Mighty Win For England. They Lead 2 - 1 In Four Match Series!

Well, with six wickets to take, Toby R-J took two in consecutive balls in the morning session but could not get the hat trick. The same had happened earlier to Ben Stokes.
Tom Goddard was the last England spinner to get a hat trick - that was on Boxing Day, 1938 in Jo'burg.
He is no longer the last - Mo Ali is!

Two identical wickets. Elgar and Rabada, both left-handers, were caught at first slip from an off-break turning away from the bat out of the bowlers' rough. That ended his penultimate over. Mo had to wait for Stokesy to complete his over before lining up for the hat trick ball. It rammed into Morkel's pads and looked to be clearly hitting leg stump.
England - and Mo - were fortunate, at the end of the 80 overs to still have a review left when, inexplicably, the umpire failed to raise the finger. The review clearly showed what everyone else in the Oval already knew - and there it was! An England spinner with a hat trick - of a trio of left-handers! - Oh, and an England victory by a superb 239 runs!

Passchendaele Remembered.

‘I died in Hell, they called it Passchendaele’ – so goes the famous lines of Siegfried Sassoon’s poem. Today, July 31, marks the 100th anniversary of one of the most famous and brutal battles of the Great War. Commemorative events and exhibitions are taking place across Europe and the UK to pay respect and remember the British and Allied Forces campaign that ran from July to November at the cost of 500,000 men on all sides.

Arise!

Fifty Years Of Word Games.

Published: July 28th, 2017 

• | 
  • Sexual Orientation, 
  • Social

This week marks 50 years since the partial decriminalisation of homosexuality, and lots has changed. Laws have changed. Public attitudes have changed. Institutions have changed. These might all appear obvious.

But one of the subtler changes has been the reshaping of language; the battle of words.

The sexual revolution has brought with it a new vocabulary: 'gay', 'straight', 'queer', 'sexual orientation', 'gender', 'gender identity', 'homophobia', 'LGBT community', 'transgender', 'sex assigned at birth', 'fight for equality' and much more.

The sexual revolutionaries have put immense pressure on society to learn this new vocabulary, and have for the most part succeeded in mainstreaming it.

Just think about the phrase 'I feel very gay today' and how it would be interpreted in 1917 and 2017. In both years, it would probably garner the same response ('good for you') but for very different reasons.

Introducing new words, and redefining old ones, has hugely affected the debate:
 

Confusion

First, new words create a fog in the public discourse. They enable you to talk about a topic without being challenged. It's a bit like using big words or long sentences. Politicians do this all the time. Fans of Yes Minister will identify strongly with the notion of 'pulling a Sir Humphrey'.

So, if I can talk in the language of Queer Theory and gender mainstreaming, speak of 'sex assigned at birth' and (self-proclaimed) 'gender identity', and the 'equality of all sexual orientations and gender identities', I can make myself sound like an expert when in fact the concepts I am speaking about have no basis in reality.

Those who do not speak the language are seen as failing to understand, and everyone listening is confused. But the person with the clever words must surely be right.
 

Immersion

Second, introducing new words can help flood the minds of your opponents, making people think about sex, sexuality and gender theory as much as possible.

Thinking about all the possible 'sexual orientations', 'gender identities' and types of relationships gives credence to the theory behind the movement. Gay activists Kirk and Madsen in their 1987 article 'The Overhauling of Straight America' spoke of the need to"talk about gays and gayness as loudly and as often as possible", and the new language serves this purpose.

Think about the impact of changing the word 'homosexual' to 'gay'. 'Gay' is a positive word; historically it was understood to mean 'cheerful'. But 'gay' also associates homosexuality with the 'gay identity'; there's a whole culture that goes with it; gay bars and gay publications and gay pride and so on. It affects all of life. Now, combine this with the concept of 'sexual orientation' which effectively makes all sexual expression morally equal. So, equally, there must be an identity associated with all sexual orientations.

And, through the power of language, we all must define ourselves by our sexuality, and think about it all the time. It must affect all of life, and so all of life will be sexualised. 
 

Implication

Third, controlling the language enables you to beg the question.

Many terms used convey an attitude (positive or negative) towards the issue being discussed. This is often deliberate and very powerful. 

For example, a friend might ask me: 'do you support the fight for equality for the LGBT community?'

If I say 'yes', then I've just signed up to bless same-sex 'marriage', homosexual sexual acts, 'sex-change' operations, and gay adoption; things which God calls sin. But if I say 'no', I am against equality, against a whole community, and part of the reason why there needs to be a 'fight' at all. I must be 'homophobic'.

Of course, I'm not against equality. It's just that the LGBT movement is not a movementfor equality. Marriage was not made equal in law in 2013. It was redefined. The movement has championed the notion of 'equality' when its real agenda is to redefine things – redefine marriage, redefine sex, redefine gender, redefine the family.

But if you frame it as 'equality', who will stand against you?
 

Clarity

So, next time you're in a discussion with someone about sex or marriage, and they use a fuzzy term, why not ask them: 'What do you mean?' Hopefully you'll get an interesting discussion out of it, and you might just expose some assumptions behind the language. Christian Concern.

Wesley And Worms.

Atheists Bully And Win!

http://www.christianpost.com/news/indiana-school-district-bans-prayer-graduation-ceremonies-ffrf-atheist-group-files-complaint-191995/

Gill On Song.

Third Test Match - The Oval. Final Day Beckons.

Skipper Root did well to opt to bat after winning the toss on Thursday. Temptations to field first were many. The England batsmen - led by a century from Ben Stokes - did a phenomenal job under difficult conditions. Their 353 was as good as a hundred more runs under less cloudy weather. The ball swung and caused problems.
England skittle the Proteas to earn a 179 lead on first innings - a triumph for Toby Roland-Jones on debut. The Middlesex paceman took a superb fivefer.
England then batted South Africa completely out of the game in the second innings - and when the declaration inevitably came - England quickly took four early wickets.
To win today, England have three sessions to take the final six - WEATHER PERMITTING!

Birdie.

Rejecting Our Roots.

ERIC METAXAS , CHRISTIAN POST CONTRIBUTOR

Jul 27, 2017.

Eric Metaxas is an evangelical speaker and bestselling author.

What happens when a civilization forgets — or rejects — its roots? We're seeing it right now.

"Europe is committing suicide. Or at least it leaders have decided to commit suicide." Those are the opening words of Douglas Murray's controversial best-seller, The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity, Islam.

What Murray means when he says that Europe is "committing suicide" is that "the civilization we know as Europe is in the process of committing suicide." It's a fate that neither his native "Britain nor any other Western European country can avoid . . . because [they] all appear to suffer from the same symptoms and maladies."

It's Murray's diagnosis of these "symptoms and maladies" that should interest Christians.

As the subtitle suggests, Murray's book covers much of the same ground as other recent books by authors such as Mark Steyn, Bruce Bawer, and the French novelist Michelle Houellebecq. These books seek to warn readers about the threat to European institutions and values posed by mass Islamic immigration.

While Murray is, to put it mildly, skeptical about the possibility of successfully assimilating millions of Muslim immigrants and their children, this mass migration alone wasn't enough to cause the "strange death" alluded to in his title.

As Murray tells readers, "even the mass movement of millions of people into Europe would not sound such a final note for the continent were it not for the fact that (coincidentally or otherwise) at the same time Europe lost faith in its beliefs, traditions and legitimacy."

In other words, it is mass Islamic immigration plus Europe's spiritual exhaustion — my words not his — that threaten to put an end to European civilization.

And at the heart of the loss of faith Murray cites is Europe's turning its back on Christianity.

In one chapter he writes about a sense shared by many European intellectuals, including himself, that "life in modern liberal democracies is to some extent thin or shallow and that life in modern Western Europe in particular has lost its sense of purpose."

According to Murray, "Here is an inheritance of thought and culture and philosophy and religion which has nurtured people for thousands of years and may well fulfill you too."

The "religion" Murray refers to is, of course, Christianity, which he calls the "source" of European ideas about rights, laws, and the institutions that protect them. He tells his secularized readers that "There is no reason why the inheritor of a Judeo-Christian civilization and Enlightenment Europe should spend much, if any, of their time warring with those who still hold the faith from which so many of those beliefs and rights spring."

He also derides the varieties of "European Christianity [that] have lost the confidence to proselytize or even believe in their own message." This lack of confidence, in Murray's estimation, is why some young Europeans turn to Islam, which doesn't suffer from the sense that "the story has run out."

What makes Murray's account especially interesting is that he is a self-described atheist. His reasons for disbelief aren't particularly persuasive, but that doesn't negate his much-needed reminder of Europe's debt to Christianity and how its rejection of its Christian past threatens its future. The same, of course, could be said about America.

As Murry writes, "If being 'European' is not about race — as we hope it is not — then it is even more imperative that it is about 'values.' This is what makes the question 'What are European values?' so important."

It's a question that can't be answered without first acknowledging the source of those values.

Originally posted at breakpoint.org

Our Navy.

Woman Taken In Adultery.

Jesus Forgives a Woman Taken in Adultery - but what for?

This story, beloved for its revelation of God's mercy toward sinners, is found only in John. It was almost certainly not part of John's original Gospel. The NIV separates this passage off from the rest of the Gospel with the note, "The earliest and most reliable manuscripts and other ancient witnesses do not have John 7:53--8:11." That is, the earliest Greek manuscripts, the earliest translations and the earliest church fathers all lack reference to this story. Bible Gateway.

This story is quite remarkable but is so wrongly interpreted that I shudder.

Is this woman really forgiven with no evidence of repentance?

If there is no punishment for her then surely all punishments imposed by God-given instruction to mankind must be equally ignored.

Let us see what we know from this story:

1) It is a trap. John tells us so.

2) Where was the evidence of the man? - Even if they were sexist in their implementation of punishments - it still 'takes two to tango' as they say. ... Did I mention that it's a trap?

3) Do we know what her 'sin' was? - We have NO evidence that she was an adulteress. (Remember - this was only the claim of those setting the trap.)

4) Was she herself part of the plot - never at any risk? That would doubly explain Jesus's response.

5) This is often preached as 'evidence for Jesus's compassion'. But His compassion - if being tested at all - is very much a side issue.

6) So, what was the nature of this trap? - If Jesus said to stone her - he would have been endorsing Jewish Law to execute - something only permitted for the Romans as the occupying power.

This would have then been taken to the authorities by those setting the trap. If however, He were to tell them not to stone her - He would have been denying Jewish Law - surely the preference of these nasty-minded people! His entire status would have been thoroughly undermined.

7) Note! - Jesus effectively endorsed the execution BUT removed the blame being pointed at him and turned it back onto those who set the trap. His 'Let the one without sin cast the first stone' was awesome. Not one could make an effective statement in public that 'he was without sin' - it would have been a blasphemy.

8) Is Jesus forgiving her for having been part of the plot - which makes far more sense?

Dear Christian. How many times have you heard this story preached? - Did it major on 'the compassion of Jesus' every time? - I have only ever heard it preached on well just the once.

Apologies For Two Aspects Of This Cartoon - But Not The Political Bit!

Tory Brexit Betrayal Nicely Under Way!

Tory Brexit Betrayal Is Up And Running

Published Jul 28, 2017

Today Philip Hammond, the Tory Chancellor gave out what some will see as a contradictory message that following Brexit in March 2019 the UK will probably continue to deal with the EU on much the same basis as before Brexit.

Hammond claimed that the UK will leave the Single Market and Customs Union, then indicated that an unspecified 'transition period' will be needed to negotiate a 'new treaty'. During this time unlimited immigration from the EU will continue, as long as EU citizens register their name with the Home Office. It is also likely that during this 'transition period', which could last for many years the UK will continue to be subject to ECJ (European Court of Justice ) oversight, be unable to sign any trade deals, continue to pay billions into the EU's coffers, have to abide by EU law and not have control of its borders with the EU or its fishing grounds.

John Bickley, UKIP's Immigration spokesman said, "Philip Hammond, a Remainer who didn't want the UK to leave the EU, is telling the British public that the UK will be leaving the Single Market and Customs Union, both core constructs of the EU, by March 2019, in other words the Tory party will deliver Brexit. However, in the same breath he appears to be indicating that the Tories intend to keep the UK in the EU in all but name for an unspecified period, with uncontrolled immigration from the EU continuing for many years after 2019. This means that hundreds of thousands of EU immigrants will be added to the population in the five years from last June's EU referendum to the 2022 General Election. The 3.2 million EU citizens already here will not be asked to leave. 

Bizarrely, the chancellor commented on the unreadiness of the various government institutions to manage the UK's borders and immigration by 2019. Why? It is over a year since the referendum result and a clear mandate to government to leave the EU. Why didn't the government immediately begin planning and recruiting staff so that our borders could be controlled by 2019. Since 2015 UKIP has stated that at least 4,000 extra Border Agency staff are needed to get a grip of our borders and uncontrolled immigration. Maybe the alleged comment by the previous chancellor, that Cameron's cabinet didn't believe in controlling immigration and that the Tories 'tens of thousands' immigration pledge was a political soundbite tells the British public that the Tories are hell bent on betraying the Referendum result and keeping the UK subservient to a foreign power for many years to come."      

Start Trying! - Now.

James Madison.

"Since the general civilization of mankind, I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachment of those in power, than by violent and sudden usurpations."James Madison to the Virginia Convention, 1788.

Unite!

Preachers Acquitted.

 

Two Christian street preachers have today been acquitted of public order offences, after being convicted in February in what was described as a "modern day heresy trial".

Michael Overd and Michael Stockwell were found guilty under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 at Bristol Magistrates' Court in February this year, with Prosecutor Ian Jackson claiming that publicly quoting parts of the King James Bible in modern Britain should "be considered to be abusive and is a criminal matter".

Mr Overd and Mr Stockwell had been arrested for preaching at a Bristol shopping centre in July 2016, along with two other men.

In February the court had dismissed the case against a third man, Adrian Clark, ruling that there was no case to answer.

Mr Overd and Mr Stockwell were both acquitted today at the appeal hearing at Bristol Crown Court. Christian Concern.

'Women & Sex' Only.

A number of women who served or were prepared to be used as brides for Islamic State fighters said that though the "sex-obsessed" jihadis talk a lot about Allah, what they really care about is "women and sex."

"They say they want to jihad for the sake of Allah, but what they want is only about women and sex. It's disgusting," an Indonesian woman named Rahma said in a CNN report.

Rahma said that she escaped Raqqa with her two sisters before they could be married to IS (also known as ISIS) fighters, but the three are now being kept with scores of other IS brides from various nationalities at a jail in Syria.

Government Workers - And OUR Taxes.

Tearfund.

Hear my prayer.

For decades schools in Afghanistan stood empty. Then, at the turn of the millennium, the Taliban rule collapsed. Aid poured into the country and schools reopened.

But for Kalan, aged 16, from Kabul, and thousands like him, nothing changed. ‘I was born deaf,’ he says, ‘so I couldn’t go to school.’

Living with disability
Nearly three-quarters of children living with physical or mental disabilities in Afghanistan are excluded from education. And they don’t gain the skills to get a job when they are older. Kalan believed he would always be shunned, in permanent need of support. 'My parents thought there was no hope for a good life for me,' he says.

What Kalan didn’t know was that people were lobbying on behalf of children like him. Tearfund partner Serve Afghanistan helps children with disabilities – teaching them sign language, literacy, braille and offering mobility support.

Thanks to Serve Afghanistan, Kalan finally enrolled at school. 'I have lots of friends,' he says. 'Serve helped my teachers to understand my needs, and respect me. My parents are so happy.’

Pioneering inclusive education
The encouragement from teachers has been pivotal to Kalan’s progress. And, thanks to your support for Tearfund, Serve Afghanistan are training more teachers to be inclusive – opening doors for more disabled children.

‘When I was younger, a blind student wanted to go to my school,’ says Ahmed, a teacher at Kalan’s school. ‘I refused. I thought he couldn’t learn anything.’ His attitude changed after a Serve training course. ‘I was surprised that I could teach children with disabilities.’ Today Ahmed champions inclusive education and is a master braille trainer.

But Serve Afghanistan are doing much more than changing one school. They have taken a central role in shaping Afghanistan’s education policies. Alongside several other organisations, Serve started advocating for inclusive education in 2009.

They took a leading role: writing Afghanistan’s inclusive education policy (approved by the Minister of Education in 2014). Thanks to this law, across Afghanistan, thousands of children with disabilities can join their friends in school.

Claiming children’s rights
Kalan has learnt sign language and is no longer living on the sidelines. ‘I shop for myself and communicate through sign or writing,’ says Kalan. ‘I go to community events and weddings. I am very proud that I can help my mum with the housework, and my dad in his workshop. I am very happy.

'Now deaf people have much more opportunity to know and fight for their rights. I talk to disabled children and tell them that they shouldn’t feel hopeless. They should ask their parents to find a school where they can get an education. I hope to become a teacher or be a help to the deaf community.'

Joined by a new generation of advocates like Kalan, and with the help of our supporters, we won’t stop until marginalised children all across Afghanistan have been empowered to unlock their God-given potential through an inclusive education.

Some names have been changed to protect people’s identities.

(This article first appeared in Tear Times Summer 2017.)

Please pray

Is Diane Intellectually Challenged?

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/830985/Diane-Abbott-Tory-police-force-cuts-crime-increase-Theresa-May-video

Dr Julia Reid MEP On The NHS.

UKIP’s Health Spokesman: With more 86,000 vacant NHS posts in the first quarter of this year, it’s about time we stopped taking our NHS staff for granted!

Published Jul 27, 2017

According to figures released by NHS Digital, more than 86,000 NHS posts were vacant in the first quarter of this year, which is an increase of almost 8,000 when compared to the same period last year.

UKIP’s Health Spokesman, Dr Julia Reid MEP, described the figures as “deeply concerning” but was quick to shut down those seeking to blame Brexit for the rise in vacant NHS posts.

Dr Reid, who has had an extensive career working as a research biochemist in the NHS, said: “Whilst the latest statistics highlight the fact that we have a genuine issue with recruitment and retention within the NHS at the moment, it is completely disingenuous to blame the problem on Brexit.

“One of the main reasons that the NHS is struggling to recruit enough front line NHS workers, such as nurses and midwives, is because we’re not training enough to begin with. Currently, we turn away tens of thousands of potential students due to the limited number of training placements available.  We should increase the number of placements immediately as it's obvious we're not training sufficient numbers to meet the needs of the NHS.

“However, to do this, we need to ensure that we have enough bright and promising students willing to train for a career in the NHS. Unfortunately, the number of applications for courses, such as nursing and midwifery, have plummeted since the Government scrapped the bursary scheme (which originally covered tuition and hospital accommodation costs). As a result of this, we’re now going to miss out on thousands of potential nurses, and allied health professionals, who will have been deterred from applying due to the enormous financial burden involved in training now.

“As for staff retention, we’re now seeing more midwives and nurses leaving the profession in the UK than joining it.  Increasingly, this is due to nurses, and other health care professionals, being overworked and underappreciated so they swell the ranks of agency staff. The Government’s refusal to scrap the 1% public sector pay cap has meant frontline NHS workers are now earning significantly less than they were five years ago due to the high levels of inflation. Lack of resources, staff shortages and increased work load effectively means that our health professionals are now expected to work even harder for less money. It’s no surprise that the NHS is haemorrhaging nurses and other health professionals and, with the current state of affairs, working for the NHS is becoming an increasingly less attractive option for young students considering their future careers.

“Despite these problems, we’re still fortunate enough to have plenty of experienced nurses and health professionals from countries such as Australia and New Zealand who want to come to work in our hospitals. They already speak our language, so employing people from countries such as these should be less complicated, right? So why does the NHS make it so difficult for them to come and work here?  The current process of registering as a nurse in the NHS can take up to a year and cost over £3,000. Furthermore, all applicants, regardless of their first language, are required to pass an English test, one that is often described by the applicants as ‘unnecessary’ and ‘difficult’. Such red tape only adds to the difficulty in filling the ever-increasing number of open NHS vacancies.

“Whilst it’s true that overseas doctors and other health care professionals have, for a long time, provided a valuable contribution to the NHS, we shouldn’t take their willingness to work here for granted. If the Government continues in failing to address the issues contributing to poor recruitment and retention of health professionals in the UK, the NHS may soon find itself struggling to recruit and retain staff from overseas as well.”

Birdie.

Labour Hypocrisy - Again?

http://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/834227/Labour-MP-Canterbury-Rosie-Duffield-grammar-schools

Verminous.

The student head of Cambridge's equality group has claimed that 'all white people are racist' after praising rioters in Dalston who lit bonfires and hurled petrol bombs at police. Jason Osamede Okundaye, who runs the Black and Minority Ethnic society at the elite institution, posted the shocking tweets amid violent protests in east London last night over the death of Rashan Charles. He said that white people had 'colonised' Dalston and ordered them to 'go back' to areas such as Exeter and 'Solihurst' (sic). Mail.

That Woman Just Makes Me SO VERY Angry!

'Understandable anger': Local MP Diane Abbott defends rioters who attacked police and vehicles in Hackney.

Birdie.

Sack NHS Bureaucrats - In Very Large Numbers!

Jarvis Browning, Main Street, Fadmoor, York. Yorks Post.

Regarding your article about the NHS deficit, one way to solve it is to get rid of all the managers in all departments, which will not be popular!

As it is, they are the bugbear of the NHS. They are the ones that have reduced the basic staffing levels and pay, whilst they lord it up. We never see their side being cut up.

Get back to the basic of nursing and let the matrons and sisters do the management off the hospital, the nurses doing basic running of the wards and the rest to the doctors and surgeons for administering, with a few secretaries for appointments, bookings etc. We don’t need managers or under-managers to manage every section of the NHS.

My sister, who is now 70, would say the same thing, having been a sister of a ward at a very young age.