The Archbishop and Shari'a

So Archbishop Rowan Williams has been completely mauled in the press in the last week and a half. It certainly hasn't been pretty to watch, and I found my blood boiling during last week's edition of the BBC's The Big Questions. Some of the so-called 'experts' were completely rude, vile, hateful and even made fools of themselves in some cases. One of them (I believe he was from the centre for social cohesion) turned into an incoherent throbbing tomato when talking to the Sheikh regarding the issue. Now I'm not saying that the Sheikh was completely right either. I think the best way to do this would be to write my opinions on the matter, so here goes:

I think that Muslims should be given the option to practice certain aspects of Shari'a law if they so desire, if, and only if, this is carried out in the correct framework of human rights and national law. The scare stories of the tabloids about women being flogged for being alone in male company are in fact irrelevant to the issue. Yes, this is an aspect of Shari'a practiced in some countries, but it would not form a part of any official implementation of Shari'a. The two main aspects which would be covered would be to do with finance and divorce.

I'll start with the latter, and I would urge anyone interested in this to watch a documentary available on 4 OD called Divorce: Shari'a Style which shows how it is currently practiced. Basically, for men an Islamic divorce entails the 'triple talaq', where a man has to say talaq to his wife on three separate occassions in order to dissolve the marriage in religious terms. For women, it is slightly more complicated, in that they need to convince a religious elder to grant the dissolution of the marriage in religious terms. However, this is for the religious aspect of the divorce, to be fully legally binding under British law a civil divorce which goes through the courts must also occur. Some Muslims feel that a) they will get 'divorced' quicker through a Shari'a court or b) they want to make peace with their divorce and their religion.

Secondly, finance. The issues relating this are derived from the prohibition of usury in Islam, so things like mortgages become a bit difficult. The solutions have been in place in some High Street banks for a while, so that isn't really a big issue.

If those two issues do form part of the law (although in a way they already do!) then I for one have my voice counted as among those supporting the move.

However, we do need to safeguard against some of the more extremist positions of certain people, such as that of the Sheikh on The Big Questions that theives should have their hands cut off. Not only do I find it inhumane to mutilate a person in such a way, but I disagree with his argument that it will act as a deterrent. Has he not looked at the murder statistics in American states which implement the death penalty?!





Oh, and a final word completely unrelated to the above - congratulations to Miss Samantha Davies Dip Mus T. I shall call her Miss T from now on and lavish tasteless gold chains upon her, as well as encouraging the mohican look. ;)


Over and out. :)

The Future, Plans, Life and Death

Geez maleez. I'm half way through my second semester of second year, meaning that I'm just about halfway through uni! Which is a bit scary, because it'll mean that I will be joining the real world. Thinking about post-uni, mortgages, learning to drive, getting a job, where I'll live.

So given my reflective mood, I've been doing a wee bit of research into post-grad courses (like I said I ain't ready to join the real world, and I don't think the real world is ready for it's injection of Gemma either). So I had a bit of a look at PGDE courses at the Universities of Edinburgh and Aberdeen.

I know that the inclusion of Aberdeen will come as a bit of a shock to a few of you, it's even a shock to me if I'm honest. But, this seems to be a sign of adulthood creeping into my life because my reasoning behind this has to do with - mortgages. Oh yes. My choices are:

1) Go to Edinburgh and live in expensive rented flat
2) Go to Aberdeen and live in not-quite-so-expensive-but-still-rather-expensive flat
3) Go to Aberdeen and live at (I really don't want to say it!) home.

Option numero trois gives me the chance to save up a wee bit of money so that I can lay down a deposit on a house when I get onto the property ladder. Given the current mini-recession I'm hoping that house prices will fall so that come 2011/2012 houses will be reasonably affordable and I can get a decent house. (Argh I'm scaring myself!)

I'm trying not to think too much about that side of it at the moment because it's still a long way away, but I'm thinking that I can start thinking about what I'm going to do for access to PGDE soon. I'm going to try writing to a few secondary schools in Edinburgh after summer enquiring as to whether they'd be happy if I helped out in some of their RE classes so that I can have the school experience required to gain entry. From there I can apply and hopefully one of them will accept me and I can go from there!

Anyhoo before then I've got to get through honours years (which I must admit to being quite excited about!) and of courses the dreaded dissertation. However, I may have an idea as to what I'm going to write about. It was a dark day in the misty streets of Edinburgh.......

Only kidding! Basically I was doing a wee bit of reading for my theology assignment on the crucifixion when I came across a chapter of our 1st year theology text book entitled: The Violence of the Cross, which got me thinking. I quite like the idea of perhaps writing my dissertation on violence and religion - 2 very rich and emotive subjects which could be very interesting. Of course I'll probably change my mind in a week or so but for now it is currently exciting me!

Oh and I'm also rather excited by the fact I didn't fail any classes, in fact getting BBB which was my target for the semester. Now I'm going to try to up it to ABB so that I can push myself. :)

Of course this week hasn't all been fabulous, given that it was the first anniversary of Gran's death on Monday. :( I'm glad that day is over, as it was just horrific.