The Established Church: new book

I note an interesting new book on The Established Church from Continuum, edited by Mark Chapman, Judith Maltby and William Whyte. The line-up is impressive, and I look forward to reading it.

Religious freedom or discrimination ?

Very interesting article in the latest online edition of Amicus Curiae on the recent case of the gay couple and the Christian guesthouse: the legal implications of Hall and Preddy v Bull by James Hand and Pat Feast.

Ray Pahl

I note a Guardian obituary of sociologist Ray Pahl, of note here for his role in the production of the controversial Faith in the City report of 1985.

The Catholic church in Poland

I note two interesting articles in the Guardian on the state of religious observance in Poland, its connection with national identity and (allegedly) with antisemitism, and the mounting excitement ahead of the the beatification of John Paul II. Interesting in themselves, and also by no means polemically neutral in the current state of discourse in Britain.

Geoffrey Robertson on the Papal visit

The work I've been doing for the web archiving project has necessarily picked up much material in the press, little of which can be added to the UK Web Archive for reasons of permissions. I thought therefore that it would be worth capturing some of that material here.

Readers may remember a campaign by Geoffrey Robertson against the Papal visit: see two pieces amongst several, on the legal basis of the Vatican's statehood, in the Guardian, and earlier on the prospects for indicting the Pope for complicity in the child abuse scandal

White evangelicals and conservative politics in the US

I notice this paper by Seth Arbutyn and Steven Brint, in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 49 (2010), and available online. It's interesting to note that this type of analysis is not one that seems to have been attempted to any great extent in relationship to Britain.

Bishops in the Lords

Whilst doing some work for the Politics of Religion project for the UK Web Archive, a selection of interesting links, some of which will be submitted to the UKWA:

On the negative side: Heresy Corner, Johann Hari in the Independent, and Polly Toynbee in the Guardian.
There have also been in recent years ongoing campaigns for reform to change the composition of the House: from the British Humanist Association, and the Power 2010 campaign.

On the more positive side, see a debate from Theos.