The BBC has provoked a backlash by asking whether it was “appropriate” for an MP to wear her ashes at a House of Commons select committee hearing.
A post on the BBC Politics Facebook page asked: “Was it appropriate for this MP to go to work with a cross on her head?”
The Rt Reverend Pete Broadbent, the acting Anglican Bishop of London, tweeted:
“Is it appropriate for people working for @bbcpolitics to be so ignorant about the Christian faith that has shaped this country?”
Ann Widdecombe told the Mail on Sunday that the post reflected a “dismissive” attitude towards Christianity.
Carol Monaghan, a convert to Catholicism and MP for Glasgow North West, told the BBC:“When I came into committee, one of the members asked me about it. I said ‘It’s Ash Wednesday,’ and they said ‘But this is going to be broadcast.’
“I think they just thought I didn’t want to be embarrassed – but I was not going to rub it off,” she said.
Before becoming an SNP MP in 2015, Ms Monaghan was a physics teacher. She said she was therefore used to people asking about the ashes.“I am happy to answer their questions. For me it is an educational opportunity,” she said.
Ms Monaghan told the Catholic Herald: “I’m not surprised people are unaware of the meaning of the ashes. Many Christians practise their faith privately and therefore non-religious people will have limited experience of ashes, Lent or seasons of the Church.
“It is always amusing to me, however, that the secular world is aware of ‘Pancake Tuesday’ but not Ash Wednesday.”
Marie Stopes abortions ‘approved in 22 seconds’
Britain’s second-largest abortion provider is approving terminations based on a brief conversation with call centre workers, a Daily Mail investigation has claimed.An undercover reporter phoned Marie Stopes and asked for an abortion, saying: “I just don’t want to have the baby.” The call centre worker replied: “That will come under ‘emotional reasons’.” The exchange took 22 seconds.
The law says that two doctors can approve an abortion if “the continuance of the pregnancy would involve risk, greater than if the pregnancy were terminated, of injury to the physical or mental health of the pregnant woman or any existing children of her family”. But doctors are not required to meet the woman personally.
Paul McPartlan of Marie Stopes UK said the Mail gave a “partial” view, as “no reporter went through the legal admission process that women must go through”.
Two pro-life groups, the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children and Life Charity, have launched a joint petition to have Marie Stopes’s UK licence to perform abortions removed.
