You are currently browsing the monthly archive for August 2007.
Rather like the proverbial bus, I’ve got two advance copies of new publications coming my way from over the pond in the next couple of weeks. My friends, Brian McLaren and Scot McKnight, are publishing two very different, but potentially very challenging books, more or less simultaneously.
I read today that the Killer of the head teacher, Philip Lawrence, has successfully appealed against his deportation to Italy (should he be released next year after serving a minimum 12 year sentence) on the grounds that it would breach his human rights.
Naturally, this has raised questions as to the implementation and extent of an individual’s human rights, over and above that of another person, or indeed the wider community.
Many commentators are outraged that a convicted killer should appeal to the ideal of human rights (and win their case) when their own actions have undermined one of the foundations of the entire declaration: Everyone has the right to life, liberty and the security of person. Indeed, Philip Lawrence’s own widow has stated that she is, ‘unutterably depressed that the Human Rights Act has failed to encompass the rights of my family to lead a safe, secure and happy life.’
Apologies if you’re popping by to discover that my blog hasn’t been updated for a week or so. I’ve been traveling around, trying to make the most of a bad summer and finding bolt holes to work on my next book – deadline fast approaching and only half written!
While I think of something to write, I thought I’d give you all a heads up for a book that’s just come out – Find Your Voice: Developing the Prophetic in you and your church by David Oliver.
David is a bit of a marketing guru, but he also works with Care For the Family from time to time, and some of you may know him from his Love Work, Live Life seminars and book, which I helped to produce.
In case this has passed you by, Northern India, Nepal and Bangladesh are suffering their worst flooding for decades.
Hundreds dead, 20 million people displaced. Whole villages destroyed, crops washed away, livestock drowned. A high risk that diarrhoea, typhoid and cholera will claim the lives of more people, especially the young and old.
Even when the floods have receded, hunger and starvation are likely to be widespread due to the fact that many of the people affected are subsistence farmers rather than commercial crop producers.
