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Comment by Dave Rose on April 20, 2009 at 1:30pm

Big Issue 17th April - As Christians we shouldn't judge a book by it's cover...Do you agree?

Last week on Britain's Got Talent Susan Boyle blew away the doubters with an extraordinary singing performance. When the devout Chriatian she took to the stage, expectations were low. The audience laughed and mocked her. But moments later when they heard her voice - they soon changed their tune. Clips of her singing have been watched by millions all over the world.

But does this story highlight that too often people are judged by their looks or dress-code, and not considered on their merits. Do you feel under pressure to comply? Can your looks, accent, clothing affect how you get on in life? Are we too quick to judge a book by it's cover?

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Comment by Skywalker on April 16, 2009 at 1:45pm

Tune in to Saturday's "Big Breakfast" show with Lizzie Crow and Tony Miles over the next two weeks as they have some family tickets to see see this wonderful production to give away. Also listen to "Premier Drive" all week from week commencing 27th April to win pairs of tickets to the Covent Garden screening with a VIP tour of the famous Royal Opera House to boot!

Comment by Skywalker on April 10, 2009 at 9:47am

It's BIG. It's coming to London....and Dave and B can get you there! Tune in to Premier Drive with Dave and B all week starting 14th April to find out more or you can also visit the Film & Theatre Club in groups.

Comment by Dave Rose on March 27, 2009 at 3:13pm

Big Issue 26th March - Should there be abortion advice advertised on prime time telly?

Condom adverts could also be shown before the 9pm watershed. The Advertising Standards Agency is launching a 12 week consultation to gauge reaction to the plans.

The watchdog claims it is responding to Government calls for action to combat rising teenage pregnancy.

However, those against abortion will be required to make clear if they do not refer women for abortion so that delays do not result in medical complications.

The move has been criticised by the church and pro-life groups.

Dr Peter Saunders, of the Christian Medical Fellowship, said: "The problem is that the Government strategy on teenage pregnancy, based on condoms, the morning-after pill and abortion, has failed.

"Allowing the advertising of abortion services is not dealing with the real problem."

But the Brook Advisory Centres, which give advice on contraception and abortion, said it was a step forward for sexual health.

The new code would see further relaxation of rules for advertising condoms, except around programmes directed at children below the age of 10.

Currently, Channel 4 is the only channel where condoms are allowed to be advertised from 7pm.

The proposal comes in response to calls from the Independent Advisory Group on Sexual Health and HIV, a quango, to combat Britain's teenage pregnancy rate, the highest in Europe, and sexually transmitted diseases.

From 2002 to 2006, more than 11,000 under-16s were diagnosed with gonorrhoea, chlamydia, syphilis, herpes or genital warts despite the Government spending £300 million in an attempt to tackle the problem.

The IAG said surveys show that young people believe television is one of the most effective ways of encouraging condom use.

The 12-week consultation closes on Friday June 19 and the new codes are expected to come into force in 2010.

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Comment by Dave Rose on March 24, 2009 at 2:15pm

Big Issue 23rd March - Justice

The offence of “inciting hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation” is part of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 (“CJI Act”). Lord Waddington successfully inserted a free speech clause into that Act, which clause 58 of the Coroners and Justice Bill now seeks to remove. The offence itself is not yet in force.
Christians do not believe in inciting hatred of any kind against any person but to love as Christ loved. Part of love is speaking truth. Clause 58 provides a vital protection for Christians to be able to speak Biblical Truth on behaviour and sexual ethics.

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Comment by Skywalker on March 17, 2009 at 4:14pm

Listen out for more about this spectacular event and how you can win tickets to experience it on Premier Drive with Dave & B all week from 23rd March!

Comment by Bridgitte Tetteh on March 12, 2009 at 3:02pm

Big Issue - 10th March - Deborah 13: Servant of God

Deborah Drapper: Follow the Bible not the Beckhams
For some, the key to rearing a good child is Christianity. We meet Deborah Drapper a devout daughter who is set to appear in 'Deborah 13: Servant of God’ on BBC Three.
Committed to her beliefs: Deborah at home in Dorset Photo: PAUL GROVER
Deborah Drapper looks every inch your average 13-year-old. Her bedroom in Dorset is pink and filled with dolls, she “tweets” on Twitter, and she has a blog in which she talks about her pet rabbits, and what fun it was when it snowed recently.
But it is when she is shown a picture of Victoria Beckham that it becomes apparent that Deborah is very different from the average adolescent. Her face goes blank. “It’s someone with dark glasses on,” she says. “Someone married to a Mr Beckham? I don’t know her, I’m sorry.”
The subjects of Paris Hilton and The X Factor provoke the reaction: “What’s reality television?”
Deborah is in this (enviable) position because her deeply religious parents have ensured all her life that she is protected from the sins of the outside world. Instead of being nurtured on a diet of celebrity culture, Deborah has been brought up on a combination of Christianity and traditional family values.
She has never watched television, or been to school, and the only people she really sees are her mother, father and 10 siblings, most of whom she lives with on a rambling farm, which she rarely leaves, bar the odd trip to the supermarket. The Bible, as opposed to Heat, is her required reading.
On Friday nights, Deborah doesn’t have girlie sleepovers. Instead, she heads into nearby Bridport to preach to the youths whom she feels have lost their way: the hoodies and the non-believers.
“Dad takes us to the skate park or the bus stop,” she says, playing with a pink pen adorned in fluff and glitter. “Sometimes they are drunk and have no idea what we are saying. But it’s OK. I never get scared.” And last summer, a BBC documentary crew set out to capture just what effect this had on her life.
I ask Deborah to pretend that I am one of the hoodies and show me how she speaks to them. She asks me if I consider myself a good person. I say that I try to be. Her eyes widen.
“Have you ever lied?” she asks.
I tell her I have told a few fibs in my time.
“OK, so that makes you a liar. And have you ever stolen anything?”
I admit to the theft of a rubber from Woolworths when I was a small child.
“So you are also a thief. And have you ever used God’s name in vain?”
She knows the answer to this - I mistakenly did so almost immediately upon meeting the Drapper family.
“So you are a lying, thieving blasphemer.” She looks very seriously at me. “Would you still consider yourself to be a good person?”
Deborah has the almost preternatural self-confidence that comes from being home-schooled. She spends half of each day praying, cooking, exercising, painting and gardening, and the other half studying a Christian curriculum that includes collectivism and creationism. She is super-bright and fiercely opinionated. She thinks that evolution is “one of the most ridiculous theories ever” and blames it for most of the nation’s ills.
“If you are taught from the start that you are just a piece of slime and that you have evolved from an animal then is it any surprise if you act like one? Survival of the fittest; if you don’t like someone, kill them. That’s what evolution teaches people so is it any wonder when children go to school and do just that?”
She has few friends, just a couple of people she emails from abroad. “I have my sisters,” she says. Does she never wish that she had someone she could call up and have a chat with? “I suppose sometimes it would be nice to have another Christian friend from church whom I could pray with,” she muses. “But I wouldn’t have non-Christian friends because they would probably lead me astray.
“I am not envious of other girls my age. I am happy as a person. A lot of the people I meet on a Friday night are not happy. If anything, they should be envious of me.”

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Comment by Dave Rose on February 27, 2009 at 2:38pm

Big Issue 26th February - Banking Bonuses

Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has announced the largest annual loss in UK corporate history.
RBS, which had to be bailed out by the government last year, said that its 2008 loss totalled £24.1bn ($34.2bn).
It also said it would put £325bn of toxic assets into a scheme that offers insurance for any further losses.
RBS is under fire over the pension of former boss Sir Fred Goodwin and the chancellor said the government had asked him to forego some of it.
Speaking at a news conference, RBS chief executive Stephen Hester said the bank was "under no illusions" about the scale of the losses.
He added that it was important "to think about the past, to know what went wrong, to disclose it and to address those issues".
The day's key developments include:
RBS said it would make "sweeping" changes to its structure following the loss and did not rule out substantial job cuts
It will put £325bn of toxic assets into a new government insurance program. RBS will be responsible for the first £19.5bn of any losses on the insured assets and pay £6.5bn to take part in the scheme
The government will inject £13bn into RBS to strengthen its balance sheet on top of the £20bn the government already injected into RBS last year. The bank will have access to another £6bn should it need it.
The bulk of RBS's £24.1bn loss for 2008 stemmed from a £16.2bn write-down of assets, which was mainly linked to its purchase of ABN Amro.
Chairman Philip Hampton blamed the massive loss on the "unprecedented turbulence" in financial markets and deteriorating economic conditions around the world.
"We owe our continued independence to the UK government and taxpayers and are very thankful for their support," he said.
RBS, which runs NatWest, said it would pay £6.5bn to the Treasury to take part in the Asset Protection Scheme.

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Comment by Dave Rose on February 27, 2009 at 2:36pm

Big Issue 25th February - Nazi row bishop returns to the UK

British Roman Catholic bishop embroiled in a row over Holocaust denial has arrived in the UK after being thrown out of Argentina.
Richard Williamson, who lived in Buenos Aires, was asked to leave after he refused to retract his denial of the existence of Nazi gas chambers.
The row hugely embarrassed the Vatican which had only recently lifted an excommunication order on the bishop.
After his arrival he was taken straight to a waiting car by police officers.
'Deeply shocked'
Those meeting the bishop, including other Roman Catholic priests, declined to answer any questions from the press before the vehicle sped away.
The bishop has been living at the St Pius X seminary in Buenos Aires, but Last Thursday he was given 10 days to leave the country for having "deeply shocked Argentine society, the Jewish people and all of humanity".
Lord Janner, President of the Holocaust Educational Trust commented: "It would be much better if Williamson was not here as his views are anti-Semitic, extremely offensive, and insulting to the millions who witnessed and suffered the horrors of the Holocaust.
"Sadly, as a British citizen, he cannot be prevented."
Earlier, Bishop Williamson had been removed from his post as head of a Roman Catholic seminary near Buenos Aires.
A row erupted in January after Pope Benedict decided to lift Bishop Williamson's excommunication on an unrelated matter.
After that move, it emerged that the bishop had denied the full extent of the Nazi genocide of the Jews in an interview for Swedish TV.
"I believe there were no gas chambers," he had said.
"I think that two to three hundred thousand Jews perished in Nazi concentration camps but none of them by gas chambers."
The Vatican later said the Pope had been unaware of Bishop Williamson's views and had ordered him to recant.
Pope Benedict met American Jewish leaders at the Vatican in a display of solidarity with victims of the Nazis.
The decision to lift the excommunication order was related to the appointment of Richard Williamson as bishop by a breakaway archbishop more than 20 years ago.
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, who died in 1991, had rebelled against liberal reforms in the Church, such as the restriction of the traditional Latin Mass.

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Comment by Dave Rose on February 24, 2009 at 2:25pm

Big Issue 23rd February - Cockney Bible

Can you Adam 'n' Eve it? Shock as Bible stories are translated into Cockey rhyming slang
When teacher Keith Park was struggling to get his pupils interested in Bible stories, he used his loaf and came up with a blinding idea. He translated them into cockney rhyming slang.
Stories such as Adam and Eve, the Nativity and Cain and Abel were transformed by Mr Park. And when he read them out in class, the previously bored and restless youngsters were entranced.
He compiled the reworked tales in a book, Bible Stories in Cockney Rhyming Slang, which is now being used in drama workshops at schools across the country.
The move has received widespread support, but traditionalists claim the book could ‘dumb down’ the Christian message.
Mr Park wrote it after discovering that the language appealed to pupils at Charlton School in Greenwich, South-East London, which caters for children with special educational needs.
Mr Park, who works there part-time, has used his book in sessions at around 30 mainstream and special schools and plans to expand the workshops further.
He recreated the story of Adam and Eve in the style of Del-Boy, the character in the sitcom Only Fools and Horses.
To retell Samson and Delilah, Mr Park deployed the ‘corny humour and double meaning’ of the Carry On films.
He used Barbara Windsor as inspiration for Delilah, whose lines include: ‘Yoo hoo Samson! Mr Triceps! Where you get those bulging biceps?’
Mr Park insists that he does not intend to be disrespectful by retelling the Bible stories in an unusual way. He points out that pupils from Charlton School performed his work at Westminster Abbey and St Paul’s Cathedral last year.
He said: ‘Some people will be offended but I have always said there’s no offence intended. I would hope it’s the opposite of dumbing down. They are first and foremost stories and there are certain stories that a lot of people don’t have access to. People can have fun doing this and then go and read the original or do them in tandem.’
Reverend Rod Thomas, chairman of Reform, a group of Conservative evangelical clergy, said: ‘If you failed to introduce children to the Bible as it’s accurately translated and just relied on this, it would be dumbing down.
‘But if it’s used as something to illustrate and engage people in the real thing then I think it’s likely to be very positive.’
And Dr Justin Thacker, head of theology at the Evangelical Alliance, said: ‘I think it’s great that these stories should be told in a way that connects with contemporary audiences, as long as the essential truth remains the same.’
But Nick Seaton of the Campaign for Real Education, said: ‘It’s dumbing down and it’s disrespectful. It will do nothing to engage or promote religion at all. It’s simply reducing religion to a joke.’

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