News and Opinion

A common theme can be detected in a number of recent headline stories. The willingness of people to lie to protect or promote the causes with which they are identified, disregarding the over-riding categorical imperative of the objective truth. There is also a welcome trend, exemplified by the Office of National Statistics, the Royal Society, and Richard Dawkins, for the guardians of truth to begin biting back at the purveyors of untruth and unreason. Let us hope that this is not just a few isolated instances but the start of a sustained campaign. We are familiar with the spin put on things by politicians. Tony Blair (known to many as Bliar for his far worse past porkies) jumped the gun on the employment statistics. He forecast that the figures would show a 'very welcome' fall in the number of people claiming unemployment benefit. The figures, showed that unemployment rose to 1.7 million in three months. He was properly slapped down by his own statisticians. His counterpart in

The day after our Open Day, 11th September, was of course the fifth anniversary of the hijacking of the planes that were flown into the World Trade Center 'twin towers'. This anniversary was marked in Leicester, rather oddly, by a cricket match played between the local Clergy and Imams. As reported in the Leicester Mercury , the Imams won. The Bishop of Leicester, the Rt Rev Tim Stevens, who was seventh into bat for the clergy said: "The great thing is that this game of cricket is building friendships. It's so important to understanding between the faiths." From which it would seem that the secular pursuit of cricket has a unifying ability that helps to counter the divisiveness of religions. There are some indeed, like Mohammad Ali Syed who see cricket as a form of religion. Another writer who has faith in cricket says: "To my mind, the beauty of cricket was that it was its own religion." Another commentator, in troutmag sagely observes: "It is

Allan Hayes has had the following article about Secular Hall published in the Leicester Mercury on 5th September. This year is the 155th anniversary of a Leicester organisation that has done perhaps more than any other in the city to create a society in which all can live together as full members without discrimination by race, belief or social status. Without its work and that of similar groups across the country, we would today be a less tolerant society, less welcoming of newcomers and less able to live together as equals. When Leicester Secular Society was founded in 1851, few men - and no women - had the vote. Those who did not belong to the established church suffered serious discrimination, people were sent to prison for criticising Christianity, elected MPs could not take their seats without swearing a religious oath, tithes still had to be paid to the church and contraception was not openly available. The society fought to address these inequities, and, on the whole, succeede