Minister decides

[censorship]

 

What a pathetic attitude.

Quite. Rather than ensuring the information about the background of the charity is public and allowing us to make our own decisions, he is going to order us not to support it.

Obviously, we can't be trusted to assess information and make an informed choice. Although, looking at the fact he's been elected by the public, perhaps he's right to stop us making choices.

[homarus]

If he get's voted in next time is correct . this guy is so wet and useless he doesn't need to water his crop he just stands in the field with them.

 

 

"Weighed measured and found severely wanting "

 

Like more than a few others!

[Lightening McQueen]

 

 

It was front page of the local rag - this is the last year it is being done

 

 

Maybe by next year there'll be no christians left.

 

The phone book's full of them :-)

[Mission]

Can you elaborate please, a link, maybe?

 

Don't be so daft. You'll be wanting thread titles that make sense next!

[Rhumsaa]

Evangelical Christians trying to convert people by underhand means?

 

No, I simply won't believe it to be true

[thebees]

My boy took his box off to school the other day, he is so cute, he'd packed cars, colouring books/pencils, gloves and a scarf, a thing (I mean it, I have no idea what it was, looked like a golden plastic giant minstrel) and a slice of tree (with paint on), the thought was lovely, he wanted to give them something he had made but the reality would have been well, who knows?

 

I wonder about this for a couple of reasons, the things we put in could be bought for less than a tenner, is really worth the postage? How are Syrians (or whomever) meant to read children's books written in English? What is point?

[woolley]

Lots of Syrians have very good English from an early age.

[notwell]

You never know when you might need it ;-)

[angelo]

The arrogance of this opinionated politician stopping a harmless and charitable Christmas gift occasion following a complaint from a single lobbyist ! If he thinks this is a serious issue for the IOM people let him table a motion in the Keys or open up a public debate. From whom did he get this overweening authority ?

[Vulgarian]

Concerning this charity, an open letter to Mr Crookall was recently sent to schools on the island. I have reproduced it here.

 

Dear Mr Crookall,

I understand that a number of island schools have participated in Operation Christmas Child in recent years and that some are preparing to do so again this year. This campaign is run by Samaritan’s Purse International (SPI), a Christian organisation that states its primary objective as evangelism. SPI operates within economically deprived communities where the wealthy international charity takes advantage of an unequal power relationship with disadvantaged communities to whom it proffers much needed resources in order to advance its evangelical aims. Operation Christmas Child targets the communities’ children with toys and gifts provided by charitable donations along with their own proselytising literature. The children are asked to join a 12 week discipleship programme, an offer they are hardly in a position to question, let alone resist. The purpose of this discipleship programme, called ‘The Greatest Journey’, is according to SPI to “raise up an army of evangelists.”

The work of SPI is problematic for a number of reasons. Amongst other things it promotes a particularly conservative and fundamentalist form of Christianity whose doctrine holds that homosexuality is sinful and that, without repentance through Christ, those who practice it are destined for Hell. Samaritan’s Purse president and CEO, Franklin Graham, has been vocal in his opposition to gay rights and equality: “Homosexuality is sin. Same-sex marriage is a sin against God.” SPI’s ‘statement of faith’ makes its position clear: “We believe God’s plan for human sexuality is to be expressed only within the context of marriage,” and “marriage is exclusively the union of one genetic male and one genetic female.”

The consequences of such sin are explained in the children’s course material for ‘The Greatest Journey’: “The punishment for sin is death and to be separated from God and everything good forever. The Bible calls this place Hell.” Such beliefs and values are apt to cause emotional and psychological harm to credulous young LGBT people and do not accord with the promotion of “mental and emotional wellbeing especially to disadvantaged or socially excluded groups or communities” that the Department of Education and Children espouses.vi At a time when LGBT people in many places, particularly developing countries where SPI focuses its attention, are struggling for recognition of their basic rights, and suffering homophobic violence, discrimination, and prejudice, SPI is actively promoting a homophobic belief system.

I urge the Department to take this opportunity to examine carefully the work of Samaritan’s Purse and consider whether state schools should be involved in furthering its central aim, i.e. evangelism, especially given the fundamentalist character of SPI’s beliefs. Samaritan's Purse was investigated by the Charity Commission in 2003 which criticised it for lack of clarity about its evangelical mission. I question whether parents, students, and teachers are being made sufficiently aware of the nature of the organisation they are being actively encouraged, through island schools, to support.

There are many charitable organisations working in disadvantaged communities whose main objective is not evangelism but the promotion of responsible social and economic development projects for the actual temporal benefit of those communities. I have listed just a few below.

 

Alternative charities
The following are amongst the more responsible charities focussed on providing aid and development to impoverished areas, and do not proselytise. They all offer ways for schools to take part in their work.

Oxfam
Aquabox
Unicef
Save the Children
British Red Cross
Water Aid
Medicins Sans Frontiers

[Vulgarian]

TL;DR

 

Fundamentalist, anti-gay, Christian charity takes advantage of Western consumer guilt to send culturally inappropriate gifts to disadvantaged children in order to recruit them as evangelists. Don't support it.

[angelo]

Letter from whom ? And what did Crookall reply ?

Is this just a bit more gay evangelism ?

[quilp]

Letter from whom ? And what did Crookall reply ?

Is this just a bit more gay evangelism ?

 

 

You just don't get it, do you ..?

[quilp]

Wouldn't it be good if the boxes had Christian tracts on the outside and when opened contained nothing?

 

Great post, made me chuckle, sums up the 'rewards' of supernaturalism perfectly.

[guzzi]

I completely agree with the 'Dear Mr Crookall' letter. Kid's clearly wouldn't understand the issues involved, and it is therefore quite grubby and deceptive to involve them in this missionary campaign. In future Christmas campaigns could be arranged around the non-proselytising charities mentioned. There's probably even a way of working Santa Steam Trains into it somehow.