A group of lords and Anglican priests have provoked criticism after they met Syrian president Bashar al-Assad last week.
Catholic peer Lord Hylton was part of a contingent including Baroness Cox, Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali, the former Anglican Bishop of Rochester and the Rev Andrew Ashdown.
Labour MP John Woodcock, vice-president of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Syria, said: “Whatever good intentions this British delegation has will fail; their presence at this man’s side can only strengthen him as his campaign of terror continues.”
Baroness Cox defended the trip, saying: “You’re in the country, you want to meet as many people as you can. You go to raise concerns, which you can’t do if you don’t meet.
“The main purpose was to hear the voices of the people of Syria, to hear their voice.”
In an interview with Premier Christian radio, Baroness Cox said the Syrian people were anxious about foreign intervention. “They plead with us: ‘Please do not let the British government and the international community bring about an enforced regime change, let us decide our own future,’ and the government is doing a lot to try to promote reconciliation,” she said. “Their suffering is huge, but you need to know and that’s why we went – to listen, to learn, to tell the stories of their horrendous suffering.”
Violence continued during the delegation’s stay in the country, with Assad’s forces renewing attacks on rebel-held Aleppo. Baroness Cox acknowledged accusations that Assad’s forces had employed chemical weapons, but said “war is horrible” and that atrocities had occurred on both sides.
New Bishop of Gibraltar is told: ‘This is not a promotion’
Cardinal Vincent Nichols has ordained the new Bishop of Gibraltar, advising him that the position “is not a promotion, but a new step on the pathway of holiness, given for God’s own purpose”.
In a homily in St Paul’s Cathedral in Mdina, Malta, where he ordained Bishop Carmelo Zammit, Cardinal Nichols said: “Governance in the name of Jesus has no trace of the patterns of this world’s ways – ‘lording it over them’ ”. Rather, he said, it was “a call to serve”.
“In my humble experience, ordination as a bishop brings with it a more radical change than even the change wrought by ordination as a priest,” he said.
Bishop Zammit, 66, replaces Bishop Ralph Heskett, who was named Bishop of Hallam in 2014. Bishop Heskett and Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta acted as co-consecrators.
Cardinal Nichols said that Gibraltar was, “in many ways, a microcosm of Europe”. “To be bishop of such a place is, I believe, a privilege and a challenge,” he said. Gibraltar is a British Overseas Territory.
Most of its 30,000 residents are Catholic.
Archbishop hails ties to Britain
Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta celebrated Mass in Westminster Cathedral to mark Malta Day UK on September 3.
The day commemorates the 1565 Great Siege of Malta, when the Knights Hospitaller and 400 Maltese held off an attack by the Ottoman Empire.
In his homily, Archbishop Scicluna hailed Malta’s close ties with Britain. This “important relationship” is “so beneficial to our people,” he said.
Cardinal: give ex-convicts a chance in jobs market
Criminals should not have to declare if they have spent time in prison when they first apply for a job, Cardinal Vincent Nichols has said.
Questions about serious convictions should be dropped from early box-ticking phases of any job application, the Archbishop of Westminster told a conference for prison chaplains.
He said a “ban on the box” would give ex-prisoners a chance to explain their behaviour at a later stage of the job-selection process. This would be fairer to them and might also increase their chances of obtaining employment needed for them to stop relapsing into crime, he argued.
“We know that for people leaving prison, one of the most important aspects of rebuilding their life is finding stable employment,” he told the meeting at St Mary’s University.
“But for at least two years after their release they must disclose their sentence on initial application forms for employment,” he said. “Every day people are instantly written off just because they have ticked that box.” He said he knew of one man who, during his time in jail for a serious crimes, worked so hard that he achieved a post-graduate degree.
“Upon release he was determined to use his skills for the benefit of others,” Cardinal Nichols said. “Yet three years on and despite many applications, he has not had even a single interview. He has not been able to tell his story. It is hard to envisage the crushing disappointment of someone who has worked hard to move away from crime and learn new skills, only to be rejected for job after job and never even given the opportunity to explain how he or she has changed since being convicted years before. That … deprives employers of potentially excellent workers.”
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