WHEN West Side High School in Trenton, New Jersey, chose a church in which to hold a graduation ceremony, they had no idea what a can of worms their decision would open.

The school’s choice of venue – the New Hope Baptist Church – turned out to be “offensive” to Muslim student Bilal Shareef, who claimed he was forced to skip his 2006 graduation because his religious beliefs prohibited him from entering buildings containing icons of God.

Said Shareef, who together with his father, brought a religious discrimination lawsuit against Newark school district authorities:

I was forced to choose between honouring my education and my faith, and no one should be put in that position.

According to an NJ.Com report yesterday, the lawsuit was settled when Shareef, now a college student, received an apology from the school district, and given assurances that it would not hold future events in houses of worship.

Said the wounded Shareef:

I’m proud I stood up for my beliefs and I’m proud that my experience will keep other students from having to face the choices I did.

The lawsuit was filed on his behalf by the American Civil Liberties Union.

Schools Superintendent Dr. Marion Bolden said in a statement that the location of prior ceremonies was “not in any way intended” to make students or parents uncomfortable.

Said Ed Barocas, the ACLU lawyer who represented Shareef:

We’re very pleased. These are important policy changes to ensure that no student is made to feel like an outsider as Bilal was.

CATHOLIC Lena Wojdan is a Warsaw-based psychologist who, unlike Iris Robinson’s pet psychiatrist who thinks gays can be “turned around”, believes instead that homosexuality is “a burden from God” which people must learn to accept.

They [homosexuals] need to accept that God created them as they are. This is something that they have been given to bear as a burden. The goal isn’t to change the patient, to shift their orientations, but rather to prepare them to accept their leanings.

To this end, this crucifix-wearing, primitive muppet is engaged in a guilt-inducing programme in Lublin at the secretive Odwaga centre, which was founded in 2007 by the Catholic Church-linked Light-Life Foundation. Journalists are not welcomed there

The aim of the programme is to convince participants they should try to choose between a “sinful” sex-life and a chaste, Christian existence.

Said Wojdan:

This is a kind of suffering which has meaning for Christians, a suffering that they have to face each day. A human being is capable of knowing what’s really important to him or her and thus of overcoming his or her feelings. When you want a sweet, for example, you are completely able to resist the urge.

According to this Yahoo report, Odwaga’s standard programmes are lengthy. For the first year, participants must devote one weekend a month to support-group sessions. And For the following two years, they devote 20 hours a month to group therapy sessions led by psychologists, who are often priests.

When not praying with priests, the “burdened”, if they are male, also kick footballs around and the women are given cooking lessons.

One graduate of the centre, who wishes to remain anonymous, said:

Today I feel free because I no longer need to live out my homosexuality actively. I no longer feel I’m a lesbian and I have even started to discover men.

For gay rights campaigners, the Odwaga programmes, which have been replicated elsewhere in this über-Catholic country where gays are considered sick, deviant or sinners, are an aberration and can even threaten participants’ mental health.

Said Marta Abramowicz, a psychologist who works for the Campaign Against Homophobia, a Polish-based gay rights group.

When a homosexual goes to see these psychologists, he or she is told: ‘You’ll get over it.’ But you don’t ‘get over it’. As a result, the person slides into depression. I’ve even known people who committed suicide.

AMSTERDAM, for decades regarded as the safest of cities for gay people, is still in shock after a serious daylight attack was carried out by a group of cowardly Muslim thugs on a man taking part in a fashion show.

According to PinkNews, model Mike Du Pree was taking part in a show to promote tolerance towards gay people when a gang of ten Muslim youths dragged him from the catwalk and beat him.

Mr Du Pree’s nose was broken in what was a clearly homophobic attack.

The fashion event was held last week on a public holiday marking the birth of Holland’s late Queen Julianna.

Fashion show organiser Jennifer Delano said that the atmosphere at the event was tense, and that the violence demonstrated that Amsterdam is no longer a tolerant city.

MPs have raised the incident in Parliament.

Said Party of Freedom MP Martin Bosma:

This shows how strong the Islamic gay bashers feel they are. Even in daylight, in the heart of Amsterdam, they strike. Only the hardest measures could turn this sick trend.

The Dutch nationality of the gay bashers of Rembrandt Square should immediately be taken from them and they should be expelled from the country today. The Netherlands can show no mercy for these people who damage our society in this way. Either they will win, or we will win.

In 2006, an American journalist, Chris Crain, was brutally beaten by a gang of Muslims during a visit to Amsterdam. He subsequently wrote an account of his attack in the Washington Blade. Subsequent press reports throughout Europe alerted gay men and lesbians that something rotten – Islamic homophobia – had taken root in Amsterdam.

More than half of Dutch gays now feel less safe than they did a year ago, a survey carried out last August by current affairs programme EenVandaag revealed.

Sixty-four per cent of anti-gay incidents were verbal but 12 per cent resulted in physical abuse.

Amsterdam’s image in the Netherlands as the ‘gay capital of the world’ is also under threat as the survey revealed gays there were more fearful than in other parts of country.

Had Du Pree been attacked in Northern Ireland, loopy MP Iris Robinson, wife of the First Minister of Northern Ireland, would, no doubt, have told him to get “cured” of his homosexuality.

Reacting to news that a local man, Stephen Smith, had been viciously attacked because he is gay, she suggested that he should consider “turn-around” therapy. Speaking on BBC Radio Ulster this Christian nutter condemned the attack on but added:

I have a very lovely psychiatrist who works with me in my offices and his Christian background is that he tries to help homosexuals trying to turn away from what they are engaged in. And I have met people who have turned around to become heterosexual.

Smith, 27, was attacked by a gang of youths in Newtownabbey last week and suffered head and leg injuries. The police are calling the assault homophobic in nature.

UPDATE: 09.00 June 7: Listeners to Radio 4’s Today programme this morning heard Eamonn McCann, a leading Irish atheist and writer, say that Iris Robinson’s remarks were unsurprising, given her affiliation to the Protestant Unionist party, the DUP – until recently led by N. Ireland’s most vociferous anti-gay campaigner, the Rev Ian Paisley.

He also pointed out that a welcome atmosphere of tolerance had overtaken N Ireland very quickly in the past few years, with strong anti-discriminatory laws put in place. This, undoubtedly, would have been a great source of annoyance to old-guard Jesus junkies like Iris Robinson, who still look to the Bible for moral and political guidance.

Her words, he said., amounted to a “scream” of frustration.

AS someone who has frequently complained to hotel managers about Gideons Bibles in the rooms I have occupied – “remove it now, or I will clog up the bog with the thing” usually did the trick – I was delighted to learn today that the American Civil Liberties Union has warned a school district in Ohio that it will take legal action if administrators don’t stop Christian busybodies from handing the Bibles to students during class time.

Fifth grade students at the Findlay’s five elementary schools in March were allowed to leave class and escorted to sidewalks where they were given a Gideon Bible.

“The school crossed the line,” said Carrie Davis, an ACLU attorney.

The district’s school board is now reviewing its policies on the distribution of materials from community groups, said Findlay Superintendent Dean Wittwer. “The Bible handout has been going on for years,” he said.

Gideons International is a group of Christian men who give out Bibles to students, prisoners, soldiers and others. It says it has distributed 1.3 billion Scriptures worldwide since 1908.

Christine Link, executive director of the ACLU of Ohio, said that students and parents who want information about a particular religion should do it outside of school time.

The school cannot be involved in sacrificing classroom time to help them hand out the Bibles.

Things have changed since the days I was compelled to complain about hotel Bibles. Many hotels have now ditched them, fearing that their presence might lead to demands that other “holy” books be placed in or on bedside cabinets. So it would seem that purveyors of the Bibles are now targeting children.

This trend was roundly condemned by Albert Mohler, President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and host of the Christian Radio show, the Albert Mohler Programme.

This is sad, but it is also a sign of the times. Gladly, not all chains and hotels have followed this example. The fact is that many persons have come to faith in Jesus Christ by reading a Bible supplied to their hotel room by the Gideons. Many others have turned to the Bible when in crisis. Some have even decided against suicide when they read from the Gideon’s Bible. Are they now to look for salvation and solace from an iPod docking station or a goldfish?

The iPod and goldfish references were gleaned from an article in Newsweek:

In the rooms of Manhattan’s trendy Soho Grand Hotel guests can enjoy an eclectic selection of underground music, iPod docking stations, flat-screen TVs and even the living company of a complimentary goldfish. But, alas, the word of God is nowhere to be found. Unlike traditional hotels, the 10-year-old boutique has never put Bibles in its guest rooms, because ’society evolves’, says hotel spokeswoman Lori DeBlois. Providing Bibles would mean the hotel ‘would have to take care of every guest’s belief’.

What might be surprising to many Americans is that the Bible-free room isn’t a development just in hip New York City hotels. Across the country upscale accommodations are doing away with the Bible as a standard room amenity. And in its stead have arrived a slew of “lifestyle” products that cater to a younger, hipper (and presumably less religious) clientele. Since 2001 the number of luxury hotels with religious materials in the rooms has dropped by 18 percent, according to the American Hotel and Lodging Association.

The Nashville-based Gideons International, which has distributed copies of the Christian scripture to hotels since 1908, declined to comment on this trend.

ONCE again criticism of religion has been wrongly equated with racism – which is, of course, a different kettle of fish altogether, and should rightly be condemned.

Nevertheless, it was reported today that legendary sex symbol Brigitte Bardot, 73, has been fined £12,000 for “inciting racial hatred” against Muslims for speaking out against unspeakable acts of cruelty.

Her bizarre conviction by a court in Paris – her fifth – arose as a result of the animal rights campaigner arguing that Muslims should stun animals before slaughtering them during the annual Aid al-Kabir blood-letting festival. (See earlier Freethinker report here).

According to the Daily Telegraph, in December 2006 the retired French film star-turned-animal rights activist wrote a letter to France’s then interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, demanding animal stunning.

She outraged anti-racist groups by saying:

I’ve had enough of being led by the nose by this whole population which is destroying us, and destroying our country by imposing their ways.

She was absent from today’s court hearing in Paris, but wrote to prosecutors saying:

I’m sickened by how anti-racist groups are harassing me. I won’t shut up until stunning is carried out on animals before their ritual slaughter.

Miss Bardot, who shot to word-wide fame in the 50s in the lead role in And God Created Woman, already had four convictions on similar charges.

In 2004 she was fined £4000 for inciting racial hatred in her book A Cry in the Silence.

France is home to Europe’s largest Muslim community, estimated at five million people.

You can see other sickening pictures of animals being ritually-slaughtered here.

NEW consumer protection laws that came into force last week covering stuff like clairvoyancy and fortune-telling has set the internet buzzing with speculation as to whether religions ought to be covered by the new regulations.

According to a Times report:

Fortune-tellers and astrologists will be bracketed with double-glazing salesman under the new Consumer Protection Regulations. Fortune-tellers will have to tell customers that what they offer is ‘for entertainment only’ and not ‘experimentally proven’. This means that a fortune-teller who sets up a tent at a funfair will have to put up a disclaimer on a board outside.

Similar disclaimers will need to be posted on the websites of faith healers, spiritualists or mediums where appropriate, as well as on invoices and at the top of any printed terms and conditions.

Andy Millmore, a partner at the law firm Harbottle & Lewis in London, is quoted as saying:

What is significant is the sweeping nature of the regulations. They will effectively criminalise actions that might in the past have escaped legal censure, even if they may perhaps have been covered by industry voluntary codes. Personalised services may also come under scrutiny. A tarot pack reader, for instance, cannot just pick one of several templates - it would have to be a proper reading designed for that person.

Claims to secure good fortune, contact the dead or heal through the laying-on of hands are all services that will also have to carry disclaimers, other lawyers say.

Said one:

You could argue that this is no different from promises given by the Church of Eternal Life, which people pay for, in the sense that they feel obliged to give to the collection. It’s no more proven.

The Spiritualist Workers’ Association attacked the changes, saying on its website:

We do not believe we are conducting a scientific experiment. To have to stand up and say so is a denial of our beliefs. It is also sending out a message that we do not believe what we are saying and doing.

Lyn Guest de Swarte, a clairvoyant, said:

It’s like trying to regulate God.

Commenting on the new regulations, Times columnist and atheist Matthew Parris said:

Another example of careless jurisprudence this week: on Monday a new law came into force requiring fortune-tellers, clairvoyants, astrologers and mediums to stipulate explicitly that their services are for ‘entertainment only’.

Well, trades descriptions legislation is anciently established; but in the realms of the spirit, prophecy, invisible worlds, ghosts and human souls, it has generally been felt that the whole thing is too cloudy for law … By deeming in law - for that is what this measure does - that claims about worlds undreamt of in your philosophy, Horatio, are false, Parliament has taken a serious step in principle, even if the measure itself is trivial and most clairvoyants are only jokers anyway.

What, for instance, about the “faith” community? Perhaps it’s there in the legislative small print already. There will have to be an exception in law for ‘religions’. Whereupon clairvoyants will presumably rename themselves spiritualists. And spiritualists will presumably claim the status of a religion. Whereupon lawmakers will stipulate that a ‘religion’ has to centre around a deity. Whereupon Buddhism will cease to be a ‘religion’; and …

Here is a selection of amusing readers’ comments that followed the original Times report:

• Does this mean that placards should be placed at the entrance to all places of worship saying, ‘all who enter here don’t believe all you see and hear.

• I trust that every Bible and other such book will carry an appropriate disclaimer regarding the reliability of its content and promises. And that preachers will similarly preface every sermon with ‘for entertainment only’.

• Coming soon to a church near you….. A huge great ‘not experimentally proven’sign. If you’re going to discriminate against one form of spiritual activity (be it questionable or not) at least discriminate against them all.

• Will this stop religions obtaining money from the Government, particularly in education, on the basis of their predictions of life after death, the claimed existence of God and the validity of their doctrine which they may believe, but cannot prove?

• Does this mean that people who promise salvation or 42 virgins if you do what they tell you can be done under the new regulations ? This looks like a good way to get rid of religions

• We should also get Trading Standards to target religious establishments. After all they too invoke the supernatural and superstition, in order to give their customers some sort of reassurance about the future. Despite holding huge financial assets they also continually ask the public for money.

• The difference is that religion doesn’t charge you for the service they provide, any money they receive is purely voluntary. Astrologers, psychic healers, mediums etc charge you for a service that is claimed to do a lot of things that are scientifically unproven. I agree with the change.

• Religion not charging? Islam makes a big deal about the faithful paying the “religious tax” and even imposes punitive taxes on non-muslims to permit them to follow their own faith. Look up zakat and jizyah. These are not voluntary, though perhaps they cannot be enforced in the courts here.

• Hmm, religion doesn’t charge … money from the government, collections at the church/mosque/synagogue/temple, purchase of the Qu’ran, Bible, Torah, Vedas, etc, ‘donations’ to the church to obtain that date for your special day. We all pay for religion even if it’s just through taxes. It’s a farce.

EVER since witnessing – as a 12-year-old – the sickening slaughter of calf by a rabbi who slit the animal’s throat and impassively watched it in its death throes, I have sworn off religiously-slaughtered meat, and have gone to great lengths to avoid all kosher and halal produce.

So you can imagine my disgust when – a couple of weeks back – the BBC Radio 4 consumer affairs programme, You and Yours, reported – in an overall tone of approval – that an increasing number of supermarkets in the UK were stocking ritually-slaughtered meat to sweeten their Muslim clientele. The programme contained not one word of criticism of this barbaric form of slaughter.

But then came the backlash. Last Friday You and Yours reported that it had received a substantial number of emails and letters from people deeply concerned that halal meat was entering our food chain. I, of course, was one of the many who emailed the BBC to complain.

According to You and Yours, halal meat “accounts for around a quarter of the UK’s meat trade”. When Muslim’s make up only three percent of the UK population it follows that a good deal of this meat is finding its way into institutional caring operations and food outlets not trading as halal establishments.

This is quite unacceptable.

Tim Buckley of Suffolk was one of those who complained to the BBC:

Nowhere was the point put that halal meat produce involves unnecessary cruelty. The animals have their throats cut when conscious ….

And Dale Godfrey said:

I think many people who quietly note the rise of in halal meat, especially in public catering, would be horrified if they realised what this meant in terms of animal welfare.

You and Yours spoke to Masood Khawaja of the Halal Food Authority, who gave an assurance that “slight electronic stunning” is permitted in halal slaughter.

The animal is only stunned to be immobilised. The animal should not be dead prior to slaughter (sic). All the flowing blood should be drained out of the animal because flowing blood is not allowed in Islam.

He pointed out that a Muslim prays over the animal at the point of stunning and slaughter.

So that’s OK then.

But You and Yours also made clear that “not all animals are stunned prior to slaughter”.

There is a debate in the Muslim community as to what constitutes halal meat. Some groups like the Halal Monitoring Committee do not consider stunned animals to be truly halal.

It is legal to kill unstunned animals in European Union countries because religious exemptions have been put in place to accommodate the dietary requirements of Muslims and Jews. This is outrageous, and just another sickening example of how groups can get special treatment simply by playing the religion card.

You and Yours asked the Food Standards Agency whether there was a requirement to indicate that meat is halal, and this is the answer it received:

If a meat product is labeled and marketed to a consumer as halal, the animal would have to have been slaughtered using this method. If the meat is not intended for the halal market, there is no law that requires the method of slaughter to be on the label.

This no doubt means that institutions such as hospitals, schools and prisons would rather ALL their meat be halal. This would be more cost effective than having to cater separately for Muslims, but such a policy is a clear violation of the rights of those who do not want to consume halal produce.

Finally, what do you do if, like me, you are passionate about curry, but don’t want halal meat?

The choice is to prepare your own, bite on the bullet and go vegetarian - or walk into a restaurant and demand pork!

According to You and Yours the majority of Indian restaurants in the UK are Bangladeshi-run, and Bangladeshis are Muslims. The programme suggested that between 70 percent and 99.9 percent of these establishments serve halal meat.

Depressing, ain’t it?

FIRST it was the Koran shoot-up. Now, just over a week later, the US military in Iraq are writhing with embarrassment over the idiotic behaviour of a proselytising Christian marine who handed out novelty coins quoting the Gospel in Arabic to Sunni Muslims.

The incident has enraged Iraqis who view it as the latest example of Americans dissing Islam.

According to Worldwide Religious News, the marine, stationed in the western city of Fallujah, this week handed out silver-coloured coins that said in Arabic:

Where will you spend eternity? (John 3:36).

The other side read:

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16).

Said Mike Isho, a US military spokesman in Anbar province, which includes Fallujah:

We are sorry for this behavior. This incident doesn’t represent the morals of the Marines.

Predictably, Muslim leaders went ballistic and were quick to call fore the “severest punishment” of the delusional loon.

Mohammed Amin Abdel-Hadi, the head of the Sunni Endowment in Fallujah, an institution responsible for overseeing the sect’s mosques, said the coins were part of a pattern of insensitivity toward Muslims, and he referred to the incident in which a US sniper in Baghdad used a Koran as a shooting target.

Huffed Hadi:

We demand the Americans leave us alone and stop creating religious controversies. First, they shot the Koran, and now they come to proselytise inside Fallujah.

The marine has been removed from duty pending an investigation.

Mohammed Jassim al-Dulaimi, 43, said a Marine forced one of the coins into his hand this week as he passed through a checkpoint at the western entrance to Fallujah. He said he was shocked when he read it.

The claims that the occupation is a Crusader War make sense now.

Dr Muhsin al-Jumaili, a professor of law and religious studies in Fallujah, said the act was especially provocative in Fallujah – which is known for its large number of mosques.

As Muslims, we cannot accept this. The Americans should concentrate on maintaining security and not doing missionary work.

Said Col Bill Buckner, a US military spokesman in Baghdad:

Regulations prohibit members of the coalition force from proselytising any religion, faith or practices. Our troops are trained on those guidelines before they deploy.

Hmmm. Not trained well enough, it would seem.

IT may have happened in Nowhereville – aka Mojave, California – but the fall-out from a Ford dealership radio ad in this über-Christian enclave is fast becoming a growing embarrassment for the Ford Motor Company around the world.

Here’s the sorry tale, gleaned from The Underground Unbeliever:

A while back the Kieffe & Sons Ford dealership decided to have a pop at atheists in an offensive ad broadcast on a local radio station, The Quake.

This is the message Kieffe & Sons had for potential customers:

Did you know that there are people in this country who want prayer out of schools, ‘Under God’ out of the Pledge, and ‘In God We Trust’ to be taken off our money?

But did you know that 86 percent of Americans say they believe in God? Since we all know that 86 out of every 100 of us are Christians, who believe in God, we at Kieffe & Sons Ford wonder why we don’t tell the other 14 percent to sit down and shut up.

I guess I just offended 14 percent of the people who are listening to this message. Well, if that is the case then I say that’s tough, this is America folks, it’s called free speech. None of us at Kieffe & Sons Ford is afraid to speak out. Kieffe & Sons Ford on Sierra Highway in Mojave and Rosamond, if we don’t see you today, by the grace of God, we’ll be here tomorrow.

The words of Mr Kieffe are now rebounding throughout the internet, with outraged atheists vowing to boycott Ford products.

This is what Anna Lemma, creator of The Undergound Unbeliever declared:

Well, Mr Kieffe, you won’t be seeing me either today or tomorrow. And you certainly won’t be seeing my money.

What an asshole. It seems that he is for free speech for himself and his majority, but the rest of us 14 percent are second class citizens who need to ‘sit down and shut up.’

And she offered a new version of the ad. “After all, ‘it’s called free speech.’”

Did you know that there are people in this country who are assholes that want to shove their religion in everyone’s faces? …

And she gave this advice to Kieffe & his sons:

We at the Freethinker urge readers of this post to contact Kieffe & Sons and POLITELY explain why their ad was so offensive, and so damaging to the Ford brand. Here are their address:

Kieffe & Sons Ford
16400 Sierra Highway
Mojave, CA 93501

Phone: (661) 824-2477
FAX: (661) 824-2801
Rosamond

Kieffe & Sons Ford
2985 Sierra Highway
Rosamond, CA 93560

Phone: (661) 256-2811
FAX: (661) 256-2743

E-mail at ksf@kieffeandsons.com

Hat tip: Freethinker subscriber Denis Watkins

IF you thought that political correctness is a peculiarly British affliction, think again.

We have just learned that the Amsterdam Police Authority want their officers to read the Koran in order to engage better with members of the surly Muslim community, who find Dutch liberalism – particularly in regard to the acceptance of homosexuality – intolerable.

Not only does the authority want police to read the Koran, they are prepared to subsidise the cost of providing the book to the tune of 50 percent.

A police spokesman explained that many officers have some knowledge of the Bible, but that the Koran was often unknown territory. The police authority reckons the new version, designed to be accessible to the general Dutch public, will give officers more insight into Islam.

But will police officers get the “real” Koran – you know, the horrible one that encourages terrorism and promotes misogyny, homophobia and anti-Semitism?

Apparently not. This Koran appears to be a revisionist version, with all the nasty bits left out.

It has been written in Dutch by Kader Abdolah, an Iranian writer living in Holland, who appears to have his heart in the right place.

In a recent interview, this is what Abdolah said of the traditional Koran:

A country becomes a living hell when you try to govern it with the Koran! The outcome is what you can see in Iran today.

Right-wing Party for Freedom (PVV) MPs are outraged by the plan, with Sietse Fritsma calling it “Islam propaganda” and saying that public money should not be spent on it.

The PVV today demanded that the government intervene to scrap the plan.

If the Amsterdam police really want their officers to understand Islam, they should hand out free copies of Abdulla Aziz’s Mohammed’s Believe it or Else, which can be downloaded in pdf format here.

NOTICE the huge demonstrations mounted in the UK this weekend by law-abiding Muslims outraged over the fact that jihadis had recruited a mentally ill man to carry out the bungled terrorist attack in Exeter?

Nope? Well we didn’t either. Maybe that’s because no provocative cartoons were published in retaliation.

Yet according to Britain’s most prominent Muslim politician, Lord Ahmed:

Decent law-abiding Muslims are outraged that people who claim to be followers of Islam should prey on the mentally infirm and encourage them to murder people on a large scale. We should consider hanging for this type of crime.

Hanging?

Lord Ahmed, of all people, should realise that the reprehensible death cult he represents actively encourages martyrdom, and that these vile, sex-starved fanatics he condemns would love nothing more than to be fast tracked to paradise to shove their under-used genitals into those 72 promised virgins.

What is far more likely to bring Muslims onto the streets in a rage are the words of The Bishop of Rochester, the Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, who yesterday accused the Church of England of failing in its duty to convert British Muslims to Christianity.

Dr Nazir-Ali faced death threats earlier this year after saying that some parts of the country had become “no-go areas” for non-Muslims, and by encouraging apostasy – which carries the death sentence in some Islamic countries - he will now doubt be pilloried even further by Muslims.

The Pakistani-born bishop was echoing concerns that many Church leaders are abandoning attempts to spread Christianity among Muslims out of fear of a backlash.

Dr Peter Brierley, a former Government statistician and expert on Church figures, has estimated that at least 50,000 Britons had converted from Christianity to Islam over the past decade, while the number of Muslims becoming Christians was negligible.

And new projections from the independent Christian Research organisation suggest numbers attending mosque on Fridays will overtake those going to church on Sundays by 2050.

Senior Churchmen are jittery about discussing the issue publicly, especially so soon after Dr Williams provoked outrage by supporting the introduction of elements of Sharia into British law.

See full report here.

CITY of London Police have been made to look exceedingly foolish following their issuing of a court summons to a teenager for displaying a sign that branded Scientology a “dangerous cult”.

Which, of course, is precisely what it is.

And today the boy’s protest was vindicated when the Crown Prosecution Service ruled the words were neither “abusive or insulting” to the church and no further action would be taken against him.

The unnamed 16-year-old was handed a court summons by City of London police for refusing to put down a placard saying “Scientology is not a religion, it is a dangerous cult” during a peaceful protest outside the church’s headquarters near St Paul’s Cathedral earlier this month.

Police said they had “strongly advised” him to stop displaying the sign but he refused, citing a high court judgment from 1984 in which the organisation was described as a cult.

The summons was issued under the Public Order Act on the grounds that the sign incited religious hatred.

A file was passed to the CPS, which today told City of London police it would not be pursuing the boy through the courts.

A spokeswoman for the force said:

The CPS review of the case includes advice on what action or behaviour at a demonstration might be considered to be threatening, abusive or insulting. The force’s policing of future demonstrations will reflect this advice.

A CPS spokesman added:

In consultation with the City of London police, we were asked whether the sign, which read ‘Scientology is not a religion it is a dangerous cult’, was abusive or insulting. Our advice is that it is not abusive or insulting and there is no offensiveness, as opposed to criticism, neither in the idea expressed nor in the mode of expression. No action will be taken against the individual.

The teenager’s mother said the decision was “a victory for free speech”.

We’re all incredibly proud of him. We advised him to take the placard down when we realised what was happening but he said ‘No, it’s my opinion and I have a right to express it.

The incident occurred on 10 May outside Scientology’s controversial Square Mile headquarters, at a rally spearheaded by the online activist movement Anonymous.

The boy responded to the police warning by quoting a High Court judgement from 1984 in which Justice Latey repeatedly said in a family division case that Scientology was a “cult” - one that was “immoral”, “socially obnoxious”, “corrupt”, “sinister” and “dangerous

The City of London Scientology building opened in 2006. The financial district’s police force was heavily criticised at the time for their apparent endorsement of the sect. Kevin Hurley, the force’s Chief Superintendent praised its work for bringing “positive good” at the opening of the multimillion-pound site, and it later emerged that officers had accepted hospitality from Scientology, including tickets to film premieres, lunches and concerts at police premises. The organisation also made donations of thousands of pounds to the City of London Children’s Charity.

A MUSLIM husband threatened to sue an all-female driving school after discovering that his wife’s driving instructor was once a man.

According to ReligionNewsBlog, Joanne Dixon, owner of the Laugh ‘n’ Pass driving school which operates throughout Yorkshire, was called by the ignorant bigot who complained after his wife’s first lesson with 42-year-old Emma Sherdley – formerly a married father of two called Andrew but now legally a woman.

Mrs Dixon said that the man asked her to send a “proper woman” instructor and, later, she received a further call asking for compensation and threatening to sue, saying that she “should have known” not to send Miss Sherdley.

Mrs Dixon, who set up Laugh ‘n’ Pass with all-female teachers 10 years ago, designed to put women learners at their ease, said:

Emma is a popular and very well-respected instructor. The husband insisted said his wife had been out with a male. I replied, No, she’s been with a female. Then he said, ‘Just send a proper female.’

In my eyes we’ve done nothing wrong.

Miss Sherdley has a birth certificate and a “gender recognition certificate” to prove her legal status as a woman, although she is still waiting for final surgery to make her transition from male to female physically complete.

The Laugh ‘n’ Pass website devotes a section to “One special lady by the name of Emma”

Emma is a transgender. She has worked for our driving school for 12 months we are proud of her, everyone loves her. She is sensitive and professional in her work.

Here we accept everyone. We do not discriminate. Life is too short.

Unfortunate in today’s society some others are not as accepting and dislike others for not being like them and we can only feel saddened by this.

Miss Sherdley says that none of her other pupils has had a problem with her sex change and she found the man’s complaints ‘hurtful, offensive and deeply upsetting’.

For that man to threaten to sue me and the driving school is totally and utterly wrong.

At present Laugh ‘n’ Pass employs 20 female instructors, who teach women throughout South and West Yorkshire, and Mrs Dixon said:

Emma’s done really well. She’s so bubbly and gets on with everybody – she’s just one of the girls.