The senior chaplain at Sandhurst military academy has dropped the Apostles’ Creed from Anglican services saying it might offend religious minorities.

The Daily Mail reported on 31st January that centuries of religious tradition have been sacrificed for the sake of political correctness.

Reverend Jonathan Gough dropped the Christian declaration of faith in God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit when he took office last month.

A fellow Chaplain said it had been removed ‘to stop upsetting cadets who do not believe in God’. This is despite the fact that attendance is not compulsory. Non-believing Sandhurst cadets can and do opt out of church.

The Ministry of Defence said the Creed had been withdrawn from services at the Royal Memorial Chapel to make the church ‘more inclusive’. Figures showing how the massive increase of attendance at church by cadets from other faiths and none since the service was made more ‘inclusive’ by hiding what Christians believe have not yet been released.

A senior member of the Chapel yesterday said the decision to cut the affirmation of faith was ludicrous. He said: ‘It’s a disgrace. Nobody was told and everybody has been left shocked and angry. It’ just an attempt to be “right on”.’

The Creed, which forms part of the Morning and Evening Prayer services, found in the book of Common Prayer, begins: ‘I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried’. It goes on to speak of His Resurrection and Ascension and the Final Judgment.

Theologian Dr Richard Bell, from Nottingham University , said ‘The Creed is the central plank of the Church of England service. If you give up on that you are effectively giving up on God. Frankly I’m appalled by this decision.’

Sir Richard Dannatt, the current Chief of the General Staff, is unlikely to be enthusiastic about Mr Gough’s revisionism. Sir Richard is a practising evangelical Christian. In October 2006 , he was reported as being concerned by the decline in Christian values in Britain that had allowed Islamic extremism to flourish. He told the Daily Mail: ‘It is said we live in a post-Christian society. I think that is a great shame. The Judaic-Christian tradition has underpinned British society. It underpins the British Army.. … Threats now are not territorial but to the values of our society.’ He was uncompromising when asked about the allegiance of Muslim soldiers. ‘If they are prepared to take the Queen’s shilling they will go wherever the mission requires them to go,’ he said. That does not sound like a man who would want any Christian service watered down in the army so as not to offend those who are highly unlikely ever to hear it.

Mr Gough, 46, is a former secretary for ecumenism for Archbishop of Canterbury. His only comment has been: ‘I had many options to choose from.’ The Chaplain General, Rev David Wilkes, a Methodist, has said that non-Christian chaplains will eventually be commissioned, a move which would shake the Christian underpinning to which General Dannatt referred. At present, only Christian chaplains can be full-time and hold officer status. All others are civilian.

Former army officer Patrick Mercer MP, whose father was Bishop of Exeter, called for the Creed to be returned. Mr Mercer, who trained at Sandhurst , said: ‘If you go to an Anglican Church service you expect to hear an Anglican service. I think the good reverend is being a little too precious.’

An Army spokesman said it was common practice to alter the service from time to time, although only the General Synod of the Church of England has that power. ‘The people who are angry should sit down with Reverend Gough for a cup of tea,’ a spokesman said. He did not say whether that approach had met with success in any of the Army’s current theatres of war.

PRAY: With secularists now at war against the Church, the last thing we need is to be cut down by ‘friendly fire’. Pray that those intent on destroying the Christian foundations of our society will find no place in the Church and especially not in the Chaplaincy. Soldiers will not respect weak men who lack confidence in their beliefs. Pray that the Christian Faith will continue to underpin our armed forces.

The Advertising Standards Authority has ruled that the humanists behind the newly-launched bus advertisement which claims there is ‘probably no God’ can’t substantiate their claims.

The ad, the brainchild of comedy writer Ariane Sherine, says: ‘There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life’.

But Stephen Green, National Director of Christian Voice, and 325 others, complained to the Advertising Standards Authority. Many complaints said the ads were offensive. Stephen Green and others said the advertisements broke the ASA’s codes on substantiation and truthfulness.

The ASA website says: ‘Advertisements are not allowed to mislead consumers. This means that advertisers must hold evidence to prove the claims they make about their products or services before an ad appears.’

But in a ruling today, the ASA says the claim that there is probably no God is ‘not capable of objective substantiation’. It says further that the complaints were not ‘serious’ or ‘widespread’ enough.

Stephen Green said today:

‘If the ASA had thought the humanists could provide evidence for their claim, they would have asked them for it. As they know there is no evidence for the proposition that ‘there is probably no God’, they have let their secularist friends off the hook. ‘I debated this issue secularists five times in recent days, and despite repeated challenges, they could not once come up with anything to back up their claim that there is ‘probably no God’.

‘The ASA have finessed Code 7.1, which says a ad should not mislead or be likely to mislead, ruling it would not be likely to mislead, so avoiding the thornier question of whether it actually does mislead. Which it does.

‘On ‘taste and decency’, the ASA have simply taken a subjective decision to dismiss the complaints of offensiveness. On planet ASA, complaints from people of faith are not given the same weight as those from secularists. But what do you expect when the ASA Council is appointed and run by a campaigning homosexual, Chris, Lord, Smith of Finsbury?’

Last year the ASA ruled against Sandown Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster when the church published an advertisement ‘The Word of God against Sodomy’ against Belfast Gay Pride. That ad, decided the ASA, breached its code on decency (offensiveness) after receiving just 4 complaints. But they allowed that the ad was a legitimate expression of opinion when dismissing another part of the complaint.

Last week, it ruled against an advertorial Christian Voice placed in the New Statesman, after just one solitary complaint that a prediction that every Government initiative on teenage sexuality would increase teenage infertility could not be substantiated.

Stephen Green commented: ‘The ASA upholds or breaks its rules as it goes along. It all depends on who is being complained about. They get 326 complaints and decide the bus ads were not causing serious or widespread offence. They get a mere 4, and say Sandown’s ad was. They allow Sandown to express an opinion, but not Christian Voice. They excuse the secularists from the need to provide evidence for a categorical statement, claiming it is impossible to do, but they say Christian Voice needs hard evidence for a future prediction, which really is impossible.

‘We always knew the ASA was just another tool of the politically-correct secularist establishment, but here’s the proof. Their ruling is a good example of how the deck is stacked against Christians today, and the Church needs to wake up to the anti-Christian agenda right now. The good news is we now know that when the secularists decided to say: “There is probably no God”, they had no reason for making that absurd claim, and time has not helped them come up with one. The bad news is that if Christians don’t start standing up for their Faith and their Saviour soon, we shall see religious liberties trampled on, and the secularists will take us further down the road to their hell on earth.’

NOTES for Editors:

The CAP Code, which the ASA administers, says:

‘SUBSTANTIATION

‘3.1 Before distributing or submitting a marketing communication for publication, marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove all claims, whether direct or implied, that are capable of objective substantiation.

‘Relevant evidence should be sent without delay if requested by the ASA or CAP. The adequacy of evidence will be judged on whether it supports both the detailed claims and the overall impression created by the marketing communication.’

DECENCY

‘5.1 Marketing communications should contain nothing that is likely to cause serious or widespread offence. …’

‘TRUTHFULNESS

‘7.1 No marketing communication should mislead, or be likely to mislead, by inaccuracy, ambiguity, exaggeration, omission or otherwise.’

Richard Dawkins is so concerned that the atheist message is dying on its feet that he is to fund a humanist evangelistic campaign, Christian Voice has learned.

But in a twist which will have Christians in gales of laughter, the advertising campaign, which will be based on the catchy slogan ‘There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and get on with your life,’ is to be stuck on bendy-buses.

Apparently, an atheist blogger named Jon Worth came up with the idea, but his fellow humanists, not known for their generosity, wouldn’t stump up the cash. Now Richard Dawkins, whose anti-Christian zeal knows little bounds, is to finance the doomed venture.

Should the ads be placed on London ‘s Bendy-Buses, it would be a highly-appropriate move since these have proved to be a danger to the public and are due for the chop under new Mayor Boris Johnson.

Stephen Green, National Director of Christian Voice, said today:

‘How funny that Richard Dawkins is so scared of the threat which evangelical Christianity poses to atheism and his beloved Darwinism that he has to fund a campaign to attack God. He really is the nearest thing atheists have to an evangelist while his belief in non-belief is held with a fervour which many religious people would do well to emulate, so long as they don’t make themselves look as inept as he so often does, poor man.

‘I should be surprised if a quasi-religious advertising campaign like this did not attract graffiti. People don’t like being preached at. Sometimes it does them good, but they still don’t like it. The advertising space on a bendy-bus is just the right height as well. But the graffiti artists, and indeed the atheist advertisers will have to be quick or the bendy-buses will be off the road in Boris’s purge, taking the anti-God message with them. Bendy-buses, like atheism, are a danger to the public at large.

‘It occurs to me that the addition of just a few words from Psalm 14 would make the entire message Biblical: “The fool hath said in his heart …” ‘

Channel 4’s Dispatches editors are accused of demonising rather than trying to understand the Christian campaigners its reporter followed for almost two years, and of being less than joined-up in their approach to Islam.

The programme, made by David Modell, who has won awards in the past, featured various Christian activists including Stephen Green, National Director of Christian Voice.

Modell was given a great deal of hospitality by those taking part but never got further than the ‘these Christians are a bit scary’ level.

And Modell’s sycophantic acceptance of Islam and his castigation of Sam Solomon, an ex-Iman who was shown describing Islam as a religion of hate, and Stephen Green, who warned of civil strife if the demographics of Islam continued unabated, were in complete opposition to the approach taken in ‘Undercover Mosque’ , which has just been vindicated by the courts with a grovelling apology by West Midlands Police.

Stephen Green said today:

‘Maybe I could have reacted better outside the Brighton Dome almost two years ago, but it’s an intimidating situation when someone is stalking you like Modell does, refusing to take no for an answer, sticking a camera intrusively in your face the whole time without permission. And it wasn’t the initial incident which made me distrust Modell, it was his evident delight in another’s misfortune.

‘I gave Modell consent for the later interviews, but I am startled now both at his duplicity and his shallowness. He gradually worms his way in, and appears to be all understanding and obsequiously courteous, until he has all the material he wants. Then he turns unpleasant and stabs people in the back. His treatment of Sam Solomon, whom he filmed on the strict understanding that consent to transmission had not been given, then broke his word, not caring whether he was putting the man’s life in danger, was a case in point. Modell in my view is not a man to be trusted.

‘As for the depth of his understanding, it was a bit like filming birds picking up sticks in total bafflement about their behaviour, when lifting the camera to the sky would reveal they are building a nest.

‘Similarly, none of my concerns about the state of our nation, with disintegrating morality leading to rising crime, family breakdown being encouraged in the courts, the injustice of abortion, all of which I aired in the interviews, or any of our other social ills, made it to the edit. The twigs were shown, but the purpose for picking them up was deliberately ignored.

‘Modell found it worrying that I spoke of a looming civil war over the expansionist aims of Islam, and thought we were intolerant to be praying at the site of the proposed West Ham megamosque.

‘But only last week, another Dispatches programme, Undercover Mosque, was exonerated in the courts after West Midlands Police wrongly adopted the same politically-correct head-in-the-sand approach to Islam as Modell.

‘Undercover Mosque showed the all the evils of Islam and the hatred against Jews and Christians being taught in mosques. Tablighi Jamaat, the group behind the megamosque plans, is part of the jihadist Deobandi movement. The 7th July bombers, Richard Reid the shoebomber, and those involved in a plot to blow up airliners were all Tablighi Jamaat followers.

‘It is basic Christian theology that Jesus Christ was the Son of God, was crucified to forgive us our sins, was dead and buried, rose again on the third day, and ascended into heaven. And it is simple logic that if Islam denies all that, which it does, that Islam is a false religion and that its deity is antichrist. Surely that could not have been too hard for someone of David Modell’s intelligence to comprehend.

‘The words of the prophet Isaiah are uncannily appropriate: ‘Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed.’ (Isa. 6:10)

‘it is rather sad that with all the time Modell spent and the access he was granted, he never managed to understand what any of us were about, or display any reaction above the knee-jerk ‘dangerous Christians’ level. What a pity to miss an opportunity like that, and sad for him as well to miss a golden opportunity to find salvation and forgiveness for his sins in his rush to make money.

‘But what a peculiar editorial policy applies in Dispatches, where militant Islam in all its horror can be exposed one moment, then its peaceful Christian opponents are castigated the next.’

ENDS