THE vicar of Christ Church in Ebbw Vale, Gwent, could face prosecution after neighbours complained about the noise of his church’s clock. The tenor bell, which chimes the hour, has been restored and sounded its first notes last month after a six-year silence. The Rev Geoff Waggett was “really annoyed” by the protests: “For every complaint that the council has had, I have had half a dozen people telling me what nonsense it all is,” he said.
TWO branches of the Free Church of Scotland are to go to court in a property dispute. A mediator had proposed that the disputants, the Free Church of Scotland and the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing), recognise each other as separate churches and allow each other’s congregations to use church buildings. But a spokesman for the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) said the proposals “provided no meaningful basis for progress towards reconciliation and reunion on the basis of the Scriptures”.
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A TRAFFIC warden in Paris has been suspended after refusing to remove her headscarf, saying it was contrary to her Islamic faith. The 29-year-old woman, of North African origin, wore the scarf beneath her blue-and-yellow cap. She has refused to work without the scarf, which contravenes the official dress code.
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THE German Government will seek to ban a Muslim gathering in Berlin called to discuss ways of combating “American and Zionist Nazism”. Initially the Federal Government said it was up to the city of Berlin to decide whether to ban the convention, scheduled for October 1-3. But the Government intervened after local officials declined to take action.
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ON Wednesday the Greek Orthodox Church held a memorial service in Athens’s main cathedral for Patriarch Petros VII of Alexandria, the spiritual leader of the 300,000 Greek Orthodox in Africa. Petros, 55, died when a Greek army helicopter taking him to Mount Athos in northern Greece crashed into the sea.
ROMAN Catholic priests in Croatia are demanding £6 million a year to hire chauffeurs after the country introduced a strict law against drink driving. The priests claim the zero-tolerance policy means that Communion wine would put them over the limit and open them to prosecution if they drive after Mass.
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THE United States has rebuked Saudi Arabia for severely curtailing religious liberties. The US State Department’s annual report declared that freedom of religion did not exist in the kingdom, either in practice or in law. Vietnam and Eritrea are also listed for the first time as “countries of particular concern”. They join Burma, China, Iran, North Korea and Sudan.
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THE two chief rabbis of Israel have protested against a plan to merge their posts. Shlomo Amar, Sephardi chief rabbi, and Yona Metzger, Ashkenazi chief rabbi, opposed the proposal on Monday during a meeting of a Knesset committee. A Bill calling for the unification of the chief rabbinate was introduced in the Knesset in last year’s, and was supported by a majority of Knesset members.
MORE than 500 Buddhist monks marched in Colombo, the Sri Lankan capital, on Monday in protest at the forthcoming film Hollywood Buddha. The movie, by the independent film-maker Philippe Caland, is about a struggling producer who rents a Buddha statue at the behest of a Buddhist friend who believes it will bring him luck. The monks were outraged by a poster for the film, which shows a man seated on the head of the statue.
LEBANON has banned Dan Brown’s controversial thriller The Da Vinci Code. It acted after the country’s Catholic Information Centre complained that the novel “harmed Christian beliefs”. Lebanon is the first nation to ban the book, which claims that the Church has conspired to suppress that Jesus Christ married Mary Magdalene.
THE Egyptian Government is considering steps to prevent mosques issuing “cacophonous” calls to prayer. Mahmoud Zaqzouq, the Religious Affairs Minister, is examining the feasibility of linking mosques in the same town so that a single call goes out. “People complain bitterly about the cacophony from loudspeakers in the mosques,” Mr Zaqzouq explained. But Abdel-Sabour Shahin, head of the Sharia law faculty at al-Azhar University, has criticised the plan. “How can they pretend to lower the sound level of the call when it is aimed at awakening the faithful so they can accomplish their sacred duty?” he asked.
LOS ANGELES County is to remove a cross from its official emblem after civil-rights campaigners threatened to sue it for violating the separation of Church and State. The county’s board of supervisors voted 3-2 on Tuesday to adopt a new city seal to replace a 1957 emblem which features a small cross above the Hollywood Bowl concert venue.
THE Canadian Prime Minister apologised this week for blaspheming during a televised discussion. Paul Martin was heard muttering “Jesus Christ!” after a presentation by Gary Doer, the Premier of Manitoba. An embarrassed Mr Martin opened the second session by apologising, saying he had been reacting to a note passed to him by a member of staff. “I have two aunts,” he explained, “and during the break one of my aunts called me and essentially pointed out that I had used inappropriate language and suggested a bar of soap. I want to apologise to anybody who might have taken offence at what I said, and I apologise to my aunt.”