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An Anglican priest’s support of the Secular Education Network’s campaign to stop the Bible in Schools programme has prompted New Zealand’s two Anglican Archbishops to reaffirm their Church’s support of the Churches Education Commission’s Bible in Schools programme.
In an interview on Television One, the Reverend Clay Nelson, an associate priest at St Matthews in the City in Auckland, said the Bible in Schools programme is an imposition on the human rights of children as it restricts the freedom of other religions which is protected under the Bill of Rights.
The Archbishops say the Anglican Church in New Zealand has long supported the Churches Education Commission’ Bible in Schools programme, both financially and in principle, and will continue to do so.
Their stament concludes:
“This is long-standing agreement which honours the freedom of choice we enjoy in this country, as well as the right of parents to influence their children’s spiritual and moral development.
We honour the work of the hundreds of volunteers who continue, in a loving, sensitive and non-manipulative way, to offer access, when asked, to this heritage in our schools”
The Reverend Clay Nelson is an Anglican priest trained and ordained in the U.S. He emigrated to Aotearoa New Zealand in August 2005. Shortly after arriving he began his ministry at St Matthew’s using his background in communications and web development to develop an “online virtual church.”
In a lecture ” The Value of a Secular Society” presented to the New Zealand Association of Humanists and Rationalists, he describes himself as a non theist. He says faith is “about ethical living rooted in finding our better self in higher purpose”
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News category: New Zealand.
