18 minute read
War Cry World
How Rosemary Conley came to see faith as fit for purpose
HEALTHY eating expert Rosemary Conley found faith in God and a new direction during a difficult period in her life, wrote Sarah Ditum in The Times.
In an interview article about Conley’s autobiography, Through Thick and Thin, Ditum described how the author of 36 diet books became a Christian in 1986 after having her gallbladder removed.
‘During her convalescence she read a Christian self-help book and had a Damascene moment,’ Ditum wrote. After finding faith, she believed ‘God was telling her to marry Mike’, her long-term boyfriend. The couple have been married ever since.
In Through Thick and Thin, Rosemary Conley explains how the Christian book the Power for Living invited her to say a prayer, which changed her life.
‘As I knelt at the side of the bed, I said the prayer and earnestly meant every single word,’ she writes. ‘As I prayed, I felt my body being “washed through”. There were no flashing lights, no flames, no claps of thunder or puffs of smoke, just a feeling of being “brand new”. A new beginning. A fresh start. It was as though God had taken my list of mistakes and wiped the slate clean.’
nTHE architect of the Eternal Wall of Answered Prayer – a Christian
landmark under construction near Birmingham – revealed that he turned to prayer before coming up with the idea of building it in the form of a Möbius strip.
In a video documenting the progress of the building work, which can be seen online at eternalwall.org.uk, Paul Bulkeley of Snug Architects explained the connection he saw between humankind’s experience of prayer and the shape of the never-ending loop.
‘For me, the Möbius strip is poetically symbolic of quite a lot of the things that matter in prayer,’ he said. ‘The way the form rises and falls … there’s a sense of it being grounded… But then it rises and is transcendent and twists, and there is a moment where it flips, and everything is turned upside down. And then it comes back down to earth and re-engages with your life, before life’s problems and life’s challenges lead you back into prayer, and life’s hopes lead you back into prayer. You go round that journey again and that journey never stops.’
At its completion, the Eternal Wall of Answered Prayer will reach a height of 51.5m, making it twice the size of the Angel of the North sculpture in Gateshead.
A computer-generated image of the prayer wall
Poor countries hurt by debt ‘chokehold’
RISING debt repayments to private lenders are creating a ‘chokehold’ on poorer countries who are repaying it, Christian Aid has warned.
Research by the international development charity has found that the practice of issuing bonds and borrowing from non-governmental or multilateral lenders is backfiring, plunging poorer and middle-income countries further into debt. Rising interest rates and a strong US dollar has made repayments even more expensive.
Christian Aid says there should be transparency. It also wants private creditors to work within IMF mechanisms.
Karimi Kinoti, Christian Aid’s interim director of policy in Africa, said: ‘The UK government has a moral obligation to act. Ministers should use their influence to compel private creditors to support debt relief.’
The research, conducted with the help of several other organisations, explored the economies of Kenya, Nigeria, Guatemala and El Salvador.
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Slavery cases rise, says Salvation Army
MODERN slavery referrals to The Salvation Army have risen by 15 per cent in the past year.
In its annual report, the church and charity revealed that 3,068 people of 100 nationalities were rescued and supported in its safe houses and by its outreach services. British people continue to be the second most common nationality exploited in the UK, the most often represented nationality being Albanian.
Between July 2021 and June 2022 almost half (46 per cent) of all modern slavery survivors supported by The Salvation Army had been exploited for forced labour with little or no pay in areas such as factories, building sites and farms. About a quarter (23 per cent) of survivors had experienced sexual exploitation, while about a fifth (20 per cent) were exploited for criminal purposes.
Major Kathy Betteridge, The Salvation Army’s director of antitrafficking and modern slavery, said: ‘People trapped in modern slavery are hidden in plain sight in villages, towns and cities across the UK. We can all help fight modern slavery and raise the alarm if we spot something suspicious and are worried that someone is being exploited.’
The Salvation Army has held the government’s modern slavery victim care contract for England and Wales since 2011.
l If you suspect that someone you have come into contact with is a victim of modern slavery and in need of help, please call The Salvation Army’s confidential 24/7 referral helpline on 0800 808 3733, the Modern Slavery Helpline on 0800 012 1700 or Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111
ON THE WRITE TRACK
National Novel Writing Month encourages budding authors to put their thoughts on paper
Feature by Emily Bright
PENS and laptops at the ready. National Novel Writing Month starts
on Tuesday (1 November). Since the initiative’s launch in the US in 1999, thousands of people globally have accepted the challenge to write 50,000 words in 30 days, and 367,913 novels have been written.
National Novel Writing Month, which is now also a non-profit organisation based in California, hosts writing events in libraries and community centres in locations from Mexico City to Seoul. Its online platform helps to keep writers focused, tracking the number of words they have set down and connecting them with other like-minded people.
Organisers want to encourage people to write all year round too. There’s now a Young Writers Program, which encourages school students to exercise their literary creativity alongside their existing curriculum, providing classroom materials, an online writing Going to community and author mentors. Each year about 100,000 students take part a source of in the programme. In a survey of participants, 77 per cent of young people said that it helped wisdom helps them write a story they care about. This number sits well with the month’s tagline: ‘Every story matters. Let’s start writing yours.’
Literary works have allowed authors to express their stories and important truths throughout the centuries, and have the power to provoke, challenge and shape our world view. It is certainly the case with the bestselling book of all time, which is packed with allegory, poetry, wisdom, history and a life-changing love story.
One of the writers whose words have found a place in the Bible explained the importance of its contents. ‘All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realise what is wrong in our lives,’ he wrote. ‘It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right’ (2 Timothy 3:16 New Living Translation).
In life’s complexities and challenges, going to a source of tried-and- tested wisdom helps. When we give it a read, it can help us write a fascinating new chapter in our own life story. We’ll also encounter God’s unconditional love, which exceeds anything we could imagine.
Broadcasting Belief Centenary
As the BBC celebrates 100 years on the airwaves, head of religion and ethics at BBC Audio TIM PEMBERTON reflects on the past, present and future connections between the corporation and religion
Interview by Andrew Stone
THIS year the BBC is celebrating its
100th anniversary. Since its first radio broadcasts from Marconi House, London, in October 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, the organisation has evolved into a media giant on radio and television and online. In its earliest years the corporation’s purpose was summed up in three words: inform, educate and entertain.
Those principles have led to programmes as diverse as Strictly Come Dancing and Panorama on television and to radio shows such as The Official Chart Show and Moral Maze – which is one of the programmes that is made under Tim Pemberton, who is head of religion and ethics for BBC Audio.
‘The BBC has always valued religion,’ he tells me as we chat over Zoom. ‘From the very beginning it was thought that religion should form a big part of the corporation’s output, whether that was the broadcasting of services or the creation of bespoke religious content.’
Today that content includes daily and weekly services on Radio 4, Heart and Soul for the World Service and Good
Broadcasting House, BBC headquarters in London
Morning Sunday on Radio 2. But there is another programme that is special to Tim.
‘My secret guilty pleasure is relaxing to Choral Evensong on Radio 3,’ he says. ‘As a person of faith, I enter into it in a particular way. But even if people don’t have a faith, I think they can appreciate the beauty and skill of the music. It’s rich and gorgeous and gives moments of space and reflection. It’s a high-quality piece of broadcasting.’
Tim’s faith journey began when he was growing up as the 10th and youngest child of a church minister. It was while he was in his teens that he ‘discovered a personal relationship direct with God’ by becoming a Christian, and he went on to study religion and philosophy at Lancaster University. ‘My faith does impact me as a person,’ he explains. ‘I practise it, and it’s important to me. However, when I go through the doors of the BBC, I realise that I have to set aside my own personal faith – not in the sense that I’m suddenly not a Christian any more, but I know that I need to be open and that my faith can’t be the deciding factor in the judgements I have to make. ‘I hope that I’m quite
Tim Pemberton
assiduous in treating all the faiths fairly and seriously. I don’t believe in doing favours for Christians or for any of the faith groups. I try to treat them all fairly and give them a proper hearing.’
Tim lists the appearance of Pope Francis on Radio 4’s Thought For The Day as one of his proudest moments while in his current role. But, while that broadcast will have delighted many Catholics who tuned in, there will have been other listeners who questioned whether the Pope, or any other religious leader, could have anything relevant to say. Some of the BBC’s audience see religion as outdated. Tim, however, is certain that, as the corporation heads into its second century, religion and ethics broadcasting is here to stay.
‘As times have changed over the past 100 years, religion has gone in and out of vogue,’ he says. ‘I’ve seen that myself when there have been people who are hostile to it and felt religion didn’t have anything to say or to contribute.
‘But I think people are mistaken in that, because through the Covid pandemic we saw people wanting to engage with religion and that it is a part of our national life.
‘One of the upshots of the pandemic was that it made people pause. They saw the fragility of life, and it made them re-evaluate what was important and what their priorities were. Nothing helps people with that better than the different religions. Faith asks the important questions about
life. It encourages people to reflect and think about purpose and what is the right way to live a good life. ‘We made some excellent People want programmes during lockdown. Because we to engage couldn’t record outside broadcasts for Sunday with religion Worship, we would assemble programmes with interviews, pieces of music and conversations. This allowed for great creativity, which many listeners found refreshing, particularly those who wouldn’t have normally listened to the programme.’ Tim is convinced that many of the people who asked those big questions about life in lockdown have not lost their interest in the months that have followed.
‘We are still seeing people finding immense value and meaning as they engage with either formal or more informal faith,’ he says. ‘That makes my job the most exciting work.
‘As programme-makers, we have to be relevant. We need to have our fingers on the pulse of what people are talking about and what matters to them. That way, we’ll make programmes that are intelligent and that speak to people.’
From street child to foster-father
‘IN Uganda, life was miserable at every step,’ recalls Peter Mutabazi. ‘Growing up poor, there was no
glimpse of hope. Sometimes we’d go to bed hungry. But you knew the next family didn’t have a good meal either. I had to grow up so quickly.’
In his book about his life, Now I am Known, Peter details how his father beat him and his siblings up to four times a week. Virtually anything they did sent him into a rage.
‘My friends weren’t afraid of their dad, but I was,’ Peter tells me. ‘I never looked him in the eyes, because I couldn’t tell what would come. Before I learnt to speak I heard my dad say: “You’ll never amount to anything. I wish you were never born so I didn’t have to feed you.” I’d been stripped of my dignity by my own dad.’
Worse still, Peter says, was seeing his mum being repeatedly abused, even when she was pregnant.
‘If she asked my dad for help with school tuition, she’d get beaten. She got the brunt of it caring for us. Sometimes I felt guilty that maybe if she had not advocated for us to have food or schooling, she would not have got those beatings or the verbal abuse. There was no place to turn.’
One night Peter snapped. When his father sent him out to buy cigarettes Peter used his own savings from selling peanuts to take a bus to the end of the line, Kampala.
‘At the age of 10 I ran away. I wasn’t looking for a better life. I just thought: “I’m going to die anyway, but I’d rather end it somewhere else.” That’s why I ran away to become a street kid.’
Peter spent the next four years living on the street, next to the sewers. He would sniff diesel to disguise the stench around him. He and his friends would steal food to survive and faced a life of sleepless nights and abuse at the hands of strangers. Children were crushed while sleeping under buses, poisoned by eating the wrong food or killed by relentless beatings.
‘Strangers called you garbage, and said you’d never amount to anything,’ he recalls. ‘You believed them because you ate from the garbage dump, you slept under the sewer, you smelt, you were a thief. I felt and was treated like less of a human being.
‘There was nothing to care for and there was nothing to protect apart from myself. So if I was stealing from someone, my attitude was: “I need food right now and I
At the age of 10, PETER MUTABAZI was forced to fend for himself on Uganda’s streets after fleeing his abusive father. But an unexpected encounter with a stranger would change his life. Now living in the US, he reflects on fatherhood and faith
Interview by Emily Bright
Peter aged about 18
Peter with Zay, an 18-year-old he is supporting, and adopted son Anthony
don’t care about your feelings.”’ this time he called me by my name. That
While living on the streets, the children was a shock to me. He remembered my would often help people with their name. That’s really what changed my life. shopping to earn food in return or steal The more I saw him, the more I looked it. One day Peter’s encounter with a man forward to seeing him. Not because of the while carrying his shopping food, but rather because would transform his life. ‘I followed a man, waiting He saw me as he saw me as a human being.’ to take shopping to his car for him. In the process, I’d a human being James continued to look out for Peter, get something to eat. But although the young boy he asked me: “What’s your name?” remained suspicious of him. That rattled me, because no one had ‘He kept meeting me and feeding me ever asked me that. Then I was worried, for a year and a half,’ Peter says. ‘He because in my experience kindness was earned my trust before offering to send always followed with abuse. So I backed me to school, but I wasn’t sure. He asked off, but then went back to carry his stuff. me several times and I said no, until He gave me something to eat and he left. he said: “There’ll be lunch, dinner and
‘The next weekend he came back and breakfast.” It was the food that attracted me. I thought I’d check out the school.’
After initially seeing an education as an impossible dream, Peter started attending Katweha Primary and Secondary School. He was amazed to discover he would be fed three meals a day at the boarding school as well as receiving an education. Students around him dreamt of becoming doctors, engineers, teachers and lawyers, something Peter had not even comprehended before. However, his new life took some adjusting to.
‘I could only think about one thing – food,’ he remembers, ‘and I realised that to receive it, I needed to go to class and stay in school. Yet as a street kid, fighting was my norm. But they didn’t kick me out
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of school. Instead, they saw the best in me.’
Six months after Peter settled into his new life James invited him to stay with him over the school holidays.
‘His family were kind, and I began to want that,’ says Peter. ‘I was always intrigued about how he could be so nice to me, and I discovered he was a Christian.’
In fact, James was a pastor. Keen to keep in favour with him, Peter began attending church. However, he struggled to reconcile the Christian faith with his own experiences. ‘I held hatred towards my dad, and I didn’t want anything to get in the way,’ he says.
‘You hear the gospel say, “Forgive those who wrong you.” I was like, “Look, there are some things we should forgive, but there are some that we should not. And that includes my father.” But I had begun his driver, who was a Christian, to pray to see glimpses of hope, so I thought: with him to know God for real. Just as “OK, I’m going to pretend I’m a Christian hatred was tearing Rwanda apart, Peter so they don’t kick me out knew that, in a smaller way, of school.”’ Peter’s perspective I forgave my his own heart was corrupted by bitterness towards his on faith changed when father. It felt as father, and he believed that James invited him to help an international relief if I lost a 100lb he needed God’s healing love. organisation get food to thousands of orphan weight instantly ‘I didn’t want to give away the hatred I felt towards my children living in refugee father until I realised that camps after the Rwandan genocide in Christ died for me on the cross for that,’ 1994. Peter became a translator, buying he says. ‘I was carrying a burden that I did essential supplies and handling the not have to carry. I forgave my father. It felt logistics of delivery. as if I lost a 100lb weight instantly, and I
While there, he witnessed the aftermath decided to use my past as a foundation to of the brutality, suffering and death that help others.’ Tutsis experienced at the hands of Hutus. Peter decided to go to Makerere Thrown into the middle of a war zone, he University in Kampala to study business was left fearing for his life and he asked administration, becoming the first person
in his village to go on to further education. While he was there, he worked as a nighttime radio operator for the International Committee of the Red Cross, helping them to co-ordinate their trucks and planes as they went in and out of Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. He also worked part-time day shifts for another relief and child advocacy group.
After taking degree courses in crisis management and theology in the UK and the United States respectively, he was offered a job at Compassion International, travelling the world to promote child sponsorship.
While he enjoyed the work, Peter later felt compelled to support vulnerable children closer to home in the US and enquired about becoming a mentor to a troubled teenager. The social worker he spoke to suggested that he become a foster-father. Peter was immediately attracted to the idea. Since becoming a licensed foster-father, he has looked after 29 children, adopted one and is in the process of adopting three more. ‘It has been a joy,’ he says. ‘The kids give me more than I give them. They’ve taught me what loving unconditionally means and how to give sacrificially.’
Peter is determined to follow James’s example rather than that of his own father.
‘I sometimes think, “I hope I don’t turn out like my dad”, and those fears come in,’ he says.
‘But I am not my father, and the kindness of a stranger taught me what a father ought to be. James didn’t know me, yet he loved me as his own. The gospel made sense for me because I based it on The kids taught his life. James didn’t share much of the gospel with me. He just lived it.’
me what loving unconditionally means
l James’s name
