News Briefing: From Britain and Ireland

Dr Anna Rowlands (left) has been appointed St Hilda Associate Professor of Catholic Social Thought and Practice at Durham University. She is currently deputy director of Durham’s Centre for Catholic Studies. Benefactors from the UK, Europe and the US contributed to the £2 million needed to endow the Chair.
Letters of support were offered by Cardinal Peter Turkson, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace; Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster, and Most Revd Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury.
A political theologian and expert on Catholic Social Teaching, Dr Rowlands has worked on theology and migration for over a decade. She is currently researching forced displacement in the Middle East and working on an immigration project with the Jesuit Refugee Service. Her department’s brief is to produce fresh research and understanding to contribute to the constructive development of the Catholic Social Teaching tradition. She said: “The questions addressed by the Catholic social tradition – questions of the common good and human dignity – are pressing and urgent for us in local, national and international contexts and the task of the Hilda Chair is to contribute to exploring these questions.”


More help for refugees The UK’s resettlement programme for Syrian refugees is to be expanded to include other nationalities caught up in the conflict in the Middle East, the Home Secretary, Amber Rudd, has announced. Under the current plan, up to 20,000 vulnerable people are to be brought to Britain by 2020.
The decision means other groups such as Kurdish, Iraqi and Palestinian minorities who sought refuge in Syria, but since had to flee, may now be eligible to come to the UK. It follows advice from the UNHCR, the UN refugee agency. Welcoming the change the Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Vincent Nichols, said: “The Catholic community has been calling for our resettlement programme to be made accessible to the most vulnerable refugees whatever their background.”
Up to 7,000 Syrian refugees have been brought to Britain under the scheme so far.


The National Office for Vocation in England and Wales has launched the new season for vocation discernment to the Religious life. Young people considering a vocation to be a nun, monk, sister, priest or brother can join a “Compass” group in October. The programme runs over five residential weekends and Easter, ending in May 2018. More information can be found at compass-points.org.uk


Row over bullying tweet The director of the Scottish Catholic Parliamentary Office has forwarded a copy of the Church’s anti-bullying strategy to Kezia Dugdale, following a tweet in which the Scottish Labour leader suggested that Catholic schools did not promote “inclusiveness”.
Ms Dugdale was responding to a story that a 16-year-old pupil at St Kentigern’s Academy in Blackburn, West Lothian, had been asked to remove a badge on the grounds that it promoted homosexually.
In a message to Ms Dugdale, parliamentary officer Anthony Horan said: “Catholic schools challenge discrimination and bullying on any grounds.” He pointed out to the Scottish Labour leader that the Scottish Catholic Education Service had recently hosted a training day on all characteristics protected by the Equality Act 2010. He also drew attention to a meeting held in March 2017 for Labour MSPs on work being done to address bullying in Catholic schools. Unfortunately, said Mr Horan, the session was attended “by only four of your colleagues, despite an invite being sent to all MSPs in the Labour group”.
West Lothian Education Authority said that the rainbow badge worn by the pupil following a Pride day on 17 June was in contravention of rules on non-school badges. The council denied the pupil’s claim that he was told to remove the badge because it promoted a gay lifestyle, a denial confirmed by the Scottish Catholic Church.


The UK Government has announced that it will fund NHS abortions for Northern Ireland women in Britain. The announcement came as 50 MPs from across parties backed a call for women to have abortions free of charge in Britain.