Merged Prayers Banned in Devon Council Meetings!

dafydd said:
Both Houses of Parliament start their business with prayers. How ironic.
http://www.parliament.uk/about/how/business/prayers/
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There is no irony, parliament is soverign councils are not.
There are moves to get prayers changed in the house of commons, as attending prayers is the only way to reserve a seat if the house is going to be busy. No-one has suggested that these prayers are iligal.
 
brodski said:
There is no irony, parliament is soverign councils are not.
There are moves to get prayers changed in the house of commons, as attending prayers is the only way to reserve a seat if the house is going to be busy. No-one has suggested that these prayers are iligal.
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I wasn't suggesting that they are illegal. I was referring to the hypocrisy.
 
You can still have prayers at the start of the meeting so long as they are not on the agenda of that meeting. It's a legal nicety but it's also a loophole that will be exploited.

Steve
 
oggiesnr said:
You can still have prayers at the start of the meeting so long as they are not on the agenda of that meeting. It's a legal nicety but it's also a loophole that will be exploited.

Steve
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If the prayers are part of the meeting they are (currently) ultra vires. They can take place before the meeting has opened, but elected members and officers cannot be required to attend.
 
dafydd said:
You must live a sheltered life.
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Very clever.

Now, can you explain what you meant by hypocrisy in this case.
The fact that parliament has powers to do some things which councils don't is not hypocritical.
 
This incident seems to have been what caused Baroness Warsi to bleat about "militant secularisation". Polly Toynbee (president of the British Humanist Association and honorary associate of the National Secular Society) replies.

I will defend to the death anyone's right to practice any faith, if it breaks no law, interferes with nobody's rights nor claims undue public policy influence. Church bells, calls to prayer, displays of crucifixes, beards or side-locks are freedoms, alongside bare midriffs and knicker-short miniskirts. Personally, I am affronted by women in face veils, but that's my problem. I will argue against them but freedom of speech, thought and dress are non-negotiable. But so is the right to robust argument that may offend religious sensibilities, including the right to challenge the improbability of the faith itself – and the right to make jokes.
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doesnt seem to have lasted very long..

"The government is activating a power it says will allow councils in England to hold prayers at meetings.

Communities secretary Eric Pickles says he is "effectively reversing" the High Court's "illiberal ruling" that a Devon council's prayers were unlawful."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17082136
 
brodski said:
Very clever.

Now, can you explain what you meant by hypocrisy in this case.
The fact that parliament has powers to do some things which councils don't is not hypocritical.
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Thou shalt not steal and the expenses scandal come to mind.
 
ginjawarrior said:
doesnt seem to have lasted very long..

"The government is activating a power it says will allow councils in England to hold prayers at meetings.

Communities secretary Eric Pickles says he is "effectively reversing" the High Court's "illiberal ruling" that a Devon council's prayers were unlawful."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17082136
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The law which will give local authorities the powers of a natural person was passed last year, it just doesn't come into force unroll 12/13. Although it will probably have the effect of overturning this decision (it overides section 111 of the 72 act) it was not brought in in responce to this issue and part one of the locallism act has not been brought forward in responce to this ruling. This minor issue of holding prayers during official meetings has nothing to do with why the localism act was introduced. It is a fundamental shift in the nature of locsl government in England and wales, the Tories have Bern wedded to the idea for a long time, as were labour, although their attempt to bring these sorts of powers in (under the general power of wellbeing) were gutted at juficial review.
 
ginjawarrior said:
doesnt seem to have lasted very long..

"The government is activating a power it says will allow councils in England to hold prayers at meetings.

Communities secretary Eric Pickles says he is "effectively reversing" the High Court's "illiberal ruling" that a Devon council's prayers were unlawful."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17082136
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BBC radio news said today that the change has now been passed. So that Bideford council and others are now free to open their meetings by praying again.

Personally if I were on Bideford council, as someone who thinks that religious belief is obviously and demonstrably dangerous, as well as being made to look absurd by the discoveries of modern science, I think I would feel quite annoyed at Christians on the council insisting that every meeting must start with praying to God.

But perhaps any atheist members of the council can now equally claim the right to read aloud a short “sermon” of their beliefs about the dangerous of religion and the fact that discoveries like evolution have made a mockery of religious claims about God making Man.
 
IanS said:
BBC radio news said today that the change has now been passed. So that Bideford council and others are now free to open their meetings by praying again.

Personally if I were on Bideford council, as someone who thinks that religious belief is obviously and demonstrably dangerous, as well as being made to look absurd by the discoveries of modern science, I think I would feel quite annoyed at Christians on the council insisting that every meeting must start with praying to God.

But perhaps any atheist members of the council can now equally claim the right to read aloud a short “sermon” of their beliefs about the dangerous of religion and the fact that discoveries like evolution have made a mockery of religious claims about God making Man.
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id get them to play a segment of this at each meeting
 
The law is from 1972. So nobody noticed prayers were "illegal" for 40 years? doubtful. I think it's just pettiness combined with self-importance: the desire to "sock it" to religious people combined with the need to proclaim one's own "superiority" for being an atheist. All of course covered with legalistic excuses.

It's a bit like the "ban nativity scenes" movement in the USA. For one thing the legal basis for the claims is highly doubtful (seperation of church and state means "congress can pass no laws favoring religion", never did "no display of religion allowed anywhere on public-owned land", which would, if enforced consistently, had meant the USA has the same policy towards religion as Stalin's USSR). Also, the real reason for the "outrage" of some idiot atheists here is really the same as that of the "outrage" of some idiot Muslims -- not really "respect for the law" or "freedom of religion", but intimidation of those "inferior" people who believe differently than they.
 
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Weird Science said:
The law is from 1972. So nobody noticed prayers were "illegal" for 40 years? doubtful. I think it's just pettiness combined with self-importance: the desire to "sock it" to religious people combined with the need to proclaim one's own "superiority" for being an atheist. All of course covered with legalistic excuses.
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It's not a petty, self-important, or a legal excuse. The objection is nothing of that kind at all.

What you have here is Christian members of a local council insisting that everyone must be subject to them praying aloud to God at the start of each days business meetings.

Many atheists, and many other people too, find that sort of overt religion objectionable for a variety of different reason, which include the rather obvious fact that (a)religious belief can & does become extremely dangerous, (b)it’s homophobic and misogynistic, eg in its views about women and gay people, and (c)all of it’s principal claims, such as the claim that God Made man, have now been shown by science to be entirely untrue and ignorant antiquated superstitious nonsense.

Why would anyone in their right mind want to sit there at each meeting listening to the Christians praying to a God and a religion which endorses objectionable practices & absurd beliefs like that!

The local council is there to make decisions about the funding of projects on such issues as the up-keep of local roads and the maintenance of school sports fields etc. It’s not there as a vehicle for Christians to force their religious beliefs onto others in the workplace.


If religious council members want to pray, then let them do that in private, or do it in church on Sundays. But it should not be any part of the councils work to incorporate sessions of praying aloud to invisible gods.
 
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IanS said:
It's not a petty, self-important, or a legal excuse. The objection is nothing of that kind at all.

What you have here is Christian members of a local council insisting that everyone must be subject to them praying aloud to God at the start of each days business meetings.
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In other words, if you go to that meeting, you might have to watch people pray, like they did for decades.

So, yes, petty, self-important legalistic bigotry.

 
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