Category Archives: Politics

"It is time to turn our swords into ploughshares"

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These are the words of Morgan Tsvangirai, new Prime Minister of Zimbabwe, in his speech in Harare today. This is how the BBC reports this:

In a gesture of reconciliation, Mr Tsvangirai quoted a speech on reconciliation made by Mr Mugabe in 1980, saying “it is time to turn our swords into ploughshares”.

The quotation is of course a biblical allusion, to Micah 4:3 and Isaiah 2:4 (two closely parallel passages) – but I won’t use this biblical allusion as people have used biblical allusions in US politicians’ speeches, as somehow indicating that they are Christians.

I don’t think anyone would expect this biblical vision of the end times to be literally fulfilled in Zimbabwe in the near future. But now at last there is real hope for reconciliation and recovery from years of conflict and poverty. The new power sharing agreement allows the country to set out on what will certainly not be an easy path. But perhaps it is even more hopeful than if Tsvangirai had won the presidential election and then attempted to assert his authority over Mugabe’s supporters.

I hope that the international community will be able to accept this deal, and that both they and the Zimbabwean government will open the way for the kind of aid that the country needs to get itself back on its feet as quickly as possible. But first the more radical supporters of both sides must heed this call to put away their swords and get back to ploughing their country so they can reap a rich harvest.

We must continue to pray for Zimbabwe.

There really are people who don't allow women in secular authority

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In the discussion on my first post on Sarah Palin, some scepticism was expressed, especially by Jeremy Pierce, about whether John Piper actually holds the position that women should not be in authority over men in the secular sphere. I must admit that he is not completely explicit about this in the extract I quoted. But he certainly seems to be leaning strongly that way when it comes to matters of major authority such as a President would have.

After a couple of days when I had little time for blogging (and confused by Commentful’s failures to pick up comments on Complegalitarian, a problem with Blogger) I came back to the first post I made on this subject on Complegalitarian. This has now attracted 87 comments, most of which I have just read or skimmed. Among them the best answers to my original question have come from Molly Aley, formerly herself a rather extreme complementarian and now egalitarian – and also an Alaskan mother of five who has written Sarah Palin Rocks!

This comment by Molly links to a 2004 article from the influential Christian patriarchalist group Vision Forum which explicitly states, in a section heading, “The Biblical Doctrine of the Headship of Man Disqualifies a Woman for Civil Office”. Here is an extract:

Could it be that the man has headship only in the family and the church but not in the state? No, this could not be, lest you make God the author of confusion, and have Him violate in the state the very order He established at creation and has revealed in Holy Scripture! If one is going to argue for the acceptability of women bearing rule in the civil sphere, then to be consistent, he or she also needs to argue for the acceptability of women bearing rule in the family and the church.

Molly adds, and I agree:

I guess the one thing I do appreciate is that at least the patriarchy folks are consistant. If it’s not okay for women to rule in the home or in the church, why is it okay for them to rule in the government?

I think it’s a really fair question. I, for one, don’t understand how it is wrong for females to lead in the home or in the church, but okay in the civil sphere. I disagree (hotly) with Piper’s take, and with Vision Forum’s take, and yet I do appreciate the consistancy in the argument.

In another comment Molly quotes Voddie Baucham, who, according to Molly, is “featured on Focus on the Family and other fairly mainline ministries and a much lauded pastor/speaker in the SBC (and also works with Vision Forum)”. Lin also links to the same post. Baucham writes:

I believe Paul’s admonition should lead us to reject any notion of a wife and mother taking on the level of responsibility that Mrs. Palin is seeking. …

Mrs. Palin is not even supposed to be the head of her own household (Eph. 5:22ff; Col. 3:18; Titus 2:5; 1 Peter 3:1-7), let alone the State of Alaska, or the United States Senate (The VP oversees the Senate). …

In an effort to win the pro-family political argument, we are sacrificing the pro-family biblical argument. In essence, the message being sent to women by conservative Christians backing McCain/Palin is, “It’s ok to sacrifice your family on the altar of your career; just don’t have an abortion.” How pro-family is that?

Another quote taken by Molly from The Backwater Report:

Sarah Palin seemingly has many of the right convictions but according to God’s word she is not the man for the job of Vice President and Christians who take Scripture seriously would be hard pressed to justify a vote for her.

First, Scripture teaches that God’s created order disallows a woman as civil magistrate. …

Second, Scripture explicitly teaches that one qualification for civil magistrate is maleness. …

So even if Piper is not quite explicit on this issue, some significant Christians are explicit, and consistent, in their “complementarianism”, which, as ASBO Jesus suggests, is sometimes a nice way of saying misogyny.

Clarifying Sarah Palin's church affiliation

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There continues to be confusion and misinformation about vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s church affiliation. I stand by what I wrote in my previous post about Palin, and I now have additional information to confirm it. In a comment on his own post Brian Fulthorp questioned what I wrote; the following is adapted and expanded from my reply to Brian.

Brian is wrong to suggest that Wasilla Bible Church is part of the Assemblies of God. That would have been surprising since there was already Wasilla Assembly of God in a city of less than 5,000 in the 1970s. The Assemblies of God Directory confirms what I thought by listing only Wasilla Assembly of God within a five mile radius of zip code 99654 – and also confirms that Juneau Christian Centre is Assemblies of God.

Wikipedia currently says the following, but it keeps changing:

Palin was originally baptized as a Roman Catholic, but her parents switched to the Wasilla Assembly of God, a Pentecostal church, where she was rebaptized at age 12 or 13.[123] When she is in the capital, she attends Juneau Christian Center,[124] another Assemblies of God church. Her current home church in Wasilla is The Church on the Rock,[125] an independent congregation.[126] Although initial reports described her as the first Pentecostal ever named to a major party’s presidential ticket, Palin describes herself as a non-denominational Christian.[127] The National Catholic Reporter described her as a “post-denominational” Christian.[128]

But in fact this statement from The Church on the Rock shows that Wikipedia is wrong about her current home church, and I was right:

In regards to Governor Palin being a member or attending Church on the Rock, this is a statement about her church involvement. Before running for Governor of Alaska she frequently attended Church on the Rock for approximately one year. Since that time she has visited on occasion and now attends Wasilla Bible Church with her family. Wasilla Bible Church is a life giving church that has blessed our community. Governor Palin is a wonderful Christian woman with outstanding leadership qualities. Our prayers are with the Governor and her family.

In Christ,

Pastor David Pepper

Wasilla Assembly of God has also made a statement about Palin, of which the following is an extract:

Governor Sarah Palin did attend Wasilla Assembly of God since the time she was a teen ager. She and her family were a part of the church up until 2002. Since that time she has maintained a friendship with Wasilla Assembly of God and has attended various conferences and special meetings here. This June, the Governor spoke at the graduation service of our School of Ministry, Master’s Commission Wasilla Alaska.

I can’t find any statement about Palin from Wasilla Bible Church. But I did find the following from the Boston Herald, which also confirms that stray moose are a problem in the town:

“I’m elated,” said Larry Kroon, pastor of Wasilla Bible Church, where the Palins worship. “Her heart for her friends and her heart for God is powerful.”

Meanwhile Time Magazine confirms my information and puts an interesting perspective on the church scene in Wasilla:

“We like to call this the Bible Belt of Alaska,” says Cheryl Metiva, head of the local chamber of commerce. Churches proliferate in Wasilla today, and among the largest and most influential is the Wasilla Bible Church, where the Palins worship.

Would John Piper endorse anti-abortion Osama bin Laden?

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In my post about Sarah Palin I suggested that it would be hypocritical for John Piper to endorse Sarah Palin as candidate for Vice-President, given his clearly expressed views that women should not be in secular authority over men.

I can still find no comment from Piper about Palin. But I can see the direction in which his thinking may be going from the latest post at the Desiring God blog, from Joe Rigney who is one of Piper’s staff members. The post title is “Abortion Is About God”. There is no specific mention of Palin, but there is the following quote which immediately follows an extract from a 1998 sermon by Piper:

During this election season, as politicians court the evangelical vote, it is vital that Christians remind themselves why abortion is the transcendent moral issue of our time.

So, it seems, to Piper and friends abortion transcends all other matters of morality, and should be the deciding issue as Christians decide how to vote. Presumably it would be OK to elect a woman President to be in authority over men, even a militant feminist, as long as she is anti-abortion and a Feminist for Life.

But how far would Piper go with this one? If Rigney’s statement is taken literally, a right stand on abortion must be taken as transcending even matters of basic morality, and not just when it comes to elections. Is it OK to be an adulterer if one is pro-life? How about a murderer or a paedophile? Probably Osama bin Laden, as a fundamentalist Muslim, is strongly opposed to abortion. So, if this were the contest, would Piper endorse Osama rather than Obama?

Sarah Palin, my kind of Republican

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I don’t often comment on American politics. I suppose I tend to leave that to Americans, but that doesn’t stop Canadians like Kevin Sam giving their opinions. But I have made some exceptions for Obama, here and here, so partly for the sake of balance I will give some initial reactions to the surprise nomination of Sarah Palin as Republican candidate for Vice-President. In fact it was such a surprise that it seems Jim West confused her with Michael Palin!

From what I have read, including this BBC report and some others and this Wikipedia profile, Sarah Palin sounds like the kind of person I could support, if I could stomach Republican policies in general, especially on social issues like health care and on Iraq.

One piece of information which may be new: in 2002 Palin was defeated in the race for Lieutenant Governor of Alaska by Loren Leman who is the brother of Better Bibles blogger Wayne Leman.

It seems that Palin is a good Christian. At least this is how she is portrayed by the conservative World Magazine. This article says that she attends Wasilla Bible Church, which is non-denominational and evangelical. David Ker among others suggests that her denomination is Assemblies of God, but the evidence for this in fact suggests only that when she was a junior high student (so perhaps before the Bible Church opened in 1977 when she was 13) she attended Wasilla Assembly of God, and that when in the state capital Juneau she attends Juneau Christian Center which appears to be Assemblies of God. This all seems consistent with what was written at the Christianity Today politics blog. So, while she has not rejected her Pentecostal upbringing, her current preference is slightly different.

Palin is not at all the stereotypical conservative Christian woman. She has not stayed at home to manage her home and home school her five children (well spaced over 19 years), but has built her own career. Yet she chose to give birth to her Down’s Syndrome son earlier this year, rather than have an abortion because of his condition. She likes hunting and fishing, not typical feminine pursuits. Given her background in small town Alaska, where guns may be necessary protection from marauding moose and polar bears, I can almost forgive her membership of the National Rifle Association; but she will need to realise that policies which work in Wasilla (population under 6,000 when she was mayor, homicide rate zero in 2005) are not necessarily appropriate in Washington DC (population 588,000, homicide rate 169 in 2006 even after dropping by half since the early 1990s).

The interesting issue is why 72-year-old John McCain picked 44-year-old Palin as his running mate. The consensus seems to be that this was political expediency, picking a young and unusual outsider to balance an old Washington insider, to mirror the Obama-Biden ticket. That certainly makes a lot of sense for McCain, and explains his surprising choice. However, I think it is a good choice – or perhaps not, because it increases the chance of a Republican victory which could have all sorts of other serious repercussions for world peace, and for the health and welfare of poor Americans.

But anyone who votes for the McCain-Palin ticket has to reckon with the real chance that Palin will become President and Commander-in-Chief of US forces, a chance that is enhanced by McCain’s age. So they should not vote this way unless they think that Palin could be an appropriate President.

So this brings me back to the question which I first raised in comments on John Hobbins’ blog (note that there is already more than one page of comments on this post including at least three by me) and then again at Complegalitarian: is a woman Vice-President acceptable to conservative Christians, who are mostly at least in theory complementarian? If not, McCain might find himself losing a substantial number of votes just because he has a woman on his ticket.

Now some complementarians limit women to submissive roles only in the church and in the family. But others teach that women should never be in positions of authority over men even in the secular realm, and so would certainly not accept a woman as President or Commander-in-Chief. Among these is the well-known Bible teacher John Piper, who, in the book Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood which he co-authored with Wayne Grudem, on pp.17-19 of this PDF file, wrote:

Mature femininity does not express itself in the same way toward every man. A mature woman who is married, for example, does not welcome the same kind of strength and leadership from other men that she welcomes from her husband. But she will affirm and receive and nurture the strength and leadership of men in some form in all her relationships with men. This is true even though she may find herself in roles that put some men in a subordinate role to her. Without passing any judgment on the appropriateness of any of these roles one thinks of the following possible instances:

  • Prime Minister and her counsellors and advisors.
  • Principal and the teachers in her school.
  • College teacher and her students.
  • Bus driver and her passengers.
  • Bookstore manager and her clerks and stock help.
  • Staff doctor and her interns.
  • Lawyer and her aides.
  • Judge and the court personnel.
  • Police officer and citizens in her precinct.
  • Legislator and her assistants.
  • T.V. newscaster and her editors.
  • Counsellor and her clients.

One or more of these roles might stretch appropriate expressions of femininity beyond the breaking point. …

But as I said earlier, there are roles that strain the personhood of man and woman too far to be appropriate, productive and healthy for the overall structure of home and society. Some roles would involve kinds of leadership and expectations of authority and forms of strength as to make it unfitting for a woman to fill the role. …

The God-given sense of responsibility for leadership in a mature man will not generally allow him to flourish long under personal, directive leadership of a female superior. J. I. Packer suggested that “a situation in which a female boss has a male secretary” puts strain on the humanity of both (see note 18). I think this would be true in other situations as well. Some of the more obvious ones would be in military combat settings if women were positioned so as to deploy and command men; or in professional baseball if a woman is made the umpire to call balls and strikes and frequently to settle heated disputes among men. And I would stress that this is not necessarily owing to male egotism, but to a natural and good penchant given by God.

It will be fascinating to see what John Piper and other complementarian leaders have to say about Palin as a candidate Vice-President. Interestingly Al Mohler, who doesn’t allow women to teach in his seminary, predicted Palin’s nomination back in May in an article about her Down’s Syndrome baby, but with no comment on whether she would be suitable. The only specific clearly negative comment I have seen is from Carmon Friedrich, called a “mover-and-shaker in patriarchy” by Molly Aley who quoted him:

Does God not ordain the means as well as the end? Why does she get a pass on the leadership issue and career mother problem just because she has the right views on abortion and helps make McCain more electable? If Christian complementarians/patriarchalists get behind this choice, then they undermine all their arguments for the creation order as the reason for opposing women in other areas of ministry. The Word of God calls the civil magistrate a “minister of God.”

Well, now we can look forward to more mothers telling their daughters, “You can be anything you want to be…even vice president!” How is this woman able to be her husband’s helpmeet and be a proper mother to her little ones with such huge responsibilities in her job?

On the other hand, the World Magazine article I mentioned earlier, despite the magazine’s generally complementarian position, comes close to endorsing Palin. And James Dobson is reportedly elated at the news. So how can these complementarians have this attitude? Perhaps it is that these people have a one track mind about politics: the only thing they care about is a candidate’s position on abortion. But then McCain who is not pro-life will not force through anti-abortion legislation for the sake of his VP, so anyone who votes for these two because she is pro-life is voting irresponsibly. Or perhaps John Hobbins is right on the facts, although wrong on the morality of them, when he writes the following astonishing endorsement of hypocrisy:

Consistency is the hobglobin of small minds. Ordinary people tend to get this instinctively. Eggheads like Piper and Grudem, maybe not.

It’s obvious that many people read P & G’s books without coming to agree with the notion that a woman by definition is unfit to be President of the United States, or drive bus, for goodness’ sake.

Well, let’s wait and see. If leaders like Piper come out against Palin, at least they are being consistent, and they may convince enough of their supporters to make a significant dent in McCain’s vote. If they don’t, they will be shown up as hypocrites. It will be interesting to watch!

Supreme Court promotes gun law

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The US Supreme Court has, according to the BBC, ruled by a 5-4 majority that the US Constitution

protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home

and therefore that it is unconstitutional not to allow people to keep guns in their homes. While not allowing these guns to be used in anger, the ruling apparently implies that the state is not allowed to stop irresponsible people acquiring and keeping guns, which they can then use for all kinds of criminal purposes for which the only protection is a greater fire power of other guns. In other words, the Supreme Court has ruled that America must be governed by gun law, and state governments are powerless to stop it.

As I wrote last year, the result of this is that the rate of “intentional homicides committed with a firearm” in the USA in 2001 was about 20 times higher than in England and Wales. The striking down of the limited laws restricting guns which have been in force can only mean further increases.

Perhaps (although the slim majority implies that the legal arguments are ambiguous) the Supreme Court should not be blamed for their interpretation of the Second Amendment, passed at a time when the USA had only just broken away from the mother country and there may have been a need for citizens to defend themselves with guns. But in these times there can be no justification for proliferation of murderous weapons.

I call on the presidential candidates to announce their intention to amend the Constitution, to repeal or greatly modify the Second Amendment and introduce tight controls on hand guns. Only in this way can the USA become a safe place for future generations.

Obama the Hindu?

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US Senator and presidential candidate Barack Obama calls himself a Christian. He has long been a member of Rev Jeremiah Wright‘s church, and although he has now left this church he has been attending other churches. And only in the last few days he has been “making a full-throttle push for centrist evangelicals and Catholics”.

Obama has often been accused of being a Muslim. There is no truth in this allegation if you accept the definition of a person’s religion as their personally accepted set of beliefs, faith commitments and practices. But there is another definition of religion which is held to by Muslims (and, in effect, Jews) as well as by some in the West who call themselves Christians, which is that religion is passed on by inheritance from parents to children. According to these people, because Obama’s father was a Muslim (although non-practising), Obama himself counts as a Muslim. But even they can hardly claim this after he has publicly renounced Islam, although they might consider him an apostate.

But now comes a new claim that Obama is in effect a Hindu. The evidence for this seems to be that he carries about in his pocket “a tiny monkey god”, as well as “a tiny Madonna and child”. This is reported by Time Magazine, with photographic evidence. According to Visi Tilak of the Christian blog Casting Stones (which lists Tony Campolo and Brian McLaren among its contributors), this monkey god is “none other than the Hindu god Hanuman”, and indeed Visi reports that “over the last couple of days every Indian newspaper has carried this story and photograph, with “Hanuman” and “Obama” on practically every headline.” The BBC reports that a group of Indians are planning to present to Obama a “two-foot tall, 15kg gold-polished, brass idol” of Hanuman.

It might be suggested that by carrying both Christian and Hindu lucky charms Obama is trying to be both Hindu and Christian. But polytheistic Hinduism has long accepted that Christian images can be used alongside originally Hindu ones, and I think that carrying lucky charms is accepted. Orthodox Christianity, on the other hand, has always condemned any kind of devotion to idols of non-Christian divinities, and has not approved of lucky charms. So by carrying this Hindu idol in his pocket, as well as a Christian one, Obama is showing himself to be either a good Hindu or a very bad Christian.

Obama is already facing an uphill challenge in his drive to win Christians over to support him, because of his positions on abortion and gay “marriage”. He may be able to win them over if he holds to a consistent Christian position on other matters of public and private morality, and promises to turn America away from the cult of self which has been promoted during the Bush administration towards caring properly for the poor and needy in America and worldwide. But this whole drive is endangered if Obama becomes seen as an inconsistent and compromising Christian, and especially if he is seen as trusting in evil demon gods (Hanuman is considered an incarnation of Shiva the destroyer) rather than in the true God and Jesus Christ.

Neither the prophet Jeremiah nor the prophetic preacher Jeremiah Wright would let Obama get away with this. He needs to read what the prophet had to say about idols in Jeremiah 10:1-16, and then publicly repent and get rid of his idol – and reject the gift from India. This may not win him immediate friends in India, but in the long run they and religious people of any faith will respect him more if he is consistent in his professed faith. Anyway, the Hindu vote in America is tiny, so this move would make electoral sense for him. More importantly, it makes sense for his own destiny and for the destiny of the country which he hopes to lead. For what God said to Israel in the past can apply also to America now:

“If you, Israel, will return,
then return to me,”
declares the LORD.
“If you put your detestable idols out of my sight
and no longer go astray,
2 and if in a truthful, just and righteous way
you swear, ‘As surely as the LORD lives,’
then the nations will invoke blessings by him
and in him they will boast.”

Jeremiah 4:1-2 (TNIV)

For too long the name of America has been considered a curse throughout much of the world, not just in countries which it has invaded and otherwise bossed around but also in countries which have been reduced to poverty while America enriches itself. If Obama repents of his idolatry and trusts only in the true God, then not only is he in a good position to win the election but he will also have the opportunity to restore to his own country the blessing of God and respect among the nations.

The greatest obstacle to the advance of the kingdom of God?

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Despite what I wrote in my last post I have found something to blog about, courtesy of Eddie. Hamo the Backyard Missionary has written a provocative post The Problem is Christianity, about the Christian scene in his own Australia but also largely applicable here in England, and I dare say also, even all the more so, in North America. Eddie quotes Hamo’s own summary of his post, so for variety I will quote some different parts, with just an extract from the summary:

The greatest obstacle to the advance of the kingdom of God in most of the West is … a resurgent Christianity.

Here is part of his explanation:

The Church of England Newspaper May 26, 2008 says, “Islam is being institutionalised, incarnated, into national structures amazingly fast, at the same time as …. the ‘excarnation’ of Christianity… out of state policy and structures”. Whilst this may be sad for those who sentimentalise about the loss of the fides historica (inherited conventional religion), it is surely a sign of the judgement of God on the human construct of privilege and compromise called “Christianity” and a preparation for a return to radical Christ- centred faith that disappeared from Western society long ago.

I was especially struck by this point:

The people of God can only know their deepest inward identity as the Bride of Christ through an immediate and passionate awareness, in the Spirit, that Jesus is their Bridegroom (John 3:29; Rev 19:6 – 8). Where this is lacking, much of what transpires as Christian spirituality is simply “spiritual masturbation.” It may have the appearance of godliness, but is part of a religious culture that lacks the interpenetrative power of holiness (2 Tim 3:5).

I wish I dared to use “spiritual masturbation” as a post title, but I don’t want to seem too shocking. The verse referred to is this:

having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.

2 Timothy 3:5 (TNIV)

Does Hamo really mean that we should have nothing to do with these practitioners of “Christian spirituality [which] is part of a religious culture”, the supporters of “the fides historica (inherited conventional religion)”? That is certainly a strong challenge. If Hamo is right, we who are looking for the kingdom of God (I hesitate to say “we Christians” because that makes us sound like supporters of the Christianity that Hamo criticises) should abandon any attempt to preserve the institutional Christian basis of our society and instead accept with joy the role of outsiders with a prophetic message.

If this is right, the latest Church of England report Moral, But no Compass is fundamentally flawed. This report calls for a reverse in the decline of the influence of the church within the government corridors of power, even for the appointment of a government “Minister for Religion”. I don’t suggest that the report has no value, for it has clearly identified some of the ways in which the British government is failing to take proper account of what Christian churches are doing, especially in the charity sector. But in so far as it is at least in part a call for the re-establishment of church influence over the state, and inevitably vice versa as a corollary, this report seems to be an attempt to restore “the human construct of privilege and compromise called “Christianity””, also described as “the greatest obstacle to the advance of the kingdom of God”.

So let us, as believers in Jesus, set aside both the spiritual adultery of looking to the state for support and affirmation and the spiritual masturbation of looking for it in our own religious culture. Let us instead seek our spiritual satisfaction only in God, in worshipping him in holiness.

Joel Edwards to join Tony Blair

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The Evangelical Alliance has announced, currently on its home page and in a press release, that Rev Joel Edwards who has been its General Director since 1997,

will bring his passion for justice for the poor to two new roles as he joins Tony Blair’s Faith Foundation and becomes the first International Director of Micah Challenge.

This is excellent news. I have been somewhat ambivalent about Tony Blair in past posts, although I never seriously called him the Antichrist! But, as I wrote before, his Faith Foundation has the potential to do real good. And that potential is all the more likely to be realised with people like Joel Edwards being brought on board.

I trust that this also means that the Faith Foundation will be supporting the aims of Micah Challenge, which is

a Christian campaign challenging governments around the world to meet the Millennium Development Goals by 2015.

Such a challenge needs not only strong leadership from someone like Joel Edwards but also powerful friends like Tony Blair. I note also (this from the June edition of the Evangelical Alliance’s newsletter youMail, which I received by e-mail and will be available online from 6th June) that Blair’s successor Gordon Brown has endorsed and written a foreword (not a “forward”) to the new book by Edwards and others Micah’s Challenge: The Church’s Responsibility to the Global Poor. David Cameron and Nick Clegg have also endorsed the book. The backing of both past and present Prime Ministers, and of the party leaders hoping to be future Prime Ministers, gives a real chance that these development goals will be met.

But will this campaign get the backing of the new US president, which would probably guarantee success? Maybe that depends on whether American Christians actually think about the poor and needy when making their now clear choice in November.

Cutting out the nonsense about petrol (gas) prices

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No one, outside the oil companies, is happy at the current high price of petrol (gas, for my American readers), currently at least £1.10 per litre here which equates to about $10 per gallon in US units. British customers are threatening blockades and boycotts in an attempt to bring the price down. It won’t work, of course, and Sam Norton explains why. International oil prices may rise and fall a bit but the long term trend must be upwards, because oil production is gradually falling while demand is still rising. This means that all of us are going to have to change our habits to use less oil.

How can this happen? Well, in principle the government could intervene with a rationing scheme, but I don’t think anyone wants that. If the market remains free the only other way of balancing supply and demand is to allow the price to rise, on the forecourts as well as in the international markets. That is the only effective method of cutting consumption. It is of course a blunt weapon, with disproportionate effects on the poor and on those living in rural areas – and perhaps on small businesses. These especially bad consequences can perhaps be mitigated with tax breaks, and it is good that the British government is considering them. But the government cannot deny the unpalatable truth, that high petrol prices are here to stay. So we all need to change our habits to use less. If we don’t do this voluntarily, which is unlikely, we will be forced to do it by spiralling prices.

One significant positive step that the government could take, perhaps necessarily in co-operation with other governments, is to charge as much tax on aviation fuel as on petrol. That would put a dampener on the boom in cheap flights, catering mostly to people who don’t need to travel, or who fly because it is cheaper than overland and under-Channel travel. Putting a brake on this rapidly growing use of fuel would help to provide more for the rest of us and keep down prices for essential uses.

And all this is quite apart from the good environmental reasons for burning less oil, and for higher prices as a way of ensuring this.