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Thoughts and non-ecumenical prayers for a particular community in Glasgow.

BBC Breakfast
@BBCBreakfast
1h
'It's not since 1534 that a British monarch will have prayed next to a Catholic Pope'
Mark Lowen spoke to #BBCBreakfast from Vatican City where King Charles will take part in a service with Pope Leo, the first time this will have happened since the Church of England split from the Catholic Church

https://bbc.co.uk/news/articles/

The King has correctly promoted reconciliation with the Roman Catholic church by this gesture of prayers with the Pope in Rome, also a reflection of the fact that at least as many of his subjects now attend Roman Catholic church services each Sunday as Anglicans do, A significant change from 100 years ago when Christians in the UK were overwhelmingly Church of England or Church of Scotland and of course from the reign of Elizabeth Ist until the Roman Catholic Relief Act in 1791 Roman Catholics were not allowed to publicly worship in Great Britain or Ireland.

However unless the Roman Catholic church allows women priests and bishops and loosens its rules on remarriage of divorcees in church I can't see a merger between it and the Church of England again. Although the non liturgical prayers for same sex couples the Vatican now allow priests to perform are remarkably similar to the prayers the C of E Synod has now approved in C of E churches under LLF

Thoughts and non-ecumenical prayers for a particular community in Glasgow.

BBC Breakfast
@BBCBreakfast
1h
'It's not since 1534 that a British monarch will have prayed next to a Catholic Pope'
Mark Lowen spoke to #BBCBreakfast from Vatican City where King Charles will take part in a service with Pope Leo, the first time this will have happened since the Church of England split from the Catholic Church

https://bbc.co.uk/news/articles/

The King has correctly promoted reconciliation with the Roman Catholic church by this gesture of prayers with the Pope in Rome, also a reflection of the fact that at least as many of his subjects now attend Roman Catholic church services each Sunday as Anglicans do, A significant change from 100 years ago when Christians in the UK were overwhelmingly Church of England or Church of Scotland and of course from the reign of Elizabeth Ist until the Roman Catholic Relief Act in 1791 Roman Catholics were not allowed to publicly worship in Great Britain or Ireland.

However unless the Roman Catholic church allows women priests and bishops and loosens its rules on remarriage of divorcees in church I can't see a merger between it and the Church of England again. Although the non liturgical prayers for same sex couples the Vatican now allow priests to perform are remarkably similar to the prayers the C of E Synod has now approved in C of E churches under LLF

Ha, I don;t think it's the universal church which will be introducing heresy to promote a reconciliation. Why buy a failing competitor when you can just take their customers for free.

If you were a conservative Anglo Catholic Anglican that opposed to female ordination you have likely already long crossed the Tiber or gone Orthodox, certainly since Synod approved women bishops and clergy.

Most of those remaining in the C of E are therefore largely liberal Catholics or conservative evangelicals. Liberal Catholics have no problem with the new female Archbishop of Canterbury and conservative evangelicals tend to be more anti gay relationships than anti women clergy on the whole (hence 2/3 of Synod voted for female clergy and female bishops on a second attempt but only a bare majority of Synod voted for LLF)

All true - but it's very much a dying institution coasting on past momentum at this point whilst Catholicism grows even ahead of immigration factors.

With the enthusiasm young evangelicals seem to have for selling churches and moving in to office buildings with cafes, hard to see the CofE not ending up as a left wing secular enterprise, to whatever extent it isn't already that.

Wasn't Jesus a left wing radical?

Politically, not so much.
(Render unto Caesar, etc)

So quite the opposite of (say) a Marxist.

What's the weather like in Caerphilly today?

Bad enough to affect the result, and if so- who benefits?

Lower turnout and I would expect Plaid to be the beneficiaries. Labour voters have no reason to turn out and how many Reform voters actually plan to vote rather than just say they will? I would say high turnout is good news for the Fukkers.

Reform voters are motivated to cast a protest vote though and Plaid likely need tactical votes from Labour voters to win

Someone said upthread that there has been higher turnout in local council elections, favouring Reform.

This gives credence to the Find Out Now opinion polls which find a lot of support for Reform among previous non-voters.

I expect Reform to win on a higher than normal turnout.

Albanian PM, Edi Rami: "You left Europe because you wanted less boats, and you have more boats."

"You left Europe because you wanted more investment. You have less investment."
https://x.com/BestForBritain/status/1981000123069940025

*fewer* boats. Otherwise correct.

Boats weren't a problem pre Brexit. It was well under 1000, maybe less than 100 arriving via that method back then. The boats started when we paid the French to stop the lorries. Unfortunately it seems migrants prefer the boats to the lorries.

What happened was that the migrants in lorries began to effect operation of the tunnel.

Because the hauliers are held liable for migrants hiding in their vehicles, they were carrying out elaborate check, themselves. In addition, trade was moving to other routes.

Migrants entering the tunnel were causing shutdowns as well.

In the French governmental system, protection of national infrastructure is given high priority. The tunnel is considered as such.

So the French moved rapidly and effectively to protect the tunnel and provide secure parking for lorries arriving at the tunnel.

This eliminated (nearly completely) the tunnel as a route.

The French continue this work.

UK govt paid for the fencing.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a815e0140f0b62302696ec4/Joint_declaration_20_August_2015.pdf

If I remember correctly, the security perimeter fence from the NATO summit in Newport was given to the French to protect the area around the port in Calais.

On the immigration law ghastliness

- a British Passport may help but isn’t 100% solid. Why?
- The Home Sec. can withdraw citizenship from any “dual national”
- From the Begum case, a dual national is someone who *is eligible* for another passport
- Renouncing another nationality might well not be enough. Most countries that allow renunciation allow reacquiring citizenship.
- So a future Home Sec. issues an order cancelling the citizenship of x hundred thousand people in one go.

In Ancient Athens, the Thirty Tyrants used the cancellation of citizenship to get round a law on trials for citizens.

It’s all been done before

As a Jewish person theoretically eligible for an Israeli passport this precedent has always been a little worrying.

Important to remember. If you have a grandparent or closer born on the island of Ireland you're eligible for citizenship, and can therefore be deported if this goes through.
Theoretically.

The way things are going I think anyone who has a connection to another country or has family that do should start to think about a plan B. Not as a baseline but as contingency planning. This country might be heading somewhere very dark. Hope for the best, plan for the worst.

I face the reverse problem. I have no wish to stay in such a country, but nowhere else to go. And where is safe from this nonsense at the moment, anyway?

Three years to work something out.