The Hermeneutic of Continuity

CBN (the Christian Broadcasting Network from Virginia) have compiled this report on an Islamic show of strength in Paris: Apparently this has been going on for some years every Friday between 3 and 5pm. There are some more videos at the French blog Bivouac ID . The places where the videos are taken seem to be mainly up in the 18th Arrondissement not far from Montmartre. In France, this islamisation is opposed strongly by the proponents of laicité, those who work against any influence of religion in the public square and have been vocal in opposition to the influence of Islam. This is an interesting contrast with England where the secularists seem to focus their energies much more on attacking the Catholic Church. Last year, I wrote about how the SSPX were prevented from ending their Pilgrimage from Chartres as they had often done before, in front of the Basilica of Sacré Coeur. Rorate Caeli carried the letter of Fr L Duverger in response. The authorities seem disinclined t...

They are Hebrews: so am I. They are Israelites: so am I. They are the seed of Abraham: so am I. (2 Cor 11.22) Ever since St Paul, great Christian preachers have spoken in a manner suited to the people they are addressing. St Louis Grignon de Montfort used to pick fights with yobs in the market square when he heard them blaspheming. Being a stout chap, he used to get the better of things. Then, when honour was settled, he would preach the gospel to them with, shall we say, authenticity . Fr Zakaria Boutros looks and sounds for all the world to my suburban eyes like one of the more fiery Ayatollahs; but he is preaching the gospel to Muslims of the middle-East. Apparently his programme is compulsive viewing in much of the Islamic world with predictable results. The US government has reportedly offered a 25 million dollar bounty for Osama Bin Laden. Al Qaeda has offered a 60 million dollar bounty for Fr Zakaria Boutros.

Each local council in England and Wales is required to have a Standing Advisory Council for Religious Education (SACRE) with representation from people of different faiths, to advise the Local Education Authority. (Their advice is directed to state schools, not Catholic schools.) In Stoke on Trent, the SACRE has recently published a Public Document Pack which includes advice on Ramadan. Sex and relationship education Whilst fasting, Muslims are not permitted to engage in any sexual relations and are expected to take measures to avoid sexual thoughts and discourse. Schools are therefore advised to avoid scheduling the teaching of sex and relationship education, including aspects that are part of the science curriculum, during Ramadan. Other sections advise schools to avoid parents' evenings and after school functions during the fast, and to avoid swimming lessons because of the danger of accidentally swallowing water. There is also advice on Muslim requirements for modesty, par...

For a few months now, James Corum has been on the list of Telegraph bloggers. I have known Jim since our Oxford days, and have followed his career with interest. He is now Dean of the Baltic Defence College in Estonia and is an acknowledged authority on counter-subversion. I have read most of the seven books that he has published and his writing style is engaging, conveying information on military matters in an accessible way without patronising the reader. Last November, Jim was recruited to the team of Telegraph bloggers and writes a blog on defence . His in-depth knowledge of military matters, together with experience in the field make for some first-rate commentary on matters of current concern. His post today looks at the political correctness that has pervaded the Department of Defense and makes an observation that will have a familiar ring to many people outside the military: Despite the negative effects on morale and efficiency these policies have had, they could not be cri...

David Palmer,a convert from Anglicanism, has revived his blog Fullness of Faith and intends to give it a more apologetic emphasis, particularly challenging Islam.

Looking through the referrals to the blog always seems to throw up something interesting. Today I found the site katolisitas.org . The subtitle "Knowing and Loving our Catholic Faith" and the picture of St Peter's and various devotional pictures illustrating the article links gave me a clue that this was probably a sound Catholic site, but I was stumped by the language. There is the occasional Shaolom and Salaam, Jesus is "Yesus", Mary, Mother of God is "Maria Bundi Allah". A bit of spadework on google led me to the guess that this was from Indonesia. In my ignorance, I looked up "indonesia language" and found that it was, in fact Indonesian. And to my surprise, I found that google translate does in fact do Indonesian. The site is very active with testimonies, catechetical articles and apologetics. It is wonderful to find such Catholic activity in a language that I have no knowledge of whatsoever, in a country I have never visited, yet sharin...

There is an interesting article on the Richard Dawkins fan site ( Petition YouTube for Pat Condell ). Pat Condell has posted a video to YouTube criticising the Saudi-based islamicisation of Britain and, in particular, arguing against the use of Sharia Law. His video has been pulled by YouTube and he has been warned that his "violation of the community guidelines" may result in his account being terminated. Meanwhile, over at mediawatchwatch (not to be confused with the excellent Media Watch UK ) there is an article celebrating the restoration of "free speech" in that YouTube have allowed the videos of people desecrating the Blessed Sacrament to be shown, but deprecating the censorship of Pat Condell. Anyone, secularists included, can see that there is a blatant double-standard operating here.

Fr Ray Blake has posted Eheu! Channel 4 about a documentary showing this evening on Channel 4 that seeks to show that St Peter did not die in Rome but in Palestine. Clerical Whispers has an article about the programme which was first shown at Easter ( The Secrets of the 12 Disciples ). It is a sort of Dan Brown style conspiracy theory which finds secret codes in the Bible to show that various Catholic traditions are nefarious invention. It also claims that St Peter was buried in Palestine and that the evidence for his burial in Rome is worthless. Fr Ray has also published an email pointing out that: The Commissioning Editor for religious broadcasting at Channel 4 is Aaquil Ahmed, a Muslim. I have long noticed that the only coverage Christianity gets on Channel 4 is in the form of programmes that seeks to undermine the authority of the Church,our traditions and our scripture. Religious programmes concerning Islam (Dispatches does not come into this category) are always propaganda for...

From Catholic Family News : Dr A. Majid Katme(IMA) emails : 'British Muslims fully support the Catholic Leaders, Ministers and MPs in their opposition to the (Human Fertilisation & Embryology Bill), the worst Bill in the history of Britain, they will continue with their letter campaign to the MPs in order to oppose this inhumane, destructive and immoral bill . . . Signed by: -Islamic Medical Association(IMA) -Muslim Doctors Association(MDA) -Islamic Medical Ethics Forum(IMEF) -Union of Muslim Organisations(UMO) H/T Catholic Action UK

Damien Thompson has an interesting post on the lecture scheduled today as part of "Islamic Awareness Week" which supposedly recounts "The collapse of the evolutionary theory". The very muted reaction to this reflects a "kid gloves" approach to Islam that would certainly not be afforded a Christian group expressing the same views. I agree with Damien's take on this and his impatience with pseudoscience. His website Counterknowledge is well worth a look. As Catholics, we should remember that the natural sciences are a profoundly Catholic project, beginning in the High Middle Ages as a result of a Christian view of the world and prospering because of the Christian concern for truth, objectivity and the goodness of the natural world. As Fr Jaki and other explained, the natural sciences had a promising start in Islam but foundered because of a rejection of the importance of secondary causes. Secularist relativism is also fatal for the natural sciences as ...

Thanks to a Facebook friend for this link to an article by Fr Raymond De Souza, originally published in the Canada National Post Palestinian Christians live in constant fear . He tells of a YMCA centre in Gaza which is open to Muslims and includes a school, sports club and community hall, and does not engage in Christian proselytism. It was blown up by militants last week, destroying a library of 8,000 books. Apparently this was in response to the reprinting of the Muhammed cartoons in Denmark last week. As Fr De Souza points out, it is not only the fact of the attack that is significant but also its insignificance in the eyes of the world's media. There is no free press in Gaza, and Christians are so intimidated that they dare not tell independent reporters anything except that they have excellent relations with their Muslim neighbours. To be fair, the BBC does carry a report on the attack .

I was more than a little suspicious of the feeding frenzy in the media over the Archbishop of Canterbury's recent lecture: Civil and Religious Law in England: a religious perspective . I printed off his lecture and read it quickly. My first impression was that this was a serious attempt to address a genuine problem of post-enlightenment positivism in law, and that it could have important implications for Catholics as well as Muslims. There certainly seemed to be little justification for the tabloid headlines. I am not a canon lawyer so I thought I would leave it alone until I had a chance to chat with Fr John Boyle about it. When he arrived at Ampleforth, he said that the train had wifi and so he was able to read the lecture and write about it on the journey up. His post is a common sense appraisal of the issue and I agree with him. See Bishop Burkha or Williams the Wise?

Just a little indication. On the search engine for BBC News and Sport: Click here for your 23 pages of search results for "ramadan" Click here for your 7 pages of search results for "lent" (actually quite a few of those are for "lent" as in "lent money") H/T to Laban at UK Commentators

There is something of a flutter on the conservative political blogs about a lecture given by Dr Jerry Brotton published on the website of the Campaign for Racial Equality: Why Muslims make Britain a better place . Brotton argues that the Muslims were responsible for the defeat of the Spanish Armada. Somewhat gauchely, he says "it was Turkish naval manoeuvres, rather than Drake's swashbuckling, which delivered the fatal blow to the Spanish invasion plans." Of course, Tim on Conservative Party Reptile: "Eh?" points out, this should be the "Ottoman Empire" since Turkey was not created for another 350 years. General conservative reaction to this is that it is wacky political correctness and so indeed it seems if the claim is taken at face value. The Spanish Armada was much larger than the English navy but was outgunned and outclassed in seamanship. Any ships detained to defend Spain against the Ottomans would have made little difference to the outcome. Ho...

We are wearily familiar with biased coverage of religious matters on British television. We are no longer surprised by selective editing of footage, weighted choice of interviewees, blasphemy, insults against the Holy Father, screening of films designed to ridicule our faith. However today's Times has a story about biased religious coverage criticised by the Police who have made a complaint about the programme to Ofcom . The reason for such prompt action by the Constabulary is that the programme was allegedly biased against Muslims. Broadcast in January, the programme Dispatches: Undercover Mosque had footage of statements such as those listed below the Times article: Abu Usamah: “They will fight in the cause of Allah. I encourage all of you to be from among them, to begin to cultivate ourselves for the time that is approaching” Dr Ijaz Mian: “You have to live like a state-within-a-state until you take over” Abu Usamah: “Why give up your religion and your long legacy of Islam to ...

Mgr Mark Langham has posted on the The Beautiful Names concert in which the 99 names of Allah were sung in Westminster Cathedral. In addition to his post about the concert itself, he has a generous and fair-minded post about the protest against it, describing it as "dignified and prayerful." There are several good photos of the Prayer Vigil taken by Marcin Mazur. In one of them you may recognise two Catholic bloggers.

You can see this week's Catholic Herald coverage of Tuesday's Prayer Vigil at the new "Exact Editions" version of the paper. (It is free until 27 July.) I am glad to see that the photo is centred on a joyful looking Fr Michael Clifton. Fr Clifton taught me many years ago at the John Fisher School and has been a doughty defender of tradition in the various parishes in which he has since worked. The same page has a rather scathing review of the concert by Igor Toronyi. Page 11 has a very good editorial on the question of the Motu Proprio. The Letters on the same page include one by Dame Suzi Leather protesting that the Charities Act is not secularism by the back door - good that she feels it necessary to comment but sorry, I'm not convinced. Oh, and my little article "Catholic Dilemmas" - this week on telephone salesmen and telling lies.

Someone asked about the canon law relating to concerts held in Churches. Canon 1210 says: "In a sacred place only those things are to be permitted which serve to exercise or promote worship, piety and religion. Anything out of harmony with the holiness the place is forbidden. The Ordinary may, however, for individual cases, permit other uses, provided they are not contrary to the sacred character of the place." There is also a 1987 declaration by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments on " Concerts in Churches ". Regarding the 99 names of Allah concert, the Cathedral authorities would argue that singing the names of Allah promotes peace and harmony and inter-religious dialogue etc. and is therefore OK. They have repeatedly made the point that this was not an act of worship but a concert. The CDW's practical directives say that concerts should only be held in Church to perform music of a religious character and not music of a sec...

Having taken a very slow train down to Brighton, we were alerted to the advantage of taking a fast train up again to Victoria. Arriving in the Piazza at about twenty to seven, there were already some good people saying the Rosary and displaying banners with scripture texts. The concert singing the 99 names of Allah was subject to strict security with a mobile "airport security" style screening tent. The police kindly provided a corral for us to use for our prayers. At 7pm we began by singing the Credo and it was immediately apparent that the participants in this prayer vigil wished to proclaim their faith in the Triune God with enthusiasm. As a priest, I was happy to provide leadership for this group whilst being prepared to recognise that many came under their own initiative. Many people said that they were pleased that a priest came to lead the prayers. We sang, prayed the Rosary, the Divine Mercy Chaplet, the Litany of the Holy Name, the Litany of Loreto, the Salve Regina...

In the combox of the post Outline for Prayer Vigil , there was a comment which began: Anonymous said... This from Mgr Langham: Mgr. Mark Langham, Administrator of Westminster Cathedral explains the background to the concert and Sir John Tavener's composition. [...] Well we know that Mgr Langham has a blog Solomon I Have Surpassed Thee about Westminster Cathedral and a google/blogger profile Administrator . Therefore what has happened here is that some lackey ("anonymous") has been asked to spam the press release round to various blogs. Thank you for that. Do feel free to reply, readers, if you wish.