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.
This is very heartening!
The June edition of youMail which I quote is now available online here.
Both Obama and McCain have had issues regarding clergy lately, that I almost think that either would of them would be hesitant to throw their verbal backing behind any sort of “religious” thing. I think that they probably would both fear that someone within the organisation would say SOMETHING that the media doesn’t like…the media would pick up on it….and then they would be labelled as a bigot.
Religious matters have so far played a greater role in this election than any other that I can remember.
Thanks, Rhea. I didn’t necessarily mean that any candidate should endorse these Millennium Development Goals now, but that the winner should actually do something about them. Anyway, this is not a “religious” thing but a set of goals agreed by the United Nations, which are backed by some religious groups including Micah Challenge and the Faith Foundation.