New Bishop for North Africa
THE new Assistant Bishop for North Africa, Dr Sam Fawzy Shehata, who succeeds Dr Bill Musk, was consecrated last month. He has a doctorate in theology from the University of Wales, and had been Dean of St Mark’s Pro-Cathedral, Alexandria, since 2013, where work to bring together Muslim and Christian young people has been under way (News, 16 December).
American Primate visits China
THE Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States, the Most Revd Michael Curry, was in China last month during a visit to Anglican Churches in Asia. He was invited by the China Christian Council and the Three-Self Patriotic Movement, and met the Minister for Religious Affairs during his visit. “Americans remember Christians smuggling Bibles into China and behind the Iron Curtain in Eastern Europe,” he said, ENS reported. “Now they’re printing more Bibles in China than probably anywhere else in the world.”
North Korean refugees discussed in Lords
THE Bishop of Peterborough, the Rt Revd Donald Allister, has challenged the Government to talk to China about its apparent policy of sending refugees from North Korea back to their country, “where they face execution or incarceration in camps”. During the debate in the House of Lords, the Foreign Minister, Baroness Anelay, said that this had been raised on “numerous occasions”. The Chinese government believed that those who fled were “economic migrants”.
Only deport ‘nefarious’ says Hispanic leader
HALF of Hispanic Christians in the United States now worry about deportation for themselves, a family member, or friend, suggests Pew Research Center data provided to Christianity Today. The survey of 1001 Hispanic adults, conducted in December and January, before President Trump’s inauguration, found that Hispanic Roman Catholics (54 per cent) and Protestants (47 per cent) were more likely than the unaffiliated (38 per cent) to say they worried “a lot” or “some” about the threat of deportation. Since the inauguration, the US Department of Homeland Security has issued new immigration-enforcement policies that widen the pool of unauthorised immigrants prioritised for deportation, including those charged with a crime but not convicted. Samuel Rodriguez, one of President Trump’s Evangelical advisers, and President of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, called on the Government to “enact and fulfil the promise President Trump made not to harm families and exclusively deport those involved in nefarious activities”.