Mouse's suggestion to anyone who donated expecting their money to go an an atheist bus campaign is to phone up the BHA and demand a refund.

Incidentally, Mouse thought the figure of £30,000 was familiar, so checked where it had come from. Sure enough, at this time last year the BHA raised £30k via Just Giving to raise funds for their campaign against faith schools. This was to fund a dedicated campaigner against faith schools. Looks like they're trying to keep paying this person's wages.

Finally, Mouse just has a plea for Christian organisations not to try opposing these posters. We really don't want an arms race of billboards.

Serbian Orthodox Patriarch to be chosen by lottery

Mouse is intrigued by a report in FaithWorld about the system of election for the Serbian Orthodox Patriarch. This has come into play following the death of Patriarch Pavle at the age of 95, and incorporates a random lottery into the system.

The system was introduced, in part, to reduce the influence of communist authorities on the appointment of Patriarchs. In essence the system involves an election using a system under which the Bishops each have three votes, and keep voting until three candidates each achieve 50% of the vote. They then put the top three candidates, who can each claim a credible mandate, into a random lottery.

Mouse is reminded of a couple of things with this. Firstly the ancient Athenian system of democracy was the first in the world. It involved elections by lottery from all male free citizens of Athens. This was considered the purest form of democracy. Secondly, Mouse is reminded of the system used to select Matthias as the twelfth apostle to replace Judas Iscariot, where a random ballot was used to discern the will of God.

Perhaps these Serbians are on to something.

Thought for Today to remain religious

The BBC Trust yesterday rejected an appeal by humanists and secularists to introduce regular non-religious voices into the Radio 4 Today Program's 'Thought for Today' slot.

The basis of the decision by the BBC Trust seems to have been that it does not need to reflect non-religious views on grounds of impartiality because it is religious output.

Mouse thinks this is a victory for common sense and pragmatism. Why on earth the secularists and humanists care about this slot really is beyond Mouse. It simply seems to be a matter of principle that in their eyes nothing in the public sphere should be wholly religious in nature. As a result they object and cry discrimination on principle, rather than because they think it would actually make any difference to anyone if once a month a non-religious person made it onto the Today Program for a 2 minute slot during the rush hour.

The whole purpose of the 'Thought for the Day' slot is to bring a religious perspective, and the whole affair seems to have taken up far too much of far too many people's time.

Look out - the blog police are coming

Well, they're probably not actually, but apparently they'd really like to. Iain Dale has a post pointing to comments to Baroness Buscombe, the new chairman of the Press Complaints Commission. Apparently she'd like to look at whether the PCC's remit should be extended to cover blogs.

The source is, of course, another blog, that of Ian Burrell, who edits The Independent's Media Pages. According to Burrell,

Some of the bloggers are now creating their own ecosystems which are quite sophisticated," Baroness Buscombe told me. "Is the reader of those blogs assuming that it's news, and is [the blogosphere] the new newspapers? It's a very interesting area and quite challenging."

She said that after a review of the governance structures of the PCC, she would want the organisation to "consider" whether it should seek to extend its remit to the blogosphere, a process that would involve discussion with the press industry, the public and bloggers (who would presumably have to volunteer to come beneath the PCC's umbrella).

Mouse is happy to reiterate Dale's response to this, that the day they try to regulate blogs is the day Mouse will give up blogging. There is absolutely no comparison between blogs and newspapers. A better comparison would be someone who runs off a newsletter at home with his own printer and hands it out on street corners. It is true that a few of the most popular blogs have large readerships, but that is hardly reason to start regulating the entire internet. When Baroness Buscombe does 'consider' this issue, she will quickly find that it is completely impractical, anyhow.

Update: Guido reckons this is all a load of mischievous selective quoting. If so, the irony has more layers than a lasagne.

Farewell Wesley Owen?

Oh dear. It seems the game is finally up for IBS-STL, the company behind the Wesley Owen bookstores. They are putting the blame on a failed IT system project, which seems to be a rather sad self inflicted death for a company.

Like many organisations during a recession they have learned the lesson that 'cash is king' and that it doesn't matter what the P&L looks like for the year if you don't have the cash to pay the rent and wages this month.

Mouse has had a quick look at their last filed accounts from February 2008 and they're not pretty. Whilst that is really out-of-date information, we can assume things didn't improve from there. It seems that around £4.5m of borrowing is what has really done them in. In better trading conditions this probably wouldn't have been a problem, but when times are tough servicing debt just sucks cash out of an organisation. On top of that, the asset they were carrying on their balance sheet for the IT system being built was £1.7m. If this had to be written off, that would rather blow a hole in the accounts - but largely because of the debt position.

The big question now is, 'what next'? Phil Groom, who has been following the Christian publishing scene for some time, reckons a buy-out is possible. Mouse reckons a hard look at the books will be required. From the numbers Phil is talking about, he's a long way from tackling the debt problem. However, it would be a terrible shame if STL did disappear. It would also be a disaster for many who depend on the organisation for their livelihoods.

Here's the statement from STL UK.

LEADING CHRISTIAN CHARITY IBS-STL UK ANNOUNCES PLANS TO
SELL OPERATIONS DUE TO FINANCIAL CHALLENGES

Leading Christian book and Bible charity IBS-STL UK today announced that it has appointed Baker Tilly Corporate Finance LLP to pursue the sale of its operations.

The move has come after a succession of financial problems, in particular the failed implementation of a new SAP computer system in October 2008, the effects of which were exacerbated by the economic downturn. These have caused significant cash flow pressures, excess stock, and supply chain and service difficulties in its distribution and retail units. They have culminated in the decision to exit the business.

IBS-STL UK convened an emergency task force led by Global President of Biblica and former CEO of STL, Keith Danby, which has been in constant dialogue with its suppliers and bankers. It had also engaged restructuring and business process consultants in an attempt to resolve the systems and financial challenges.

Danby said: “Given the severe financial and operational strains we have experienced, the Board of Trustees and management team believe a sale or exit from all or parts of certain operations is a prudent and necessary step. Whilst a difficult decision, we are focused on finding a solution to continue the important work of IBS-STL UK, to secure the jobs of the 490 people employed in our ministry, and to fulfill our financial obligations to our suppliers and creditors. We are working diligently and praying vigilantly for a successful outcome.”

The corporate finance division of Baker Tilly is actively marketing the operations of the charity to a number of interested parties and is hopeful it will complete negotiations for the sales or potential closures within the next few weeks. IBS-STL UK was founded in 1962 and has grown to become a major UK charity.

IBS-STL UK has three trading divisions; Authentic Media, a book and music publisher; STL Distribution, a distributor of Christian resources and Wesley Owen Books and Music, a retailer with 40 shops in the UK. IBS-STL UK is part of Biblica, a global Bible translation, publishing, distribution and outreach ministry serving more than 100 countries with books, Bibles and other Christian resources. Biblica said the planned sale of the UK operations will not impact its other global operations and donor funds supporting Biblica’s worldwide outreach ministries will not be affected.

Michael Fitch, Chairman of the IBS-STL UK Board of Trustees, concluded: “We continue to believe strongly in the power of God’s Word and Christian resources to change peoples’ lives. We are praying that we can pass the torch on to other likeminded organisations so that our UK staff, suppliers and ministry partners can carry our work forward.”

Faith groups as policy advisors - the real story

John Denham's announcement that he is setting up a panel of faith groups to be involved in policy making has certainly generated some noise. The National Secular Society is outraged, commenting that "It's totally wrong to have faith groups as consultants. It's not right that they should have this privileged position to promote their dogmas, many of which are unacceptable. We shouldn't have unelected people influencing decision making."

Presumably that rules out the NSS from any involvement, not to mention all lobby groups, the civil service, the House of Lords and, of course, the general public. Good thinking chaps.

However, Mouse notes a few more interesting things.

1. This was actually announced by John Denham on 19 October, when he addressed Churches Together in Britain and Ireland. This was not noticed by anyone (sadly, including the Mouse) until Mr Denham repeated the statements in an interview with the Telegraph.

2. Whilst we're all busy dissecting David Cameron's believes, John Denhams seem equally interesting. In his speech on 19 October he said, "When I say I am a secular humanist I have to admit that it would take a very skilled theological surgeon to separate my secular beliefs today from the values I absorbed from my upbringing in the Church of England." It seems a rather damning verdict on the good old CofE that Denham reckons a secular humanist looks imperceptibly like an Anglican. However, Mouse suspects that's more to do with Denham's lack of understanding of a transformed life in Christ than anything else. However, his view is undoubtedly similar to that of a large number of people who think that a set of good moral values gets you 90% of the way along the road to Anglican salvation.

3. The actual role of the faith panel that has caused so much stir seems to Mouse to be little more than window dressing. On 19 October, Denham put it this way "I am in the process of setting up a panel of experts on issues of faith and public policy to act as a sounding board for myself and the Department, as well as recruiting a permanent advisor who specialises in the role faith communities can play not just in community cohesion but in the wider issues I have touched on tonight." So this panel will not be full of religious people, although it may include some, but it will be 'experts on issues of faith and public policy'. Presumably the NSS, the BHA and others would consider themselves in that category. Secondly, it will have absolutely no formal role in anything. It will merely be a 'sounding board'. Or to put it another way, a focus group. This hardly constitutes giving faith groups the hotline to the cabinet that the NSS fear, although, Mouse would be interested to see if they change their tune if / when they find out that they're in the magic circle themselves. It also seems to be a tool to assist with the practical implementation of government policies in communities. Again a very sensible step.

4. The most helpful aspect of Denham's latest interview as far as churches go is the attack on aggressive secularism. Its great to hear someone coming from a humanist perspective talking about the positive role that Christians and other faiths can bring to society.

Overall, Mouse's reaction is, "hmmmf". Looks like a sensible step, but this is a long way from something for anyone to get too excited about.

When 'sorry' means something else entirely

A number of people have been very quick to condemn the idea of Gordon Brown apologising for the transportation of British children to Australia under the Child Migration Program. The policy in question was certainly morally reprehensible. But the question is whether the Prime Minister of the country responsible should apologise. Some of the children transported to Australia are still alive, yet Brown has drawn criticism.

There is certainly much politics involved in Prime Ministerial apologies. Brown is often called on to apologise for things which he was not personally responsible for, and as recently as September apologised for the wartime treatment of British code breaker Alan Turing, a move which was widely appreciated.

Regular readers may be a little surprised by this, but Mouse thinks that people have been rather too quick to judge Brown on this one. Brown represents the British Government, and an apology costs nothing, but may bring a crumb of comfort for those affected.

The bigger issue for Mouse is the very long line of things which Brown is personally responsible for, but which there is not the faintest hope of an apology. A number of blogs have been drawing up their own lists of things they would like an apology for. Heresy Corner provides a good one, for example.

The most recent example, of course, is Brown's apology to Jacqui Janes for the 'hastily scrawled' letter of condolence that Brown wrote her following the death of her son in Afganistan. Despite the swing in public opinion after the Sun's over-aggressive hounding of the PM on the issue, the fact remains that he did mis-spell the dead soldier's name and leave a correction in the letter. He should have re-written it, and had it checked for accuracy. But the apology was something to behold. His recorded phone call to the grieving mother did not contain any meaningful apology. It added up to, "I did absolutely nothing wrong, and if you're upset its really your own fault for not being able to read my handwriting, but still I'm sorry for the offence you have unreasonably taken'.

Even more recently, there was some concern raised by the fact that both David Cameron and Gordon Brown were pictured in the Garden of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey on Remembrance Day, without having first cleared it with the Abbey's authorities. The suspicion was that they were using the event to get some publicity. Both men have now apologised. However, once again Mouse cannot help questioning Gordon Brown's apology.

A Downing Street spokesman said: "Following the service at the abbey that morning, the prime minister expressed a desire to visit the Field of Remembrance, as an appropriate way to recognise those who have made the ultimate sacrifice while serving their country.
We apologised for any inconvenience caused by this late change of the programme."

So really what he's saying there is, sorry for the inconvenience, but I did nothing wrong, and the only thing I have to apologise for is some minor inconvenience. Secondly, it is not the inconvenience that anyone was bothered by, but the principle of grabbing some publicity shots an an inappropriate time. Finally it is very odd that the spokesman said that 'we' had apologised. Surely Brown is the one responsible, and 'he' should have said sorry. Cameron went a little further, and admitted that he shouldn't have been photographed there. He said, "It shouldn't have happened... I want to make that clear."

From a Christian perspective, Mouse cannot help thinking that an apology which makes no admission that you've done something wrong really is no apology at all. In fact, that kind of apology is really nothing more than an attempt to close down the issue without doing anything more to put right what has gone wrong.

Quick drink and a fight anyone?

Shocking figures released this week showed that a quarter of men have been involved in 'alcohol fueled fights'.

An ICM poll has been conducted into the effects of alcohol on people's lives. Amongst other things they found that:

• 30% of people had been unable to function effectively the next day at work or college after drinking heavily;
• over 20% of people have had to take a day off work to recover from a hangover
• almost 25% of men have been involved in a fight after drinking
• 6% of men and 3% of women admitted waking up with a stranger

This truly is shocking by any standard. What is most worrying is that the public debate on alcohol is so limited. The government's disastrous 24 hour drinking laws stimulated some debate, but there seemed to be no angle which generated real interest in the news, so the story lacked real bite.

Whilst some Christian organisations work in this area, the Church itself is generally too afraid to speak out on the role alcohol plays in our society for fear of sounding moralistic. Latest figures show that alcohol killed 7,341 people in 2008. Mouse cannot think of anything that has killed that many people, yet is treated with such a privileged place in our society.

Update: Thanks to @thurible for tweeting Mouse to point out the Bishop of Aberdeen and Orkney's comments on exactly this topic last week.

Boris Johnson and Rowan Williams on religious social activity

Sometimes we love the way the Archbishop of Canterbury provides deeply thoughtful commentary from a Christian perspective on some of the biggest issues of the day. This week he gave a talk for the Tony Blair Faith Foundation on faith and development. He acknowledged that many were suspicious of faith organisations who engaged in social action, fearing aid would be used as a 'cloak for proselytism'.

The Archbishop's commentary was thoughtful and accurate, calling for greater understanding on all sides to allow faith groups to do their work more effectively. However, sometimes a part of the Mouse wishes that Rowan was just a little bit more like Boris Johnson.

Boris addressed the Street Pastors conference this week, and simply said it how it is.

Faith groups who want to slip in the odd coded message in favour of salvation, I have absolutely no problem with that and why not!

That’s one of the things that I think has been going wrong in the last few years. We have got a slightly politically correct super-sensitivity to anything that can be remotely classed as religious advocacy. And frankly I’ve got no difficulty with it whatsoever.

Boris admitted that red tape was making it 'too difficult to do good' for some Christian organisations.

Women in the Episcopate - to me, to you, to me

So the Revision Committee have dropped their earlier proposals which would have meant a two tier episcopate by vesting certain functions in bishops by statute.

Mouse does not pretend to understand the legal complexities of how or why these proposals came about and have now floundered. However, he is pretty baffled by the approach that the revision committee has taken. Firstly they went down the track of trying to introduce proposals to limit the authority of women bishops, which seem to be directly contrary to the vote by General Synod (in spirit if not by the letter). They then issued a press release, when they did not need to, to announce this decision, causing a pretty big stir. And now we hear that they have abandoned the whole idea.

Mouse heard the news on the lunch-time news on Radio 4. He can't help thinking that this will be baffling the vast majority of people both inside and outside the church.

France abandons burqa ban

There has been a lot of talking in France about a potential ban on full veils. The idea was mooted some time ago, and it had looked like the measure was proceeding with government support. President Sarkozy had said that “France is a country that has no place for the burqa or the subjugation of women — not under any pretext, any condition or any circumstance”. However, it now seems that the proposal will simply be a 'recommendation', without any legal force.

The news comes from an interview with Andre Gerin, a leading proponent of the ban. After being pressed quite hard on French radio he eventually admitted that there would be no legal ban.

Mouse feels this is a good thing. France's approach to secularism is not a model that Mouse endorses, as he feels it does curtail individual freedoms. Whilst Mouse would not advocate the wearing of a burqa, and does not see how it follows from the Koranic texts which are often used to justify it, he does feel that it is wrong to tell people what they can and cannot wear.

Youth and the internet - they just can't live without it

Mouse is once again indebted to Rev David Keen for his excellent blog. This time for bringing to Mouse's attention a report entitled 'Life Support: Young people's needs in a digital age', commissioned by online charity YouthNet.

The report deals with young people's views on the internet and its importance in their lives, and included a survey of 994 young people aged 16-24. The headline findings are stark.

• 75% said that they couldn't live without the internet
• 45% said that they felt happiest when online
• 32% agreed with the statement: 'I can access all the information I need online, there is no need to speak to a real person about my problems'
• Four in five (82%) said they had used the internet to look for advice and information for themselves and 60% had for other people
• 37% said that they would use the internet to give advice to others on sensitive issues.

The report coins a new term, Digital Natives, which it describes as young people 'under the age of 25, and have been surrounded by computers, mobile phones and digital video games since a pre-school age. The report reckons they have "fundamentally different to previous generations, living 'hybrid lives', communicating and networking in a more advanced way than their parents and grandparents, and have 'highly developed visual-spacial skills."

This is a really important piece of work, particularly for the church. There can be few churches who have wondered how to relate better to the young people in this age bracket. Part of the answer must be through online engagement. Of course, the problem is that church leaders, not being Digital Natives themselves, are really going to struggle.

Mouse will ask his readers to think back some time to the guest post on this blog from Sarah Malik, Youth President of the Methodist Church. Their strategy is to invest in young people to engage with and lead other young people, backed up with £4m of investment. Mouse still reckons that's a good idea.

Update

After posting this, Mouse received an email from the extraordinarily intelligent Peter Phillips (who has guest blogged here before). He pointed out that Mouse was wrong when he said that the term Digital Natives was coined by this paper. He points out:

"Digital Natives was developed as a term through the Digital Natives programme, through Dan Tapscott’s research unit, through John Palfrey’s work and so on. There is a whole load of work about Digital Natives (often referred to as Generation Y or Millenials) and Digital Immigrants and Exiles (usually coming from the Baby Boomers and previous). There is also Cathelat’s work on this Generation and he divides young people into chameleons and bisons and talks about the ‘Zapping Generation ’."

As always, Mouse is happy to be corrected.

Rowan Williams - busy chap

The Archbishop of Canterbury has been a busy chap this week. Amongst many other things, no doubt, he has been speaking at the RSA for the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, writing in the Guardian's Comment is Free and using his sermon at All Saints, St Margaret St, for All Saints Day to grab some column inches by describing the future of the Anglican Communion as 'chaotic'.

All in all Mouse considers these activities to have had a positive effect. Whilst not quite hitting the PR highs of the Archbishop of York, Rowan Williams has been steadily doing the right things. Whilst this may not be desperately exciting, and he may still be taking criticism for failing to control the uncontrollable elements of the Church of England, Mouse still holds our Archbishop in high regard.

Friday round up

Here's my round up from the blogosphere. Ten of the best from the blogs this week.

1. Clayboy translates the Apostolic Constitution

2. The Beaker Folk of Husborne Crawley on the Catholic Chuch's offer of Alian Ordinariates to extra-terrestrials

3. Tall Skinny Kiwi thinks 'denomination-hopping is for wussies' and has six good reasons to stay Anglican

4. Tikhtak says farewell to CMS (did you know they don't do youth and children's work any more?)

5. Bishop Alan Wilson on remembrance

6. More from Clayboy as he brings back Screwtape for a swipe at the media

7. Bishop Nick Baines really doesn't like the Sun

8. Maggi Dawn with one of the more sensible pieces on Thought For The Day

9. Damian Thompson on Rowan Williams' 'chaotic future' comment (Damian doesn't quite get Anglicanism

10. Catherine Beyer on the 1012 hysteria

Lazy reporting in the Church Times

Yesterday Mouse blogged on the new report from Theos on faith schools. Lets just remind ourselves what it said about standards in faith schools:

...while the effect is small, the evidence presented supports the claim that students at maintained church schools gain higher academic achievement beyond the differences that can be accounted for by the measurable prior academic achievement and socio-economic status of the intakes.

But the report also concludes that the currently available research is limited, and does not allow any definitive conclusions to be drawn about the spiritual impact on students of a school’s Christian ethos.

So it was rather surprising to read the headline in this morning's Church Times, "Christian ethos does not raise standards in schools, says report".

Supporting this was the line that "A report published yesterday by Theos, a think-tank, and the Staple ford Centre, found that there was little evidence to support the widely held view that a Christian ethos made a difference to pupils." Quite right, the report did fine little evidence. However, the evidence they did find "supported the claim". The lack of evidence was simply due to a lack of research. The actual conclusion of the report was that more research should be done.

Mouse thought the CT article entirely misleading.

The dodgy education dossier & the call for more evidence

Today the think tank Theos have published a report into the impact of faith schools. Their conclusion is, basically, that there simply isn't enough research to draw any firm conclusions on the impact of faith schools either on pupils. Whilst the evidence presented seems to show there is an increase in educational attainment at church schools, beyond what can be explained by prior educational standards or socio-economic factors in intakes, the evidence is limited.

The report also states, "It should strike us as extraordinary that the institution that has sponsored and nurtured education the longest (even more than any government or monarch) should be required to make the case for why it should be involved in public education today. Long before the first universities in the West, the Church through its cathedral schools was the progenitor of education and schooling. There was no England or Europe until languages were given a script and until oral histories were written down; in a word, until schools began."

Nevertheless, in the face of aggressive secularism the case must be made, and the best way to do that is to use reason and evidence. Theos are quite right to call for more evidence in the faith schools debate.

Compare this approach with the Accord Coalition dossier of 'evidence' on church schools. The stated purpose of the dossier is "to help researchers, journalists, campaigners and members of the public to find information about the policy implications of state funded faith schools and their practices." This is smart campaigning technique, as it is seeking to shape the information used when considering the topic. This dossier doesn't really overlap with the Theos report, as the Accord dossier is primarily concerned with the impact on wider society, whilst the Theos report on the impact on the individual. However, there clearly is a link.

Unfortunately, Mouse thinks it is a dodgy dossier. Now, to be clear, Mouse is not suggesting that anything in there has been 'sexed up', distorted, changed or taken out of context. However, the exhibits on show in the dossier have, as you might expect, been selected carefully to tell the story that the Accord Coalition want to tell.

The 'dossier' contains a compilation of reports from opinion polls, think tanks, and other organisations. The first piece of evidence, for example, is a YouGov poll commissioned by Accord on the subject. It found that most people wanted church schools to have equal admissions and employment policies, should teach a balanced syllabus and, most importantly, that they undermine community cohesion. However, Mouse is curious why the polling commissioned by the Church of England was not included. Perhaps it is because Accord asked the questions they wanted to ask and the good old CofE did the same.

An Opinion Research Business Survey in 2008, commissioned by the good old CofE, showed that, of those who agree that church schools are different to other state schools:

• Eight in ten (79 per cent) agree that church schools help young people develop a sense of right and wrong
• 75 per cent think that church schools help young people grow into responsible members of society
• 78 per cent agree that they promote good behaviour and positive attitudes
• 85 per cent agree they have a caring approach to students.

The usual Achilles heal for the Accord Coalition is the issue of standards. The organisation is very keen to promote equality and diversity, but doesn't have much to say about standards other than to claim that any high standards in faith schools are merely the result of creaming off the best pupils. Mouse's view is that standards is the most important issue in education policy. On this issue, the Accord dossier has just one piece of evidence.

This is a study which Mouse has blogged on before, which uses the case study of church schools to see whether their existence in an area has an impact on the standards of other schools in the area. The study concludes that it does not. Mouse thinks this, therefore, shows that they are not having a detrimental impact on other schools, as opponents of church schools often claim. However, some seem to think this is a form of attack on church schools for failing to improve other local schools, as if it was a reasonable expectation of one school not just to deliver a first class education, but also to improve standards in all the other schools in the area.

The final problem with the Accord dossier is that some of the exhibits in the dossier are not even factual studies, but subjective opinion based reports. For example, the dossier includes a 'report' from the 'Sea of Faith Network'. This organisation promotes the idea that religion is a human invention, but that it can still be good for us. The report included in the dossier is an opinion piece by a 'Commission' of three members of the Sea of Faith Network, one of whom felt that the report "does not adequately express the secular/humanist position and does not address the serious political issues in sufficient depth." There is no description of how this three man commission came to its recommendations, what evidence was considered or who was consulted. Mouse does not think this report has a place in this kind of dossier.

Jonathan Bartley, co-Director of think-tank Ekklesia which was a founder member of Accord, said, "The point of the dossier is not to be a comprehensive resource of everything to do with faith schools. It is instead to collect together evidence of where church schools could do better. As such it is designed to counterbalance the refusal of some institutions such as the Church of England to acknowledge that church schools have any failings at all, particularly in the area of admissions and employment. It should be noted that religious organisations such as Tearfund are cited in the report as well as groups such as the Runnymeade Trust which has a long track record of working with churches and faith groups."

In itself these are fair questions to be raised, and the current position could probably be improved. However, the Accord coalition includes organisations the British Humanist Association, who are implacably opposed to faith schools. Mouse had an interesting comment from one of the Ekklesia Directors that Accord was set up 'to make faith schools better'. However, the BHA's position on faith schools is that they would like to see the abolition of state-funded faith schools. In fact, they have recently raised £30,000 to employ someone dedicated to campaigning for the abolition of state funded faith schools, so I don't think they intend to 'make faith schools better'.

Jewish experiences of women's ministry

Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain has written a really interesting piece in the Guardian about Jewish experience of Women's ministry.

The thrust of his article is that it has been 35 years since the firms Jewish women became Rabbis in Reform and Liberal Synagogues ("the Anglicans of Judaism"). Opposition had come for a range of reasons, from genuine theological positions through to straight forward sexism. There were predictions of splits and mass walk-outs, but 'almost none of these occurred'.

The really interesting thing, however, is not the history lesson on whether women's ministry has been 'successful' or not - the parallels are too distant. The really interesting thing for Mouse was the fact that the initial arguments used in favour women's roles as rabbis was not based on equality or human rights, but it was a theological argument, based on women's leadership roles in the Bible.

Mouse has long been of the opinion that the current divisions in the Church of England are quite wrongly characterised as Biblical arguments on one side against the forces of liberalism. In fact there are simply two theological positions.

New sitcom to be set in the good old CofE

There cannot be a single person who has spent much time in the good old CofE without, for a few moments at least, thinking they could be in Dibley. The debate over religious broadcasting has been dominated, in the past few months, about whether Aaqil Ahmed, a Muslim, is the right man for the job of Head of Religion and Ethics and Commissioning Editor for TV at the BBC. Mouse points out that Dawn French's character in Dibley and Father Ted between them have had a far bigger effect on the perception of the church than the entire output of the Religion and Ethics department added up.

So Christians should take note that a new sitcom is in the pipe, with the main character a vicar from the good old CofE. This is how The Times describe the planned show,

BBC Two has commissioned Handle with Prayer, a series about a frustrated Anglican priest in an inner-city parish, whose faith is tested by his venal, amoral flock. Although the series is intended to provoke laughter, the BBC said it would be an authentic portrayal of modern church life, based on research with senior church insiders.

Tom Hollander, star of In the Loop and Desperate Romantics, helped to create the series and plays Mr Smallbone, newly promoted from a sleepy rural parish to the “socially divided” St Botolph’s in Kennington, South London.

In familiar Father Ted-style, Mr Smallbone is an unworldly figure who struggles to cope with the enormous daily frustrations and moral conflicts of his new role. Unable to turn anyone away, his church is sought out by the lowest elements of society, from scheming, hypocritical MPs to local criminals. He must tend to urban sophisticates, the chronically lonely, the homeless, drug addicts, the lost, the poor and, occasionally, the insane.

Lets just hope its funny. Mouse's advice to the BBC is simply to focus on the jokes and the characters. Attempts at deep social comment or, worse, intentional controversy just for the sake of it will merely attract the wrong sort of attention.

UN 'defamation of religion' proposal

When Mouse first heard about this story, it was in the context that the British Humanist Association were opposing something. Mouse therefore instinctively thought that whatever was being proposed was probably a good idea. However, upon investigation this looks like a very worrying development, and Mouse will be agreeing with the BHA.

A United Nations forum, the UN Human Rights Council, has adopted a non-binding resolution which condemns 'defamation of religion' as a human rights abuse, on a par with religious persecution. This is being sold as part of the balancing act between freedom of speech on the one hand and protecting people from gross offence on the other. However, it seems that in reality the proposal came from Pakistan, whose record on religious freedom is patchy to say the least, and was voted for en mass by Muslim countries keen to introduce the concept that insulting Islam is an offence.

A similar proposal was drafted for the UN conference on racism, known as Durban II, but was withdrawn after western countries refused to consider it. The conference itself was widely considered to be a bit of a joke after they allowed Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to speak.

There seems little chance of this concept going much further, as it is totally unacceptable to most western and European countries. According to Reuters,

Germany said on behalf of the European Union that while instances of Islamophobia, Christianophobia, anti-Semitism and other forms of religious discrimination should be taken seriously, it was "problematic to reconcile the notion of defamation (of religion) with the concept of discrimination."

"The European Union does not see the concept of defamation of religion as a valid one in a human rights discourse," it said. "The European Union believes that a broader, more balanced and thoroughly rights-based text would be best suited to address the issues underlying this draft resolution."

However, the development is interesting for a number of reasons. However, the conclusion Mouse has drawn is that in the face of a united front from the European Union and almost all other western countries, the British Humanist Association still think they need to chip in.

Digitalnuns to host Virtual Chapter

Mouse is a fan of the Benedictine Nuns of Holy Trinity Monastery, East Hendred. They are a small community of nuns, yet their online engagement provides a lesson to even the biggest churches in the world. Mouse became aware of them when they won the People's Choice award at the Christian Blog Awards, and accepted their award via a video message. So, Mouse is delighted that they will be hosting a virtual chapter this coming Friday.

Mouse has no idea what will happen at this event, but the Digitalnun's blog says, "There will be a short talk from the prioress on the feast of the day (All Benedictine Saints), followed by an opportunity for discussion."

Unfortunately, Mouse won't be able to join in, but will be eagerly looking for news of how it went. Naturally, you can follow the Benedictine Nuns on Twitter, on their blog and through their podcasts.

Is blogging sinful?

Bess Twiston-Davies picks up on a fascinating discussion topic. The discussion going round is whether blogging is sinful. Essentially it boils down to the question of whether it breaks the Biblical commands against gossip. This is not only a dilemma for Christian bloggers, but also Jewish bloggers, for whom the law is the same.

From Mouse's perspective he has a pretty clear conscience on this one, but he does recognise the issue. Mouse's only other observation is that this is hardly a new issue for blogging. It has been an age old danger for any story-teller or writer.

Apostolic constitution published

Crikey. Pop out for a cup of tea and the internet erupts. Well, its finally here. The apostolic constitution setting out the detail of how Anglicans can join the Catholic Church has been published.

There has already been a huge amount of reaction. Mouse will try to add something to that already, but in the mean time will link to just a couple of the comment pieces. Ruth Gledhill does her usual diligent job in the Times, and Bishop Graham Kings has a piece in the Guardian.

The most interesting reaction has come from Bishop John Broadhurst, who commented, "What Rome has done is offer exactly what the Church of England has refused. Indeed it has offered the requests of 'Consecrated Women' with the completion of its ecumenical hopes. We all need now to ask the question 'is this what we want?' For some of us I suspect our bluff is called!".

No doubt much more will follow.

Goldman Sachs - doing God's work?

Banker bashing has been a rather popular past time over the past year or so. Which makes yesterday's Sunday Times front page headline one which must have raised more than a few eyebrows. The multi-millionaire head of investment bank Goldman Sachs has declared that they are doing "God's work".

Lloyd Blankfein has, apparently, paid himself $68m in 2007, and owns around $500m worth of shares in the company he runs. Which means that his claims to be acting with a 'social purpose' will be carefully considered.

We help companies to grow by helping them to raise capital. Companies that grow create wealth. This, in turn, allows people to have jobs that create more growth and more wealth. It’s a virtuous cycle … We have a social purpose.

There is no doubt that many will simply scoff at this kind of talk from such a man. However, Mouse must admit that he has some sympathy with this point of view.

For some time, Mouse has admired the work of Ken Costa. Ken is the Chairman of Lazard International investment bank, Chairman of Alpha International and Churchwarden of Holy Trinity Brompton. He is also author of God at Work, a book aimed at supporting Christians in the workplace. In a recent article in the Financial Times, Mr Costa said:

I passionately believe that capitalism is the best way we know of improving people’s living standards. Precisely for that reason, wealth creation is a duty and, as George Osborne, Britain’s shadow chancellor, has emphasised, enterprise must be supported. Society as a whole benefits – provided that individual enterprise is grounded in broadly acceptable and agreed values.

Not very different from Mr Blankfein's comments. However, there is a difference. Mr Blankfein is attempting to justify a quick return to big banking bonuses, whilst Mr Costa is arguing for a new moral basis to our capitalist system. Sometimes its not just what you say that counts.

If you'd like to express your view, FaithWorld is running a poll on the subject.

Clergy pensions and the media coverage: Guest post from Matt Wardman

Matt Wardman is the Editor of The Wardman Wire is an internet consultant, commentator, freelance writer and Project Manager based in the UK. Matt writes at Poligeeks, Total Politics, and occasionally in several other places.

Matt posted a comment on Mouse's blog post on the FT article about the troubles of the clergy pension scheme. Matt offered to post it in full to further the debate on the media, and Mouse is happy to do so. Mouse also suggest reading the other comments on that post. They are well worth a read.

The points that interest me in the reporting of this story are:

a) That the FT mentioned the £10m or so going out of the fund each year, but was silent on the much greater figures of £70m going in. For an FT analytical story, it should have been better.

b) The way the story ran around the Press and Media, without any comment apparently being obtained from the Church (I first heard the story on the Today Programme before 8am).

c) That someone in the Church Pension Fund seemed to have their media relations act together (good).

d) Why anybody covered the story at all, bearing in mind that it is all based on old material which was published nearly 6 months ago? Why now?

The only hooks I can find are that the consultation period on the changes has just finished, or that Mr Ralfe did a superb media relations job himself.

e) That the whole thing emanated from a single source, Mr Ralfe, and the press/media seem to be insufficiently sceptical in reporting his line. I'll acknowledge, after hearing him on R4 on Saturday lunchtime, that he is both professional and credible, but that doesn't justify the lack of media probing.

f) That the whole thing fits the standard "Church broke" and "Church bad at financial management" templates.

g) That Ruth Gledhill did a damned good detailed job in the Times. That may be because the Times was late on this one, and didn't have so much deadline pressure.

h) That the FT illustrated an upcoming media problem when they linked from their public blogs to source articles behind their paywall.

More financial mis-management at the CofE?

This time, pensions. The FT ran a story on Monday accusing the CofE of being 'seduced by the cult of equities' in the pension scheme formed in 1998. The accusation was that they bet the whole fund on shares, investing exclusively in equities. This was derided as reckless, and highly unusual for pension funds.

However, the CofE didn't take this story lying down, however, and have hit back with the accusation that the story in the FT failed to take into account the youth of the fund. Since the fund is new, and therefore will not be paying out significantly for some time, equities represent a better bet, as they tend to outperform other investments in the long term, despite volatility in the short term. Nor did the Church deny that the central point of the FT article that they were considering making changes to the pension fund rules in light of its recent appalling performance.

Mouse is not entirely taken in by the Church's line on this, however. The fact that they have already diversified the fund by shifting to 20% bonds is an indication that they are not entirely happy with their previous strategy. More importantly, however, the FT article explicitly mentions the youth of the fund and the amounts it is paying out. There is no indication at all that they failed to take this into account.

Mouse is not a pensions expert, so will not make his own judgement. However, he is rather more convinced by the independent experts, than those attempting to defend the loss of huge amounts of other people's money.