A selection of the week's happenings to aid your prayers.

Society & Politics

• Corbyn refuses to apologise for anti-Semitism: In an interview with Andrew Neil, Corbyn avoided repeated requests to make a formal apology to Jewish people over Labour's anti-Semitism scandal. Read more here.
  
• Anti-RSE school protests banned: Parental protests against compulsory LGBTQ+ primary education have been permanently banned by the High Court in Birmingham. Read more here. Also this week, faith leaders have published an open letter in the Church of England Newspaper calling on the Government to postpone the roll-out of the new curriculum (due in 2020), while the CofE has published a new ‘faith-sensitive’ advisory document to support schools on this issue.
  
• Newsnight exposes transgender regret: The BBC programme featured several testimonies from people who have tried to change their gender and later regretted it and sought to reverse the process. Read more here.
  
• Universities union says you can self-identity race: The University and Colleges Union’s new position statement on the matter says that people can ‘identify’ as any ethnicity they choose. Read more here. Also this week, Cardiff University Students’ Union has officially adopted a pro-choice stance on abortion, with the debate dismissing pro-life views as “equivalent to racism”. Read more here.

Church Issues

• Anglicans plea for CofE to protect unborn: Hundreds of clergy and laity have signed an open letter in The Times pleading for Anglican leadership to take a stand against the further liberalisation of Britain’s abortion laws being called for by Labour and the Lib Dems. Read more here. Also this week, 80 election candidates have signed Right to Life’s ‘Both Lives’ pledge. Read more here.
  
• Requests for Bibles follow floods: Fishlake, the Yorkshire village recently engulfed by flood chaos, has put out a request for a dozen Bibles in response to the needs of the parish church, which has proved a lifeline to many families requiring temporary shelter. Local Gideons have been happy to respond.
  
• Handmade exhibition raises awareness of persecution: A 16,000-strong petition of written, painted and embroidered names along with portraits and testimonies of persecuted Christian women have been exhibited at Westminster Abbey to raise awareness about Christian persecution, thanks to charity Open Doors. Read more here.

Israel & Middle East

• Lebanese and Iraqis turn on Iran: Increasingly bloody popular protests in both countries against corruption, oppression and economic problems are now including open criticism of Iranian influence. On Wednesday of this week Iraqi demonstrators burned down the Iranian consulate in Najaf, southern Iraq, while Lebanese Christians in Beirut have bravely been chanting "This is Lebanon, not Iran”.
• Netanyahu agrees to leadership contest: Following the Attorney-General’s decision to press three sets of criminal charges, the embattled Prime Minister is facing pressure to resign. He has agreed to hold an internal party leadership contest in the next six weeks. Read more here.

Recommended Sources

At Prophecy Today UK we are aware that the world is moving very quickly and it is difficult to keep up with all the latest developments – especially when the material circulated by our mainstream media is increasingly far from reality and definitely not devoted to a biblical perspective!Though we are not a news service, we want to help keep you informed by passing on updates and reports as we are led. This will be a selective, not an exhaustive, round-up, which we hope will be helpful for your prayers. Click here to browse our News archive.We recommend the following news services for regular updates from a Christian perspective: