Daily media briefing

Accuser's lawyer says legal and religious establishment delaying case in hope Lawrence Hecker, 92, dies before trial.

The Guardian

Burkina Faso's military junta has announced a ban on homosexual acts, making it the latest African state to crack down on same-sex relations despite strong opposition from Western powers.

BBC

Queensland supreme court also told trial is 'religious persecution' by leader of group accused of killing eight-year-old.

The Guardian

Head of campaigns for the National Secular Society, Megan Manson, said: "As much as the Church may wish it, our state schools are not there to serve the interests of the Church of England. They are there to educate our children."

Premier Christian News

Megan Manson of the National Secular Society reflects on what a Labour government might mean for secularism in the UK and the worrying trend of religious groups publishing manifestos to advance their sectarian agendas.

The Freethinker

Senior members of Sir Keir Starmer's new government have spoken of their personal faith as a driving force in their politics: two of the great offices of state — those of Chancellor and Foreign Secretary — are held by Christians.

Church Times*

A man who called himself a doctor and circumcised seven young boys in their homes has been jailed for six-and-a-half years for endangerment.

RTE

A law which would see the introduction of an assisted dying service in the Isle of Man has moved one stepped closer.

ITV

Jonathan Fletcher faces charges dating between 1973 and 1999.

The Standard

Quebec's secularism law — commonly known as Bill 21 — prevents public school teachers, police officers, judges and government lawyers, among other civil servants in positions of authority, from wearing religious symbols while at work.

CBC / Yahoo! News

In an era of deep divisions in the church, newly ordained priests overwhelmingly lean right in their theology, practices and politics.

New York Times*

Judgement deems one of Baghdadi's widows complicit in crimes against Yazidi women.

The Guardian

Bible-bashing drug boss accused of targeting Afro-Brazilian religions and Catholic congregations.

The Guardian

Charles Bradlaugh was eventually allowed to take an oath in 1886, and two years later a bill he proposed became law that allowed MPs to affirm.

Yahoo! News

The survey was commissioned by the Integrated Education Fund.

The Irish News

Between 1949 and the mid 1970s, thousands of women were sent away to mother and baby homes run by churches and the state - places of secrecy, cruelty and even abuse - where babies were put up for adoption or died through poor care.

ITV

The Charity Commission has found that trustees of a south London church committed serious misconduct and mismanagement by giving £1 million in unsecured loans to a Dubai-based property developer.

Premier Christian News

The Bishop of Blackburn, the Rt Revd Philip North, said that he had previously supported full operational independence for safeguarding, but had changed his mind after conversations with safeguarding professionals in the dioceses.

Church Times*

General Yehuda Fox said that Jewish extremists were 'adopting the ways of the enemy'.

The Jewish Chronicle

Facebook will suppress attacks on Jewish people as "Zionists", warning the term is used to mask anti-Semitism.

The Telegraph*

"In 1961, he declared Buddhism the state religion. By transforming Buddhism into a political ideology, U Nu sowed the seeds of the dangerous populist ideology that would become known as political Buddhism", writes Hein Htet Kyaw.

The Freethinker

A religious group accused of killing an eight-year-old girl believed "God would heal" her diabetes after they withheld life-saving insulin, a judge has heard.

Canberra Times

Satanists are volunteering to fill vacancies across Florida schools after Ron DeSantis signed a new law pushing for more religion in education.

Independent

The archbishop of Canterbury urged traditionalists not to abandon the church over the move.

The Guardian

Church must reach working-class males in particular, say officials as 'attendance declines'.

The Telegraph*

A call for a new independent inquiry into abuse in the Soul Survivor network was lost at the General Synod in York on Sunday, despite support from Charismatic Evangelical members.

Church Times*

Gambian lawmakers on Monday approved a committee report supporting a 2015 ban on female genital mutilation , as a bill seeking to overturn the law heads for a final vote this month.

RFI

Three Columbia University deans have been removed from their posts after sending "disturbing antisemitic" text messages to each other during a forum about Jewish issues.

The Times*

The 69-year-old former heart surgeon and health minister campaigned on promises to moderate Iran's conservative outlook and improve relations with the West. He has criticised the country's notorious morality police.

BBC

School laptops are allegedly monitored by a roster of church members, with parents sent summaries of their child's internet use.

The Guardian

Online protest claimed the work mocked the Christian religion and Liverpool mayor Ned Mannoun called for it to be taken down.

The Guardian

Secularist campaigners have branded a new Church of England evangelism initiative in Salisbury as 'a cynical move to use our schools to ease its plummeting membership.'

Salisbury Journal

The collective that mobilised Muslims to elect five pro-Gaza independents says it plans to continue its work over the coming years

The Times*

A newly elected MP who dedicated his victory to "the people of Gaza" is the brother of the founder of the hardline Islamist group Friends of Al Aqsa.

Jewish News

"However big the headline change in the vote between the past two elections, drill down into two demographic pockets of Britain and you find staggering shifts. It all centres around the relationships between the Labour Party and not just Muslim voters, but Jewish voters too."

BBC

The Archbishop of York, at the opening of the General Synod in York on Friday, addressed confusion about the consensus of the Archbishops' Council in its decision to disband the Independent Safeguarding Board last year.

Church Times*

The Roman Catholic Church has been ordered to pay settlements totalling $104 million to 292 survivors of historical abuse in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Toronto Star

Auditor headhunted by Francis in 2015 to expose waste and embezzlement at the Vatican is fighting for compensation after claiming unfair dismissal.

The Times*

Doctors deplore decision and point to country's high neonatal mortality rate as bank, which opened in June, forced to close without taking a single deposit.

The Guardian

Carlo Maria Viganò was charged with creating a schism in the Catholic Church as Francis takes on critics of his liberal stance on issues including homosexuality.

The Times*

"Votes on the basis of ethnic identity are reshaping British politics".

The Critic

A pro-Hezbollah nurse reportedly travelled to Lebanon while on paid leave from the NHS to interview a terror chief for a documentary about her "martyr" grandfather.

The Jewish Chronicle

The Church of England fears that worshippers are donating less to the collection plate in protest over its creation of a £100 million slavery reparations fund.

The Times*

Labour suffered a series of shock losses at the hands of independent candidates representing pro-Gaza interests in key seats.

The i

A suspected loyalist gang has targeted Catholic and African residents in a spate of sectarian and racist attacks in County Antrim that has forced at least one family to flee.

The Guardian

Pope Francis's chief of staff has become one of the highest-ranking Holy See officials to testify in a foreign court, giving a British tribunal a detailed explanation of the negotiations at the heart of the Vatican's "trial of the century".

The Guardian

Australia should not go down the road of faith-based politics, the prime minister has warned, as parties vie for Muslim voters.

North West Star

Two re-elected female MPs have relayed in sober victory speeches the intimidation and harassment they faced during the general election campaign.

BBC