BHA

The Pod Delusion reports that Anthony Grayling has said that he won't take up the presidency of the BHA on July 1st because of the controversy surrounding plans for his £18,000 a year New College of the Humanities. Current BHA President Polly Toynbee will stay on until she can be replaced.

The British Humanist Association reports that £2 million towards the cost of the Pope's visit to the UK last year came from the Department for International Development (DfID), justified as a recognition of "the Catholic Church's role as a major provider of health and education services in developing countries". The BHA has dismissed this as "irrational and wrong".

BHA Chief Executive Andrew Copson was interviewed on BBC News about the amendment to the Children, Schools and Families Bill (see previous posts), before it was debated. Sadly, the Commons voted for Ed Balls' amendement.

Video courtesy of the BHA

BHA President Polly Toynbee has been cited in the official Iranian media as "One of the great conspirators who wants to overthrow the Islamic regime," according to a contributor to the BBC's Dateline London yesterday.

Polly said this is probably because of her presidency of the BHA, "... and we tend to attack all religions."

You have 6 days to see the programme using BBC i-Player.

Apparently, we've won an award from the British Humanist Association for The Best Group Website, with a certificate and everything! Hooray! Denis Johnston, our secretary, collected it at yesterday's Groups Annual Meeting (GRAM) in London. Thank you Denis.

No acceptance speech from me, but a big thank you to our webmaster, my son Nathan Nelson, who keeps the technical show on the web, as it were.

The BHA now has its own YouTube channel. The latest video is of Daniel Dennett at Conway Hall, providing "A Darwinian Perspective on Religions: Past, Present and Future".

From the Independent:

Religious broadcasting has taken an unexpected turn at the BBC, leaving secularists last night claiming a breakthrough. An important new committee that the corporation will consult on religious broadcasting is to include a humanist.

Read more about it on the BHA website. The humanist who’ll sit on the Standing Conference on Religion and Belief will be Andrew Copson, the BHA’s Director of Education & Public Affairs.