Publicity

The Hastings Observer today (Friday 30 october) has included, on page 2, a report of our last meeting under the heading "Humanists discuss clairvoyance", based on a News Release that I sent two weeks ago. It concludes with details of our November meeting.

This is the first time we have appeared so near the front of the paper. Possibly this may relate to the connection of our meeting with the paper's promotion of an "Evening of Clairvoyance", so it includes news of their own activities as well as ours.

I've already had an enquiry by telephone from someone who has seen the article and is interested in coming along.

The Arts Forum has put one of our posters in their window. I also gave one to the Hastings Trust, but haven't seen it in their window yet. It's quite time consuming travelling around trying to get people to put up a poster, and I'm not sure that anyone ever notices them anyway! You can download one in PDF form (see the column on the right). Please print it out and put it on display, anywhere legal will do.

Sometimes we should worry about our fellow countrymen

According to a recent poll, 54% of Britons believe that Creationism should be taught alongside evolutionary theory in science lessons!

The story, as reported in the Guardian is here.

Thankfully, the government seems to have come up with a reasonable response:

The UK government has been quick to denounce creationism and intelligent
design as unrecognised scientific theory that did not meet the requirements of
the national curriculum, but it has said that young people can "discuss
creationism as part of their religious education classes".
Neither the
primary nor secondary school science curriculums mention creationism or
intelligent design.

Perhaps creationism could be taught in science with the purpose of demonstrating that there is no evidence for it. This may be a useful exercise in teaching children how an argument or theory can fail when there is insufficient evidence to support it. However, from memory, enough went wrong in the school science lab when we were trying to prove things that did stand up to scrutiny. That seemed to take enough time as it was; surely there isn't enough time in the classroom to take apart an argument which doesn't meet scientific criteria?

Doublethink Alive and Well

The government has published a response to a petition to 10 Downing Street on Removing Collective Worship from non-faith schools.

All community, foundation or voluntary schools MUST offer a daily act of collective worship which is broadly of a Christian character in keeping with the religious traditions of this country.

Schools can apply to the SACRE ... to have the requirement for collective worship lifted [So it's NOT compulsory like you just said after all?]

... if it is not appropriate for the pupils in their school. [So christian worship is appropriate in a non-faith school?]

... collective worship provides the ... unique opportunity to [do all sorts of other things that are not worship! that could be done in other non-unique ways]

Parents have the right to withdraw their child from collective worship [but only by creating a hullaballoo, and singling their child out for special bullying.]

The Age of Wonder

The Essay series on BBC Radio 3 has resumed its Enlightenment theme whis week with five programmes about Haydn. Wednesday's issue featured the biographer Richard Holmes talking about possible influences on Haydn's "Creation" oratorio of his visit to William Herschel's observatory in Slough, and Erasmus Darwin whose poem "Zoonomia" came out in 1791, at the time when Haydn was in this country. In particular his, non-biblical, depiction of the Chaos from which the Universe supposedly emerged.

Richard Holmes is also the author of The Age of Wonder which explores the history of that period and the relationship between the romantic poets and artists and the scientists and explorers of the time. This has received glowing reviews and won the Royal Society's Prize for science book of the year.

Teaching of evolution in the primary curriculum

There was a petition recently as follows:

“We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to include the teaching of evolution by natural selection in the new national primary curriculum.”

The PM's office has now responded (the following answer follows a load of old flannel about needing scientists for the country's growth, etc):

The proposed new primary curriculum has been developed in consultation with a wide range of key stakeholders including primary head teachers, teachers, subject specialists and learned societies. The development of the scientific and technological understanding area of learning was directly informed by the outcomes of the consultation exercise to ensure that it contained the scientific knowledge, skills and understanding considered essential learning for children aged 5 -11.

The National Curriculum science programmes of study cover evolution explicitly in Key Stage 4 (age 14 -16). The understanding of evolution is underpinned by extensive knowledge about the living world. This underpinning knowledge and understanding for evolution is carefully developed in the primary curriculum and at Key Stage 3 (age 11 -14). In both the current primary programme of study for science and in the proposed programme of learning for scientific and technological understanding, variation between individuals and groups, classification and interdependence are all introduced. At secondary level these areas are developed further and genetics, selection and evolution are all included. In this way the fundamental concepts underpinning evolution are developed, leading to a fuller understanding at Key Stage 4.



Or, to put it briefly (if I'm reading this properly), the answer to the petition is "not quite".

Okay - so they've made their decision on science.

"key stakeholders", "outcomes of the consultation exercise"?

When is someone going to teach the PM's office some plain English?

Priest attacks "modern" funerals

Some of you may have seen this article.
http://www.thisiskent.co.uk/tunbridgewells/Vicar-attack-mourner-tributes/article-1427997-detail/article.html

Speaking as someone who conducts funerals, I'm afraid I have a lot to say on this subject:

Here are a couple of quotes from the article:

Father Ed Tomlinson, of St Barnabas' Church, Quarry Road, said he had better ways of spending his time than at crematorium services where the dead were "led in by the tunes of Tina Turner...and sent into the furnace with 'I Did It My Way' blaring out across the speakers".


Better ways of spending his time than helping someone say goodbye to a loved one? That would not appear to be a very supportive or kind attitude.

He added: "I have... stood at the 'crem' like a lemon, wondering why on earth I am present."

Here's the news, Fr Tomlinson - the funeral is not about you - you are merely a tool (and I use the word carefully) to help a grieving family have some kind of ritual as they make their goodbye.

For some people, a priest at the funeral is the right thing; it allows them to pray to their god, and give them the comfort that they get from their religion. But is it really up to the church or its representatives to tell people what they should have?

Another quote in the article, from a local funeral director, suggests that many mourners don't know what they want. This is true, particularly if the death is unexpected. But that's where the skills of the undertaker and the celebrant (religious or otherwise) come into play, to let the mourners know what their options are and to only offer advice when it is requested.

The original blog post (and subsequent article) may simply be the ramblings of a particularly angry priest. However, it could backfire; having looked at the comments to the online article, it would appear that Fr Tomlinson has his supporters, but there are also those who feel that his approach to funerals is not the one that they would want.

And, of course, he managed to let people know (because not everyone does) that there is a humanist alternative to the man in a frock. For that, we thank him.

Faith Good, Secularism Bad?

There have been two attacks on Secularism in recent speeches by religious politicians. The first by Baroness Warsi at the Conservative conference:

The state's continued suspicion of faith is wrong /// under Labour, the State has become increasingly sceptical of an individuals religious belief. /// At the heart of these cases lies a growing intolerance and illiberal attitude towards those who believe in God. The scepticism of senior Liberal Democrat MP Evan Harris driving this secular agenda has now grown to become an ideology permeating through many parts of the public sector. It's an agenda driven by the political-elite, who have hijacked the pursuit of equality by demanding a dumbing down of faith. It's no wonder that this leads to accusations in the media that our country's Christian culture is being downgraded.

The second by Tony Blair in a speech to Muslims in the US:

We face the challenge of relevance - showing how faith can be a force for the future, for progress, that it will not fade as science, technology and material prosperity alters the way we live. We face an aggressive secular attack from without. We face the threat of extremism from within. These challenges are not for Muslims alone or Christians or Jews, Hindus or Buddhists for that matter. They are challenges for all people of faith. Those who scorn God and those who do violence in God's name, both represent views of religion. But both offer no hope for faith in the twenty first century.

His equation of "those who scorn God" with "those who do violence in God's name", is particularly pernicious, as if critical words and bombs were equally harmful.